Bloomberg Línea — It took 47 years for the Denver Nuggets to win their first NBA Championship title by defeating the Miami Heat 94-89 on Monday, and with it, real estate developer Stan Kroenke accumulated his fourth championship victory in just a year and a half, boosting his fortune.
The 75-year-old Kroenke is ranked 115th on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index with a fortune of $14.9 billion.
In addition to his sports investments, Kroenke has real estate businesses comprising ranches of about 2 million acres in the US and Canada. He also owns commercial properties through Kroenke Group and THF Realty.
Together, the companies own more than 200 properties, according to data compiled by Real Capital Analytics. Because the billionaire owns THF Realty with co-founder Michael Staenberg, he is credited with half of THF’s properties.
Kroenke also privately financed the construction of SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California, the world’s most expensive stadium.
Fortunate family
Stanley Kroenke graduated with an MBA in 1973 from the University of Missouri. That same year, he met nursing student and Wal-Mart heiress Ann Walton, whom he married a year later. Walton is ranked 349th on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index with $6.73 billion.
He worked with retail developer Raul Walters, who had built some of Wal-Mart’s stores and became his partner in 1979. The two developed more than 20 retail shopping centers throughout the Midwest, many of them with Wal-Mart stores.
When Kroenke founded his own real estate development firm in 1985, Wal-Mart remained one of his most important clients. He joined its board of directors in 1995 and stayed on until 2000 to then focus on the sports world.
In 1994, he bought the Los Angeles Rams soccer team and moved them to St. Louis. He acquired the Colorado Avalanche professional field hockey and the Denver Nuggets basketball team in 2000, the Colorado Mammoth lacrosse franchise in 2002, the Colorado Rapids soccer team in 2004, and a majority stake in the Arsenal soccer team in 2011 all under the Kroenke Sports & Entertainment umbrella.
His NFL team, the Rams, is his biggest asset, as Bloomberg estimates it to be worth $5.9 billion, followed by Arsenal, which is worth about $3.6 billion.
Kroenke has spent more than $1 billion on his sports assets, according to Bloomberg.
Denver Nuggets’ crowning glory
Among the stars of Monday night’s game was Nikola Jokić, the 28-year-old Serbian who led the team with 28 points and 16 rebounds and was named the NBA Finals Most Valuable Player (MVP).
Jokić was consecrated as the best player in the world in these playoffs. After five successful games, he won the Bill Russell NBA Finals MVP award.
However, the game report tells that it was a contest where the Nuggets did not shine and suffered more than expected. “In their first final. They didn’t play well, but they held their own against a Heat that fought, took the game to the ground that suited them best, but their limited talent, especially on offense, meant that they could never get away. Denver turned it around in the last quarter, knew how to suffer in the end,” according to a game report by news portal Infobae.
Nuggets’ head coach Michael Malone referred to Miami Heat president and former coach Pat Riley after the win, and said he kept a quote from him on the wall about “the evolution in this game, and how you go from being a nobody to an upstart, and an upstart to a winner, and a winner to a contender, and a contender to a champion and the last step after a champion is to be a dynasty, so we’re not satisfied.”
However, in the streets of downtown Denver everything was celebration, joy, fireworks and chants. But there were also celebrations from the fans of the rest of the NBA teams, who congratulated the new champion through their social networks.
Trophy cabinet
The last team to win the championship had been the Golden State Warriors, who beat the Boston Celtics in the final, placing third on the podium of top winners, one step ahead of the Chicago Bulls. However, Boston Celtics and Los Angeles Lakers are the teams with the most trophies in their trophy cabinets, both with 17.
This is the ranking of the most-frequent winners:
- Boston Celtics: 17
- Los Angeles Lakers (formerly Minneapolis): 17
- Golden State Warriors (formerly Philadelphia): 7
- Chicago Bulls: 6
- San Antonio Spurs: 5
- Detroit Pistons: 3
- Miami Heat: 3
- Philadelphia 76ers (formerly Syracuse Nationals): 3
- Houston Rockets: 2
- New York Knicks: 2
- Milwaukee Bucks: 2
- Baltimore Bullets (discontinued): 1
- Denver Nuggets: 1
- Portland Trail Blazers: 1
- Sacramento Kings (formerly Rochester Royals): 1
- Oklahoma City Thunder (formerly Seattle SuperSonics): 1
- Atlanta Hawks (antes St. Louis): 1
- Washington Wizards (formerly Bullets): 1
- Dallas Mavericks: 1
- Cleveland Cavaliers: 1
- Toronto Raptors: 1
