Mark Walter’s pending sale of the Los Angeles Lakers is not expected to impact his standing as controlling owner of the Los Angeles Dodgers, according to a team source granted anonymity because the Lakers sale is not finalized. Walter remaining at the top could save the Dodgers’ dynasty from immediate, damaging ramifications.

Shohei Ohtani, the face of the franchise, four-time MVP and driver of the Dodgers’ thriving business in Japan as well as Los Angeles, has intertwined his future with Walter’s. When Ohtani signed his 10-year, $700 million deal with the Dodgers in 2023, his contract included a “key man” clause tying him both to Walter and president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman.

If either were to leave the organization over the span of the contract, Ohtani could opt out and become a free agent after that season.

“Everybody has to be on the same page in order to have a winning organization,” Ohtani explained through an interpreter at his introductory news conference on Dec. 14, 2023. “I feel like those two are at the top of it and they’re in control of everything, and I feel almost like I’m having a contract with those two guys.

“I feel like if one of them is gone, then like I said, (we) might not be on the same page, things might get a little out of control, so I just wanted like a safety net.”

That safety net is still in place, even after the Lakers entered a sale agreement at a $12.5 billion valuation, the largest of any American sports franchise. ESPN first reported the news that the Lakers were being sold.

Walter and Guggenheim Baseball Management’s $2.15 billion purchase of the Dodgers in 2012 was a landmark moment for the club. Their ownership of the team has coincided with what Friedman has called the “golden era” of the franchise. When trying to pitch Ohtani into signing with Los Angeles, Walter called the first decade of his ownership — in which the club became an annual postseason contender, winning a 2020 World Series and two more pennants — a failure.

In Ohtani’s first two seasons with the Dodgers, they have won the World Series, making good on a pledge Walter made to his new star.

“It takes pressure off of me,” Walter said after the Dodgers won their second consecutive title last October. “Because I promised him we’d win one. And we did it.”

Walter’s tenure, particularly since Ohtani’s arrival, has been marked by extreme spending and allowing Friedman and his crop of baseball operations lieutenants to operate without interference. When asked last October on how he helped form a dynasty, Walter eschewed credit.

“(The front office) makes all the decisions,” Walter said. “I just tell them yes.”

The owner is not an everyday presence at Dodger Stadium, though he showed up to Wrigley Field last week when the team was in town to play the Chicago Cubs. Walter, whose insurance companies are reportedly under investigation by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York and the Securities and Exchange Commission, also accompanied the Dodgers to the White House last month to celebrate their 2025 title with President Donald Trump.

The Dodgers have operated in a different financial stratosphere on the field and drawn public ire and accusations of ruining baseball with their deep pockets. That has made the club an avatar for Major League Baseball’s push for a salary cap during upcoming labor negotiations and a likely lockout this winter.

The club boasts a projected luxury tax payroll figure of more than $415 million for 2026, according to Cot’s Contracts. Much of that free spending can be traced to the financial boon of Ohtani, who structured his contract to defer 97 percent of his salary, giving the club more flexibility to add to the roster.

Ohtani’s mere presence on the Dodgers’ roster has also changed their financial reach into his native Japan. The club’s CEO, Stan Kasten, has repeatedly said that the business of Ohtani has exceeded even the Dodgers’ rosy expectations. Last year, Sportico estimated that the Dodgers eclipsed $1 billion in revenue.

The Dodgers opened the 2025 season in Tokyo, with Ohtani accompanied by a pair of other Japanese stars on the roster: pitcher Yoshinobu Yamamoto (signed to a $325 million deal that was the richest ever for a pitcher) and phenom Roki Sasaki.

Dodger Stadium is now awash in advertisements from Japanese-based companies, including the ballpark’s first-ever field sponsor, UNIQLO. They have added Japanese-language tours to accommodate the influx of Japanese fans traveling to the ballpark and have even launched a Dodgers fan club in Japan in an effort to, in Friedman’s words, “paint Japan Dodger blue.”

Selling the Dodgers — and potentially losing Ohtani — would have put that all in jeopardy.

Great Britain’s Dina Asher-Smith and Amy Hunt win their semi-finals, while Success Eduan’s time is quick enough to see all three sprinters into the 200m finals at the European Athletics Championships.

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The most significant solar eclipse since 1999 was visible across the UK and Europe on Wednesday and briefly took attention away from various sporting events in the process.

A total solar eclipse peaked in parts of Spain and Iceland.

In the UK, people could see a partial eclipse with more than 90% of the Sun covered by the Moon depending one where you were.

Whether you were at the European Athletics Championships in Birmingham, a Hundred cricket match or Aston Villa’s Super Cup game against Paris St-Germain in Austria, sports fans paused to take in the rare sight.

Experts told watchers not to look directly at the Sun without protection, which saw many supporters who did not have glasses come up with home-made solutions.

BBC Sport looks at how some sporting events were affected.