Brooklyn-born Terry Semel, the former boss at Warner Bros. and Yahoo!, was the secret runner-up in the battle to buy the Nets.

Semel was beaten by Russian billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov, who offered to pay for the arena being built in Brooklyn as well as the team in a deal worth hundreds of millions of dollars. But sources say Semel, who divides his time between New York and Los Angeles, had hoped to be at most of the games as the new owner.