At least 3 groups bid on Red Sox Boston buyers make latest deadline

BOSTON – Prospective owners of the Boston Red Sox submitted bids for controlling interest in the team on Thursday with no indication of when or how the winner will be selected.

The Jean R. Yawkey Trust is selling its 53 percent stake of the team, which owns Fenway Park and 80 percent of the New England Sports Network. The price is expected to be $350 million or more.

“As we have stated from the outset, this is a private auction, and we are now in the most private phase of the process,” said Justin P. Morreale, the trust’s lawyer. “We do not anticipate further public statements until decisions are reached.”

Red Sox chief executive officer John Harrington, the head of the trust, said the team and its advisers could spend weeks reviewing the bids. Harrington has said he would pick the highest qualified offer.

Among those confirming bids on Thursday were South Boston land developer Frank McCourt, Cablevision Systems Corp. chairman Charles Dolan and New England Sports Ventures, a group led by former San Diego Padres owner Tom Werner and former ski resort developer Les Otten.

“I feel great,” McCourt said in an interview Thursday from his office, which overlooks the 12-acre site in South Boston where he hopes to build a new ballpark for the team. The group led by Werner and Otten wants to renovate Fenway at its current location.

McCourt’s investment group includes Boston-area venture capital firms Alta Communications, Great Hill Partners and Halpern, Denny & Co., as well as FleetBoston Financial Corp.

Among the investors in New England Sports Ventures are former Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell and former Padres and Baltimore Orioles president Larry Lucchino.

New York lawyer Miles Prentice also made an offer.

“All I can tell you is we have submitted a very compelling bid, one that values the franchise at a record level,” Prentice said. “We look forward to the opportunity to carry on the fine tradition established by the Yawkey Trust in bringing back the World Series trophy to Boston.”

Dolan’s group, meanwhile, confirmed that it has brought on board John J. McMullen, a former controlling owner of the Houston Astros and the NHL’s New Jersey Devils.

“They are confident that they have the professional and financial capacity to be the successful bidder and to put a championship caliber team on the field,” the group said.

Wendy Watkins, a spokeswoman for Boston Bruins and FleetCenter owner Jeremy Jacobs, who was also expected to bid, refused to comment.

A spokeswoman for Philadelphia-based concessionaire Aramark Corp., also expected to bid, did not immediately return a telephone message.

The other leading candidate is a group headed by local developers Joseph O’Donnell and Stephen Karp. O’Donnell was out of town Thursday but confirmed through an assistant, Janice Oberlander, that he and Karp had submitted a bid.

The groups have been busy adding wealthy backers to their investment groups in recent weeks. On Tuesday, The New York Times Co., which owns The Boston Globe, announced it had joined the Werner-Otten group. That group has also had discussions with Florida Marlins owner John Henry, who has talked about selling his team to current Montreal Expos owner Jeffrey Loria.