While attempting to buy an NFL team, Bobby Axelrod, the imperfect protagonist of the popular HBO TV series ‘Billions’ opined that “Sports franchises are how we knight people in this country.” While the series somehow manages to dramatize the already sensational world of hedge funds and high finance, the observation from Axelrod is a poignant one; ownership of sports franchises is America’s closest comparable to knighthood in the United Kingdom. With the lofty societal status assigned to owners of professional sports franchises, the reasoning for parting with such as asset is not always apparent.