NFL succession: Billionaire families’ tax concerns bring private equity plan

Moved indoors because of a blizzard, the game, a precursor to the annual championship now known as the Super Bowl, was played in front of about 11,000 people on a 60-yard field using dirt and manure left over from a traveling circus. One punt hit the stadium’s organist. Two years later, a radio station owner paid $7,952.08 (about $180,000 in today’s dollars) to buy the Spartans and move them to Detroit, where they now play as the Lions.

Now, the 101-year-old McCaskey owns the Bears. Before his death in 1983, her dad came up with a plan to pass the team to McCaskey, his only living child, without saddling her with a heavy tax burden. Halas divided the 49.35% of the Bears he owned into equal shares for his 13 grandchildren using a set of trusts. Voting power over those shares went to McCaskey, who already owned close to 20% of the team. McCaskey has since raised 11 children, with 21 grandchildren, 35 great-grandchildren and four great-great-grandchildren.

The Bears are part of a towering US media colossus. The National Football League was responsible for 93 of the 100 most-watched TV broadcasts last year, and brought in nearly $20 billion in revenue. McCaskey’s team alone is worth $6 billion, according to the latest estimates by sports-business media outlet Sportico, and across the league average franchise valuations rose 69% between 2020 and 2023. 

That growth has helped make NFL team owners rich. But it has also created succession-planning challenges in a league that venerates family and tradition — and could force the doors open for investors driven by financial imperatives.

In September,…