Tunisian tennis player ONS JABEUR has joined NWSL club N.C. Courage as a minority owner. Jabeur becomes the second pro tennis player to invest in the club alongside fellow tennis player NAOMI OSAKA, who joined the club in 2021 (Courage).
FOR A GOOD CAUSE: Basketball HOFer SHAQUILLE O’NEAL has signed artists JOHN LEGEND and JENNIFER HUDSON for his annual charity show, “The Event,” which is set for Oct. 7 at MGM Grand Garden. The show will benefit The Shaquille O’Neal Foundation. In just two shows, “The Event” has raised more than $6M (LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL, 8/28)....In the name of children’s cancer research, over 60 celebrities and athletes gathered at Detroit Golf Club on Monday for a round of golf to benefit Children’s Miracle Network at Beaumont Children's and the MARK WAHLBERG Youth Foundation. Michigan State men’s basketball coach TOM IZZO was among the competitors (DETROIT NEWS, 8/28).
FIGHTING BACK: A minority investor in American Mart Corp., a holding company controlled by the WIRTZ family, is challenging the company's recent merger that cashed out minority stockholders at $375 a share. The lawsuit, filed in Delaware Chancery Court last week, alleges the defendant, the newly formed American Mart Company LLC, “broke Delaware law and failed in its fiduciary duty to disclose important financial details of its short-form merger with American Mart Corp. on Nov. 21, 2022.” The plaintiff “seeks to void the merger and asks for monetary relief" (CRAIN'S CHICAGO BUSINESS, 8/28).
BUYERS & SELLERS: The U.S. Soccer Federation on Aug. 11 sold two adjoining vintage Near South Side mansions in Chicago that it long had used as its HQ for a combined total of $3.9M -- and the new owners plan to “return the mansions to residential use and occupy them.” The two mansions both date to the late 19th century (CHICAGO TRIBUNE, 8/28)....MLB consultant THEO EPSTEIN has sold his 7,800 square-foot Lakeview home for $3.5M on Friday. Epstein previously bought the house in November 2011 for $3.25M (CRAIN'S CHICAGOBUSINESS, 8/28)....Chiefs QB PATRICK MAHOMES has put his two-bedroom condo near the Country Club Plaza up for sale for $550,000. It has been on the market since late July. Mahomes bought a condo in the Belleview Plaza building, just west of the Plaza, for $307,000. The 1,800-square-foot condo has "two bedrooms, two-and-a-half bathrooms, a private two-car garage and three outdoor decks" (K.C. STAR, 8/28).
NAMES: Mets RF STARLING MARTE announced on his Instagram that he had proposed to his now- fiancée ELIANNY SANTANA (N.Y. POST, 8/28).
IN MEMORY: Longtime publisher of the Ogden Newspapers G. OGDEN NUTTING died last Friday at 87. Nutting joined former Pirates team owner KEVIN MCCLATCHY’s ownership group in 1996. McClatchy and Nutting knew each other initially through their newspaper industry ties before McClatchy "brought Nutting into his ownership group that kept the team from leaving Pittsburgh." McClatchy eventually lost his majority ownership stake to Nutting’s son, BOB, who supplanted McClatchy as the Pirates’ principal owner in 2007 (AP, 8/28)....JOHN DAVIS, a 2019 inductee into the Arizona Golf HOF and sports journalist for nearly 36 years, died early yesterday after a long battle with cancer at 73 (GOLFWEEK, 8/28).
