Kwanza Jones could make MLB history as the first Black woman majority owner

A ceremonial ribbon cutting for the Kwanza Jones Hall featuring Kwanza Jones (Princeton ‘93) (PRNewsfoto/SUPERCHARGED)

Kwanza Jones’ $3.9 billion agreement with the San Diego Padres could usher in the league’s first Black woman majority owner.

For more than a century, Major League Baseball has stood as one of America’s most tradition-bound institutions. Since its modern founding in 1903, the league has weathered wars, strikes, integration battles, and cultural shifts, but one milestone has remained conspicuously unmet: no Black woman has ever held a majority ownership stake in an MLB franchise.

And that may soon change.Entrepreneur, philanthropist, and singer Kwanza Jones is on the brink of making history as part of a $3.9 billion agreement to purchase the San Diego Padres.

Last Saturday, the family of late San Diego Padres owner Peter Seidler announced it had reached an agreement to sell the franchise to an investor group led by Jones and her husband, José E. Feliciano, co-founder of private equity firm Clearlake Capital.

“The Padres are more than a baseball team; they are a unifying force in San Diego, rooted in community, connection, and belonging. As life and business partners, and as a family, we are honored to lead this next chapter together,” Jones and Feliciano said in a joint statement.

If approved, the purchase would make Jones the first Black woman to own a majority stake in MLB history. And Feliciano would cement his own place in the record books as the first majority owner in the league of Puerto Rican descent and the second Latino majority owner, joining Los Angeles Angels owner Arte Moreno.