Time Warner agreed to sell Major League Baseball’s Atlanta Braves to John Malone’s Liberty Media, according to several published reports.
In exchange for Liberty returning about $1 billion in Time Warner stock to Time Warner, Liberty will pick up the Braves, several craft magazines and $1 billion in cash, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and The Wall Street Journal reported Monday night.
The deal, which has been rumored for several months, raises the prospect that former Time Warner vice chairman and former Braves owner Ted Turner could once again take an operating role at the team, which he first purchased in 1976.
“We love Ted. If he’s interested, we’d love to involve him. For nothing else, he’s great at a party,” Liberty chairman John Malone said in May, when the deal was first discussed publicly.
Time Warner took ownership of the Braves in 1996, when it acquired Turner Broadcasting System from Ted Turner.
