THIS IS MAJOR:Hank Aaron bidding for Atlanta Hawks!

Former baseball home run king and Atlanta icon Hank 

Aaron has joined a group of current owners from the NBA, 

Major League Soccer and Italian soccer's storied Serie A 

that is seeking to purchase the Atlanta Hawks, according to 

league sources.

Sources told ESPN.com that the group is spearheaded by 

Memphis Grizzlies minority owner and vice chairman Steve 

Kaplan, Indonesian billionaire sports and media magnates 

Erick Thohir and Handy Poernomo Soetedjo and former 

Grizzlies CEO Jason Levien, who is the current managing 

general partner of DC United in MLS. ‎

The deep-pocketed consortium, sources say, also includes a 

select and diverse group of prominent investors, including 

Aaron and other Atlantans.

Kaplan and Levien declined comment Sunday.‎ Said Allen 

Tanenbaum, Aaron's longtime business adviser, when 

reached Sunday night by ESPN.com: "This is a private 

process and he'd like the private process to play out."‎

‎

After a historic two-decade run of slugging in which he 

shattered Babe Ruth's all-time record by hitting 755 home 

runs, Aaron has ‎spent much of his post-playing career as a 

baseball executive as well overseeing a business portfolio 

that has featured numerous car dealerships and restaurants. 

Sources say Aaron's devotion to Atlanta as a city and his 

longstanding fondness for the Hawks as a basketball fan led 

him to join this group of bidders.

The 1982 Baseball Hall of Fame inductee, whose 715th 

homer in April 1974 ranks as one of the most indelible 

images in the annals of American sport, founded the 755 

Restaurant Corporation with wife Billye in 1995.‎

Kaplan is a co-founder of the leading global investment 

firm Oaktree Capital Group. Widely regarded as a savvy 

private equity investor, Kaplan previously led an 

unsuccessful bid to purchase the San Diego Padres before 

emerging as a member of the ownership group which 

acquired the Grizzlies from the late Michael Heisley.‎

‎

Thohir and Soetedjo, in 2011, became the NBA's first-ever 

Asian owners when they partnered with Levien as members 

of the Josh Harris-led purchase of the Philadelphia 76ers. 

Thohir and Soetedjo currently co-own DC United with 

Levien, while Thohir concurrently serves as majority owner 

and president of Italian soccer giants Inter Milan. All three 

have since sold their respective stakes in the Sixers.‎

Kaplan and Levien worked together in Memphis after 

Levien largely assembled the Pera-led ownership group 

which took over the Grizzlies in June 2012 and promptly 

helped the club reach the conference finals -- and place No. 

1 in ESPN The Magazine's 2013 Ultimate Standings survey 

-- in their first season together.

Levien has a track record of successfully teaming up with 

high-profile athletes and entertainers, having partnered with 

pop star and Memphis native Justin Timberlake and Denver 

Broncos quarterback Peyton Manning in the Grizzlies' 

ownership group, as well actorWill Smith in the Sixers' 

ownership group before that.

The new group featuring Aaron and his partners is the 

second known consortium with certifiable interest in buying 

the Hawks. NBA.com and Bloomberg.com reported earlier 

this week that former NBA stars Grant Hill and Junior 

Bridgeman ‎have teamed with USA Basketball chairman 

Jerry Colangelo and son Bryan Colangelo, two-time NBA 

Executive of the Year, to form a group that also will be 

bidding on the team.

‎

The Hawks officially went on the market this week in the 

wake of the embarrassing revelations last summer 

stemming from the exposure of racially insensitive e-mails 

and conversations within the organization. The scandals 

prompted majority owner Bruce Levenson to immediately 

announce his intention to sell the team in September and led 

to an indefinite leave of absence for general manager Danny 

Ferry, who has been forced to watch from afar while the 

group he has assembled has unexpectedly risen to the top of 

the Eastern Conference on the strength of a 29-8 start.

The Hawks were valued in 2014 by Forbes at $425 million, 

but that figure was issued before Steve Ballmer's purchase 

of the Clippers for a staggering $2 billion in a bidding process that also featured a group led by Hill. The operating 

rights to Phillips Arena are also for sale, but attendance this 

season has still lagged in the bottom third of the league 

despite the Hawks' surprising on-court performance.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported last week that 

100 percent of the franchise will be available to prospective 

buyers, with Goldman Sachs and Inner Circle Sports 

overseeing the sale and vetting interested parties. The 

newspaper reported that April is a potential target for 

finalizing an agreement, with the group that ultimately wins 

the bidding process also requiring NBA approval.

Grant land's Bill Simpson likewise tweeted earlier this 

week about two Seattle-based groups, led respectively by 

Chris Hansen and Thomas Tull, which have expressed 

interest in buying the Hawks to try to relocate the franchise 

to the Pacific Northwest. But the Hawks' current owners, 

league officials and Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed have been 

adamant about their intent to keep the franchise in Atlanta.

TNT's David Aldridge reported via Twitter earlier this week that the Hawks would have to pay a $75 million fee to the 

city of Atlanta and Fulton County to free themselves from 

the club's lease before 2017. The Hawks, according to a 

2012 SB Nation report, would also have to pay off bonds 

from a 2010 refinancing to be able to move, which would 

also be subject to the NBA's blessing.