The Yankees Are Less Valuable Than Their TV Station

Got $3 billion lying around? Jeez, who doesn't? Well, if that $3,000,000,000 is just burning a hole in your pocket, rest easy: You could buy the YES Network.

Yankees officials aren't confirming it, but sources tell Fortune that the network could be on the block ... and that's the ridiculous potential asking price.

YES brought in $340.5 million in revenue in 2006, up about 6 percent from the prior year, according to Kagan Media Research estimates. (YES doesn't release official financial data.) Kagan believes that 40 percent of that revenue - about $136 million - translated into cash flow. The cash flow, of course, is the key to YES's valuation. John Mansell, a prominent sports-industry analyst, notes that stakes in other regional sports networks have traded hands recently at 19 times cash flow. So if YES, which is the cable home of the Yankees and Nets, can grow its cash this year by 8 percent or more - as Mansell thinks it will - a $3 billion valuation seems well within reach.

Christ; we had no idea "Yankeeography" could be so freaking profitable. Meanwhile, with George Steinbrenner "declining," it's possible the Yankees could be sold in the next few years anyway. Come on, Mark Cuban!

The Dismantling Of The Yankee Empire [Fortune]