Nicholas Makes an Offer for Angels, Ducks : Business: Source says billionaire is willing to pay Disney more than $400 million for baseball, hockey teams.

Technology billionaire Henry Nicholas III has offered to pay more than $400 million for Walt Disney Co.’s Anaheim sports teams, a knowledgeable Orange County business source said Wednesday. The amount exceeds what most sports business experts have estimated the teams are worth.

To help justify the high price, Nicholas and any partners would receive ownership of all assets associated with the Angels and Mighty Ducks, the source said. That would mean, for example, that Disney would have to license the rights to use the Mighty Ducks name if it wished to make another sequel to its movies about a hockey team of that name.

Although experts surveyed last week by The Times suggested a maximum value of about $370 million for the money-losing teams, analysts said Wednesday a $450-million figure could be justified in part because of the potential for developing an extreme sports complex adjacent to Edison Field, home of the Angels.

Nicholas, whose Broadcom Corp. is based in Irvine and who lives in the Laguna Hills area, has raised his public profile sharply in recent months and might be willing to pay a premium price to acquire the county’s two pro sports franchises at a single stroke, analysts said.

He also appears to see the sports franchises as part of an ambitious larger picture in Anaheim. With surf wear executive Marvin Winkler, he is among the partners in an as yet unfinanced plan to build Gotcha Glacier, an immense indoor arena that would offer snowboarding on artificial snow, surfing and bodyboarding in wave pools, and other individual sports.

The Glacier, whose cost has escalated into the $100-million range, would have particular appeal for teenagers and young adults--the “Generation Y” that has become the darling of marketers. It would be the anchor for Sportstown, a proposed shopping, hotel, office and entertainment development on a parking lot between Edison Field and the Arrowhead Pond, where the Ducks play.

The premium price for the teams could be justified by valuing them not simply as sports franchises but as assets in real estate development, said Rick Burton, director of the Warsaw Sports Marketing Center at the University of Oregon.

Imagine a mall, Burton said, with Edison Field at one end, the Pond at the other and the Glacier in between. Instead of department stores like Nordstrom or Neiman Marcus, the anchor tenants of this imaginary sports mall would be the Angels and Ducks.

“[Nicholas and any partners] could use them as anchors in a new-age mall,” Burton said. “They can have baseball at one end of the mall and hockey at the other end of the mall, and that will bring the parents in. Then they could have the adventure court--like a food court--in the middle.

“Hockey and baseball might be the anchor tenants to a much more exciting contemporary development staged in the middle.”

One could argue, Burton said, that Disney has essentially subsidized such a development with its $1.4-billion investment in Disney’s California Adventure, an under-construction theme park adjacent to Disneyland with a hotel and entertainment complex in between.

When the new park opens in 2001, millions of additional tourists are expected to visit Orange County each year, including families whose older children might find a day at the Glacier more fun than a second or third day at the Disney parks.

In Denver, the NBA Nuggets, NHL Avalanche and Pepsi Center arena were sold in July for $461 million. Disney owns neither Edison Field nor the Pond, so Nicholas would not get an arena in the deal and would not get the economic advantage of operating two teams in the same facility.

Dean Bonham, a Denver sports marketing consultant, said a $450-million price for the Angels and Ducks would be “arguably and hypothetically possible.” Bonham suggested $400 million would make more sense, citing the possibility of an NHL lockout before the collective bargaining agreement expires in 2004. A lockout could wipe out many games, perhaps an entire season.

Still, Burton said, a $450-million price would not be outrageous in the nation’s second-largest market. Sponsors could reach millions of fans, at the games and watching at home, with a single advertising deal.

“The market value of a Los Angeles franchise, all things being equal, should always be higher than the market value of a franchise in Milwaukee or Kansas City or Denver,” Burton said. “You pay a premium because of market size and market potential.”