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    The Big3 basketball league, co-founded by Rapper Ice Cube, is targeting a $290 million valuation as it plans to go public later this year. The deal was announced on Friday with Graf Global Corp., a publicly traded special purpose acquisition company. 

    The Proposed Big3 League’s IPO

    The  Big3 basketball league was co-founded by rapper Ice Cube and businessman Jeff Kwatinetz in 2017. It’s a 3-on-3 professional basketball league founded in 2017 by Ice Cube and Jeff Kwatinetz, featuring 12 teams composed of former NBA players and international stars. 

    This proposed deal will let fans buy stock in the league. Big3 plans to list on a major stock exchange in Q4 2026 under the ticker TONT for 3-on-3. “You can’t participate in the upside of the team besides winning,” Ice Cube told Bloomberg. “And we need the fans for the league to be successful, so it’s a match made in heaven.”

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    Most major sports leagues stay private. TKO, which owns UFC and WWE, has traded publicly since September 2023. Big3 tips off its ninth season next week in Los Angeles. The league’s title game is set for Aug. 22 in Charlotte, North Carolina.

    Kwatinetz said the move opens the pool of people who can gain exposure to the league. Investors include John P. Angelos, whose family once owned the Baltimore Orioles; Peter Briger, executive chairman of Fortress Investment Group and minority owner of the San Francisco 49ers; Drew McKnight, co-chief executive officer of Fortress; and Ken Howery, co-founder of PayPal and Founders Fund.

    Big3 runs eight teams. The league owns franchises in Boston, Chicago, Dallas, and the DMV. Independent investors own the other four teams in Los Angeles, Miami, Detroit, and Houston. NBA legend Clyde Drexler serves as commissioner.

    Eric Mullins and Milton Carroll bought the Houston franchise for $10 million in 2024. Mullins runs private equity firm Lime Rock Resources. Carroll is the former chairman of CenterPoint Energy Inc. The league’s ninth season starts June 20 at the Intuit Dome, home of the Los Angeles Clippers.

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    How The Big3 League Will Shape Up After the Deal

    When the transaction closes, the publicly traded company will be named Big3 Basketball Holdings, Inc., and is expected to be listed on the New York Stock Exchange, NYSE American, or Nasdaq under the ticker symbol “TONT” (3-on-3). The BIG3 management team will lead the combined company. The team includes co-founder and chief executive officer O’Shea Jackson, also known as Ice Cube; co-founder and chairman Jeff Kwatinetz; President Sean Bannon; and commissioner Clyde “the Glide” Drexler. 

    The Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame created the inaugural Ice Cube Impact Award to recognize Cube’s impact on communities through basketball. The Hall now presents the award annually at its ceremony.

    The transaction values BIG3 at $290 million pre-money. That value does not include potential earnouts tied to share price performance. Existing equity and equity-linked interests will convert to common stock of the combined company at closing.

    Closing depends on GRAF delivering at least $50 million in net cash proceeds from its trust account. Closing also requires other transaction-related funding and payment of redemptions, cash transaction costs, and other expenses. GRAF’s trust account held about $249 million in cash deposits as of June 10, 2026.

    GRAF’s shareholders must approve an extension of the time allowed to complete a business combination. The approval deadline is June 27, 2026. GRAF’s public shareholders can redeem up to all of their ordinary shares during the extension vote. They can redeem again right before the final shareholder vote on the proposed business combination.

    “We are excited to partner with Cube, Jeff, and their team to bring BIG3 to the public markets,” said James Graf, chief executive officer of GRAF. 

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    “There are few, if any, opportunities for public market investors to own equity directly in professional sports leagues or teams. We believe such investments may deliver uncorrelated returns over time, especially given the appreciation of team values and the growth of sports advertising across media.”

    Image Source: Flickr

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    The post Ice Cube’s Big3 League Set to Go Public After $290M Valuation appeared first on UrbanGeekz.

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