It’s been reported that, despite having a one-month negotiating period and what seemed like a desire by both sides to get something done quickly, the Mike Ilitch purchase of the Detroit Pistons fell through for some reason.
Well, Mike Ozanian from Forbes.com has a possible reason:
"What happened? According to one person familiar with the negotiations, after agreeing to a price in excess of $400 million (my source was not more specific), Ilitch discovered the revenues presented in the prospectus were inflated. Ilitch, one of the great gentleman owners in sports, got pissed, lowered his offer price and the deal quickly blew up. I hope to find out more about the actual price in the near future. But from what I am hearing it will now be hard for Davidson to get $400 million for the team given the Ilitch debacle and dismal state of Detroit’s economy."
(Hat tip: The Detroit News, which unlike PistonPowered, had the good taste to edit ‘pissed’ out of that quote).