Last week, Penn National announced that it had a deal to acquire the remaining 64% of Barstool Sports that it did not already own. Barstool’s founder and president Dave Portnoy says that announcement was more of a PR trick than actual news.
“This, to me, unless I was missing something, is very much old news packaged as new news,” he said on the latest episode of the Dave Portnoy Show with Eddie & Co. “Like, I knew the dates the second we did the deal. They always intended on buying it all.”
The deal is set to close in 2023. Barstool Eddie, Portnoy’s co-host, said that the announcement is akin to a team holding a press conference to introduce a player that it had already been reported was joining the team.
Portnoy agreed. He said literally nothing changes regarding the day-to-day operations of Barstool. In fact, this was such a non-issue that he did not know a major announcement was coming.
“I didn’t even get a call regarding this latest announcement. The changes that happen [for Barstool] already were enacted.”
Penn National Gaming has acquired both Barstool and TheScore since 2021. Portnoy says that is Penn, a company he called “an old school company” embracing entertainment over traditional casino operations.
He said that evolution nearly put the Barstool brand front and center.
“At one point, I think there was thinking of turning the name of the company to Barstool, but with all of the baggage we have, me personally, I guess that was probably the right move not to do it.”
According to Dave Portnoy, he already believes he is an employee of Penn National. The only change he believes is coming to the Barstool offices is the day Penn National officially takes over the remaining 64% of the company, any employees holding shares of Barstool will get a nice payday.
