‘Big, big financial commitment.’ New SKC owner Peter Mallouk shares plan for team
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Peter Mallouk assumes ownership and pledges major financial commitment.
- Sporting KC overhauled management and coaching to reset performance.
- GM David Lee and coach Raphael Wicky face roster rebuild during preseason.
Peter Mallouk spent his childhood falling asleep to Kansas City Royals baseball games on the radio, and so when he became old enough, he applied for a job at the stadium. They offered him one, selling peanuts, but he wanted to be closer to the action.
How about a bat boy?
Turns out, the best they could offer was a job as a visitors’ clubhouse attendant — a “clubbie,” as it’s known in baseball lingo. Mallouk, then 15 years old, was disappointed it wasn’t on the Royals’ side, but he soon learned that, well, “I was an idiot, because I got to know the Royals by being there every day, and I got to know every player in the American League by being with the visitors.”
Like, quite well.
On some nights, Mallouk would drive players from the stadium back to the Adam’s Mark Hotel across the street, the clock nearing 3 a.m., the players more than a few beers deep into the night.
“I don’t know how my parents let me do this,” he thought.
After signing up to get closer to the action, he’d become closer than he ever realized possible.
That’s the symbolism today.
He’s even closer now.
Because before baseball, his first love was soccer, instilled by his parents. They had moved to the United States from Egypt, leaving behind family and friends but bringing their love of soccer with them. They signed their boy up to be part of a team.
He’s more than part of one now. He owns one.
Mallouk has agreed to buy the majority stake in Sporting Kansas City, as The Star reported Friday.
Forbes value the sale at $700 million, which will give Mallouk, the CEO of Creative Planning in Overland Park, controlling (but not sole) ownership of the Major League Soccer club. He will leave the day-to-day control and the MLS board of governors representation to the Illig family, who were part of the purchasing group from Lamar Hunt back in 2006.
Why buy now?
It’s simple, really.
“The option presented itself,” Mallouk said in a phone interview with The Star on Saturday. “I’m born and raised in Kansas City, and I’ve forever loved Kansas City sports. So when the option presented itself, I was in. I didn’t hesitate.”
He loved soccer as a kid but jokes that his talent wasn’t the best match for it.
Mallouk, who turned 56 on Friday, would find his success in life elsewhere, eventually purchasing Creative Planning in 2004. Under his leadership, the firm has more than $700 billion in assets, serving clients across the world. His wife, Veronica, served as the company’s chief financial officer from 2015-20 but now spends much of her time focusing on their philanthropic work.
Mallouk graduated from Rockhurst High School before attending undergrad school at Kansas, where he had four majors. He then stayed to complete KU’s law school and MBA programs. Two of his three kids are at KU now, the other residing here.
He knows the city. He knows its passion for sports. He’s lived the fandom.
So what will he prioritize as the majority owner of an MLS team?
“I really would say 99.5% of the metric I’m going to care about is winning,” Mallouk said. “And 0.5% will be everything else.”
And the best way to accomplish that?
“What you’re going to see next season is a big, big financial commitment,” he said, “to do whatever it takes to build upon what we’re building upon this season.”
Sports ownership isn’t entirely new for Mallouk. He has been a minority owner with Sporting KC since 2022, and a minority owner with the Royals since John Sherman led the purchase of the team in 2019.
Mallouk attends 15-20 Royals games every year, and he estimates he’s at roughly half the Sporting KC games. The Illig family has run Sporting’s operations during his time as a minority owner.
That won’t change now.
Ownership’s financial commitment will.
“The fans are incredible,” Mallouk said. “They deserve a competitor all the time.”
They haven’t had one for the last couple of seasons. Sporting KC has finished out of the playoffs two straight years and was dead last in the Western Conference a year ago.
That prompted the most significant changes for the club in more than a decade. Sporting KC parted ways with longtime manager Peter Vermes nearly 10 months ago and hired David Lee as the general manager last fall. Raphael Wicky was hired as head coach earlier this month.
Sporting KC has already begun its preseason regimen in West Palm Beach, Florida, but Lee is still working to fill out the roster.
“I think there’s been a big investment in the last year,” Mallouk said. “We’re doing everything we can to be able to do that right now. I think what you’ll see on top of that is next year, we’ll be able to say, ‘OK, this was a reset. Really for the first time in over a decade, we changed everything. How did that go? And how do we build upon it?’
“You’ll see a lot of commitment of time and economics to make sure it’s built upon effectively.”
This story was originally published January 17, 2026 at 2:56 PM.