So, looks like the rumors are true.
While on “The Tonight Show” with Jimmy Fallon on Monday night, Vancouver-born actor Ryan Reynolds confirmed his interest in buying the Ottawa Senators as part of a group.
“I am trying to (buy the Senators),” said Reynolds, who added he partially grew up in Ottawa. “It’s very expensive, so I need a partner with really deep pockets. It’s called a consortium, when you form a group to buy an entity, and it’s such a fancy way of saying, ‘I need a sugar mommy or a sugar daddy,’ and if that doesn’t happen I’ll buy a U.S. senator which everyone can afford.”
Reynolds owns Wrexham A.F.C., a Welsh-based team in the fifth tier of English soccer.
The news comes after the Senators confirmed last week that they were going up for sale. The condition of a sale would require the Senators to stay in Ottawa.
The Deadpool actor has a projected net worth of $150 million, with Sportico listing the Senators as having a valuation of $755 million, 27th in the league. Sportico projects that the team’s future arena deal, plus the sale, would help boost that value.
The team is owned by Anna and Olivia Melnyk, the daughters of the late Eugene Melnyk, who passed away in the spring.
The Senators play at the Canadian Tire Centre in Kanata, more than a 20-minute drive from downtown Ottawa. The team signed a memorandum of understanding with the National Capital Commission and other investors this past summer to build a new downtown arena just west of Parliament Hill in LeBreton Flats.
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