NFL: Seattle Seahawks are up for sale – 10 days after Super Bowl win

The Seattle Seahawks are officially up for sale, 10 days after winning the biggest prize in American football.

It was reported before Super Bowl 60 that there were discussions about selling the Seahawks, who beat the New England Patriots to become NFL champions for the second time.

The late team owner Paul J. Allen, who co-founded Microsoft with Bill Gates, bought the franchise in 1997, saving it from potentially relocating to Southern California.

He oversaw the Seahawks’ first Super Bowl win in 2014 but died in 2018, at age 65, of complications from non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

His estate announced Wednesday that it had “begun a formal sale process” for the franchise “in keeping with Allen’s directives to eventually sell his sports properties and direct all proceeds from the properties to charity.”

According to Forbes, Allen paid $194m (£143.6m) for the Seahawks and the latest publication valuation was $6.7bn (£5bn) – making him the 14th most valuable franchise in the NFL.

The most recent NFL team sale saw the Washington Commanders purchased in 2023 by a group controlled by Josh Harris for a record $6.05bn (£4.5bn).

This amount was surpassed as the most expensive purchase of a sports team in the world last year, when the Los Angeles Lakers, which plays in the NBA, were purchased for $10 billion (£7.5 billion).

Allen also owns the NBA’s Portland Trail Blazers. Since his death, his sister, Judy Allen, has been the executor of his estate, as well as the president of the Seahawks and Trail Blazers.

A Trail Blazers sale is already underway with Tom Dundon, owner of the NHL’s Carolina Hurricanes, having agreed a contract to buy the NBA team in a deal worth $4.25bn (£3.3bn).

The Allen Estate has selected investment bank Allen & Company and law firm Latham & Watkins to lead the Seahawks sale.