Dan Gilbert, Cavaliers Owner, Reportedly Submitted $5 Billion Bid for Yahoo

The Cleveland Cavaliers are busy squaring off with the Golden State Warriors in the NBA Finals, but team owner Dan Gilbert reportedly has his eyes on other business ventures as well.

According to Brian Womack and Alex Sherman of Bloomberg, Gilbert “and AT&T Inc. each bid about $5 billion for Yahoo Inc.’s core business, patents and real estate assets, people with knowledge of the matter said.”

Womack and Sherman noted Verizon Communications also made a bid, but it was between $3.5 billion and $4 billion and only covered “Yahoo’s core business.”

Womack and Sherman pointed out that “Verizon didn’t bid on the intellectual property and real estate because Sunnyvale, California-based Yahoo told the company it wished to sell them separately.” According to one of Womack and Sherman’s sources, Verizon would be willing to eventually buy the patents (of which Yahoo is reportedly going to sell more than 3,000) and real estate.

Gilbert, who is also the founder of mortgage-lending company Quicken Loans, reportedly will not search for additional financing, although his bid is backed by Warren Buffett, per Womack and Sherman.

According to the Cavaliers’ official website, Gilbert led an investor group that bought the team in January 2005. Since the transaction, Cleveland has been to the NBA Finals three times, thanks largely to the presence of LeBron James.

The Cavaliers drafted James with the No. 1 overall pick in 2003, and he has developed into a future Hall of Famer, four-time MVP and 12-time All-Star as one of the best players in the history of the sport. James does have two championship rings, but both came with the Miami Heat, where he played from 2010 to 2014.

Gilbert infamously criticized James in an open letter after the Akron native decided to leave the Cavaliers for the Miami Heat in free agency. “This shocking act of disloyalty from our homegrown 'chosen one' sends the exact opposite lesson of what we would want our children to learn,” Gilbert said, per Ramona Shelburne of ESPN.com.

However, James returned to Cleveland before the 2014-15 season after he had a meeting with Gilbert, per Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo Sports' The Vertical. Since then, the Cavaliers have reached the last two NBA Finals, although they lost to the Golden State Warriors in six games last year and trail 2-1 against the same team this year entering Friday's Game 4.

As for Yahoo, Womack and Sherman reported CEO Marissa Mayer “has failed to spark a turnaround” since she came aboard four years ago. As a result, the company is looking into these offers in the face of competition such as Google and Facebook.