Who owns the Los Angeles Dodgers? Mark Richard Walter, explained

Mark Richard Walter is the principal owner and controlling person of the Los Angeles Dodgers, running the club through Guggenheim Baseball Management LLC since 2012. Walter is the CEO of Guggenheim Partners, an asset management firm, and has built one of the largest private sports empires in the United States in the past two years. The Dodgers are the second-most valuable franchise in Major League Baseball and the only one of six West Coast teams to operate and profit from their own regional sports network.

🏟️ Ownership at a glance

Principal owner	Mark Richard Walter
Controlling group	Guggenheim Baseball Management LLC
Current group since	2012
Purchase price	$2.15B
Latest valuation	$7.8B
Owner’s net worth	$7.3B
Value multiple	3.6× the purchase price

Who is Mark Richard Walter

Walter was born on May 22, 1960, in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, the son of a concrete block plant worker. He earned a business and accounting degree from Creighton University in 1982 and a law degree from Northwestern in 1985. His fortune did not come from sports. In 1996, he cofounded Liberty Hampshire; in 1999, he helped create Guggenheim Partners alongside heir Peter Lawson-Johnson II. Today, as CEO, he oversees more than $300 billion in assets under management across private credit, insurance, and asset management. In May 2024, Walter cofounded TWG Global, the vehicle through which he has assembled his sports portfolio. He is married to Kimbra, also an attorney, and lives in Chicago.

Walter’s entry into baseball ownership came as part of a group that acquired the Dodgers in 2012 after the team emerged from Chapter 11 bankruptcy. His partners in that initial purchase included Magic Johnson, who invested $50 million for approximately 2.3% of the club; Stan Kasten, who became president and CEO; Peter Guber; Todd Boehly; and Bobby Patton. Billie Jean King and Ilana Kloss joined in 2018. Alan Smolinisky and Robert L. Plummer entered in September 2019, purchasing the stakes of Magic Johnson and others.

How they bought the team

Guggenheim Baseball Management paid $2.15 billion for the Dodgers in 2012, acquiring a franchise that had passed through several hands over six decades. Walter O’Malley held majority control in 1950. Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation and Fox Entertainment Group bought the team in 1998 for $350 million. Frank McCourt purchased it in 2004 for $430 million but ran it into Chapter 11 bankruptcy by 2011. The 2012 acquisition by Walter’s group marked the beginning of sustained investment and payroll expansion that would define the franchise for the next 14 years.

The Dodgers are now valued at $7.8 billion as of March 2026, according to Forbes, making them the second-most valuable team in baseball—a gain of 15% in one year. The franchise has grown 3.6 times its nominal purchase price. An alternative valuation by Sportico placed the club above $9 billion in 2026, reflecting the wide range of methodologies used to assess sports franchises.

Year	Buyer	Amount
1950	Walter O’Malley (majority control)	—
1998	News Corporation / Fox Entertainment Group (Rupert Murdoch)	$350M
2004	Frank McCourt	$430M
2011	Bankruptcy (Chapter 11)	—
2012	Guggenheim Baseball Management (Mark Walter, Magic Johnson, Stan Kasten, Peter Guber, Todd Boehly, Bobby Patton)	$2.15B

What else they own

Walter controls far more than baseball. Guggenheim Partners, which he leads as CEO, manages over $300 billion in assets. Through TWG Global, which he cofounded and cochairs (holding 21% ownership), he has assembled stakes in professional sports across multiple leagues and continents. In June 2025, he acquired control of the Los Angeles Lakers with a valuation of $10 billion, approved by the NBA in October 2025. On August 12, 2026, it was reported that he is selling the Lakers to Josh Kushner and Bob Iger for more than $12 billion, a record price for any sports franchise. He has owned the Los Angeles Sparks of the WNBA since 2014 and is the sole owner of the Professional Women’s Hockey League, launched in 2024. He holds 12.7% of BlueCo, the holding company that controls Chelsea FC and Strasbourg. In motorsports, TWG owns the Cadillac F1 Team, which debuts in Formula 1 in 2026, plus Andretti Global, Spire Motorsports in NASCAR, Wayne Taylor Racing in IMSA, and Walkinshaw TWG Racing. He also holds stakes in Beyond Meat and Carvana, and owns a wildlife reserve in Florida.

Where the games air

SportsNet LA remains the Dodgers’ local home in 2026, broadcasting approximately 145 of 162 games under a 25-year, $8.35 billion contract signed in 2013—the most expensive local television deal in baseball history. A six-year distribution blackout that kept millions of Southern California households from watching the team ended in 2020 when Charter licensed the signal to AT&T and DirecTV. In 2026, games are available on Spectrum, DirecTV, DirecTV Stream, Fubo, and the direct-to-consumer platform SNLA+. Unlike the Padres, Diamondbacks, Rockies, and Nationals, the Dodgers are not part of MLB’s national local media package and remain the only one of these six teams to operate and profit from their own regional sports network.

Facts worth knowing

The Dodgers paid a luxury tax of $169,400,000 in 2025, the highest in MLB history, on a payroll of $417,300,000. The previous record was also theirs: $103,000,000 in 2024. Under Guggenheim they have paid the tax 10 times in 13 seasons, for a cumulative total of $506,600,000.
In 2026 they opened with a luxury tax payroll of $410,800,000, but only disbursed $261,700,000 in cash this year: a difference of $149,100,000 in deferred salaries from ten players.
Shohei Ohtani’s contract is the jewel of that engineering: $700,000,000 over 10 years, of which $680,000,000 is deferred. He receives only $2,000,000 per year through 2033 and will receive $68,000,000 annually between 2034 and 2043. For luxury tax purposes the contract is worth approximately $460,000,000 and counts approximately $46,000,000 per year.
Frank McCourt was involved in the most expensive divorce in the history of American sports: in October 2011 he agreed to pay Jamie McCourt approximately $131,000,000 for her to renounce all claims to the team. Months later he sold the club and came away with a fortune; she attempted to reopen the agreement in 2013 claiming she had been deceived about the real value, and lost.
McCourt never fully left: he retained economic interest in the land around the stadium and the Dodgers pay him approximately $14,000,000 per year to lease the parking lots at Dodger Stadium.
In July 2026 it became public that a federal grand jury issued subpoenas in February 2026 against Guggenheim Partners and two of Walter’s insurance companies (Delaware Life and Clear Spring Life), investigating whether they concealed that billions in private credit were being channeled to other businesses of Walter himself. TWG said it cooperates with the investigation.
A group of South Korean investors negotiated in 2015 to buy 20% of the Dodgers for approximately $370,000,000. The deal never went through.

Where they stand among the 30 owners

List	Rank
By franchise value	#2 de 30
By purchase price	#3 de 27
By owner’s net worth	#5 de 21
By years in charge	#23 de 30

Amounts are nominal and not adjusted for inflation: comparing a decades-old purchase price with today’s valuation overstates the real gain.

Walter stands third among the 30 owners in the nominal cost of acquisition and 23rd in tenure at the helm—a relatively recent arrival who has already reshaped the franchise’s spending power and competitive ambition. The Dodgers’ $7.8 billion valuation places them second in baseball, behind only the Yankees. The club has paid the luxury tax in 10 of Walter’s 14 seasons, accumulating $506.6 million in penalties, including a record $169.4 million in 2025 alone on a payroll of $417.3 million. This spending pattern, enabled by Walter’s wealth and his firm’s financial engineering—most visibly through Shohei Ohtani‘s $700 million contract, 97% of which is deferred—reflects an owner willing to absorb historic penalties in pursuit of championships.