Rice, who has also served as a national security adviser as well as a Stanford University professor, lived in Denver during her childhood and received a BA and PhD from the University of Denver. In June, a group led by Walmart heir Rob Walton and including Walton’s daughter. Carrie Walton Penner; her husband, Greg Penner; and Mellody Hobson, co-CEO of Ariel Investments and chairman of Starbucks Corp., agreed to buy the Broncos for $4.65 billion. In a statement Monday, Walton said: “We are pleased to welcome former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to our ownership group. A highly respected public servant, accomplished academic and corporate leader, Secretary Rice is known as a passionate and knowledgeable follower of of football who has worked to make the sport stronger and better.She is the daughter of a football coach and served on the inaugural College Football Playoff Committee…Her unique experience and excellent judgment will be a great asset to our team and the Broncos organization.” 2 Related The sale of the team, which paid a record price for a North American sports franchise, is under review by the NFL and must be approved by a full vote of NFL owners in the coming weeks. Twenty-four yes votes are needed to officially approve the sale. It was expected to take 60 to 90 days to approve the sale and close the deal. The Walton-Penner Group was, according to multiple sources, one of four groups that had advanced to the second round of bidding for the team in early June. The Broncos have been one of the NFL’s most successful franchises in the Super Bowl era, with three Super Bowl wins under Pat Bowlen’s ownership tenure, and now have an ownership group with some of the deepest pockets. Greg Penner and Carrie Walton Penner are expected to have prominent roles in the team’s day-to-day operations, and current Broncos CEO Joe Ellis has expressed since the team was officially put up for sale on February 1 how important is that the new owner is “visible” in the community and understands the Broncos’ position in Denver, the state of Colorado and the region. The sale of the team ended an eight-year odyssey since Bowlen stepped away from the day-to-day operations of the team he had held for 30 years in July 2014 due to the onset of Alzheimer’s disease. Bowlen died in 2019. Bowlen never formally named a successor among his children, and when he passed away, he held his interest in the team (estimated to be about 78% at the time) in a trust overseen by Ellis, Broncos adviser Rich Slivka and Denver attorney Mary Kelly. What followed included a lawsuit between family members, harsh words and court dates that coincided with an ongoing six-year playoff failure streak on the court. The team’s victory in Super Bowl 50 to close out the 2015 season was the last postseason game the Broncos played. The sale agreement with the Walton-Penner Group also means Walton and Stan Kroenke, Walton’s cousin by marriage, will own five of the six major professional sports franchises in Colorado. Kroenke owns the Denver Nuggets, Colorado Avalanche, Colorado Rapids and Colorado Mammoth lacrosse teams, in addition to a regional media company in the state.
