The party is over in pro sports. There is a new reality and it can get a little harsh. Rich DeVos understands that now, which is why the Orlando Magic are likely to have a new owner before they have a new arena.

Five or 10 years ago, it may have been different. If an owner had established some goodwill in the community and could demonstrate that he could not break even under the current economic conditions, he stood a good chance of getting a new facility without paying for most of it himself.

It may take some time and pursuasion, but it would get done.

That is not the case now, and may not be again for a long time. The public sports dollar is tapped out, and politicians have little fear of saying no to owners of teams.

It used to be when an owner heard "no," his next step was to threaten to move his franchise. That was his ultimate leverage.

Now the threat is idle, for the most part, because there are few places to go that would actually make the owner's situation better. Occasionally an ambitious smaller market like Louisville, Ky., or Norfolk, Va., may come up with a plan for a new facility, just to get into the big-time. Or perhaps a big city like New Orleans or St. Louis will be able to justify spending $250 million.

The Magic need a new arena to turn a profit, and the response of the city of Orlando and Orange County has been: "Fine. Build one!"

Ideally, that would have been the response all along, whenever and wherever a private enterprise has asked for public funding. Unfortunately, the opposite has been true. Owners of sports franchises have grown so accustomed to getting someone else to pay for their facilities that they have developed a sense of entitlement.

So DeVos was sincerely shocked at the negative response to his plea for a new arena. And now that it is apparent he is not going to get one, he wants out.

Original reports had him waiting to sell 49 percent of the team. That is likely to be a very hard sell, however, since owning 49 percent of a team is a lot like owning none of it. DeVos wouldn't discuss it Saturday night.

"This is tough on Rich. Rich loves this team, I can tell you that. You can tell in his voice this is a very difficult thing for him to do," said Magic Coach Doc Rivers, who talked with DeVos by phone Thursday when he put the team up for sale. "But they're going to do it. This is not a trump card. We're not playing poker here and trying to scare anybody. The process is played out now."

It is a little surprising that it has gone this far because Orlando has a unique source of funding in place. Orange County's Tourist Development Tax has some dollars earmarked for spending on sports, at least according to the Magic's interpretation of it. But as DeVos put it last year, the county's hoteliers got "their grubby little fingers on it" and don't want to spread it around.

DeVos was right, but the statement did him more harm than good. He came off as a billionaire with his hand out.

Orlando Arena (now the TD Waterhouse Centre) was built in the late 1980s, just before the era of mid-level suites drove the whole NBA revenue equation through the roof. Nearly every team in the league has had a new arena built since then and is collecting millions from from the sky boxes that were built into it.

Without those millions, it may well be impossible to have a competitive NBA payroll and also turn a profit. The Magic claim to be losing about $10 million a year.

This isn't DeVos' fault, and it certainly is not the fault of Orange County or the city of Orlando.

But it is a problem for DeVos, and apparently one he has decided he doesn't need.