The sale of the Utah Jazz marks the end of an era. Larry Miller — and by extension, the Miller family — were the Utah Jazz. You could not think of one without the other. Miller was in the middle of an amazing array of projects — car dealerships, a race track, movie theaters, art and historical works, philanthropy — but they were overshadowed by his ownership of the Jazz.
I sat across the table from Larry Miller in his home for seven months in 2008 while we discussed his life for his biography, “Driven.” I assure you he was completely sincere when he said, sometimes with tears in his eyes, that he bought the Jazz to keep them in Utah because he loved his native state; it was his gift to Utah, he liked to say. He felt it was his duty to keep the Jazz in the state, and he believed he had the savvy to make it work when absolutely no one else dared.
He was convinced the team was important to the economy and would become a rallying point for Utah, all of which certainly came to pass. When the Jazz reached the NBA Finals twice at the end of the ’90s, the state came to a standstill. Even criminals took the night off.
Miller wasn’t even a basketball fan when he bought the team, and it would’ve been laughable at the time to say the purchase of the Jazz was to make money. The franchise had experienced severe financial problems. When the team moved to Utah in 1979, it had lost $17 million in 11 years. Even in its best year, the Jazz had lost $1 million.
Miller risked everything financially, paying $8 million to buy the first half of the Jazz in 1985 when his net worth was less than half of that. In doing so, he prevented the team from being moved to Miami. A year later he was about to sign a contract to sell his half of the team, but after 15 seconds or so he put the pen down and said he couldn’t do it.
He not only passed up an offer that would have enabled him to pay off his debt and make a $6 million profit, he spent another $14 million for the other half of the team. That prevented the franchise from moving to Minneapolis. In subsequent years he refused countless offers from other out-of-state buyers that would have both relieved him of immense debt and provided a big profit.
“Selling the Jazz,“ he once said, “would be like selling Canyonlands.”
But Miller told his wife Gail before he passed that it was her decision, that he trusted her to do as she thought best. After Larry passed away, Gail and her family created a trust that would ensure the team would stay in Utah. Nothing about the sale has changed that. The new owner, Ryan Smith, has passed up several opportunities to buy other NBA franchises because he lives in Utah and because he wanted to buy the Jazz. He has assured the Millers they will remain in Utah.
I think this is what would have happened if Miller had been there for Wednesday’s announcement of the team sale. First, he would have cried his way through the press conference and then the businessman and Utah benefactor in Miller would have turned to Gail and said, “Nice going.”
I think this is what would have happened if Miller had been there for Wednesday’s announcement of the team sale. First, he would have cried his way through the press conference and then the businessman and Utah benefactor in Miller would have turned to Gail and said, “Nice going.”
She not only kept the Jazz in the state by selling to a Utahn and loyal Jazz sponsor, but she did so at a staggering profit. If Yahoo’s reported sale price of $1.66 billion is correct, then she turned a profit of approximately $1.545 billion from Larry’s original $115 million investment for the Jazz and the arena construction (plus whatever he paid for the other sports entities that are included in the sale). That profit will be used to fund philanthropic efforts and new business ventures, the Deseret News has learned.
Miller might even have been impressed that the family held onto the team for 11 years after he was gone, enduring all the headaches that entailed — the messy departure of Jerry Sloan; the trading away of the team’s best player, Deron Williams; the exhausting failed pursuit of the team’s next franchise piece, Gordon Hayward; the failure to make the playoffs in five of the six years after his death; the upheaval over the national anthem; the resignation of his son Greg as CEO. And through it all Gail oversaw the team as owner and chairman of the board for the Jazz’s parent company, along with being swamped with speaking requests and myriad other business and philanthropic undertakings.
It’s tempting to imagine how Larry Miller would have navigated all of these things. There’s never been, before or since, an owner quite like him. He had his own locker in the team locker room. He stuffed himself into a uniform and went onto the court before games to bump and body up his players in warmups. He stormed into the locker room occasionally to scold the team for lack of effort, something he wouldn’t tolerate anywhere in his life. He got into that embarrassing fight with the Denver Nuggets fan. He got into periodic tiffs with the mercurial Karl Malone as if they were some old married couple, only to patch things up a day or two later. He drew the line on attending games on Sunday, but for the big ones he might show up late in the game and pace around outside the arena.
Some of us might miss that kind of passion and scrappiness as the league turns more corporate and political. He brought all that to bear on the Jazz. The Jazz began as an NBA franchise with nine consecutive losing seasons from 1974-75 to 1982-83. Under Miller’s ownership, beginning with the 1985-86 season, the Jazz were the second winningest team in the NBA during the next 30 years, winning 50 or more games 16 times and nine division titles, as well as advancing to the NBA Finals twice.
Now the Millers, after 35 years of ownership, are stepping aside and moving on from the team. It’s the end of a golden era.