Report: Retailers lining up for Sports Authority assets

Dick’s Sporting Goods and Academy Sports + Outdoors have submitted letters of interest to buy some of the assets of Sports Authority Inc. that will go on the block in a bankruptcy auction, according to Reuters.

Modells Sporting Goods is also reportedly interested in some of the assets of the chain, which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in early March.

The bankruptcy auction will determine whether Sports Authority will be sold off in pieces, or if its creditors will hold on to it and try to find a buyer for its entirety.

On Thursday, Sports Authority was granted approval from the court to push back the planned auction from April 25 to May 16 amid “substantial” interest from several potential bidders. Nearly all of the chain’s assets—its stores, intellectual property and website —are on the block.

Dick's, based in Coraopolis, Penn., is the nation’s largest sporting goods chain, with approximately 600 stores nationwide. Texas-based Academy Sports operates approximately 200 stores, primarily in the South. Modell’s, based in New York City operates more than 150 locations mostly on the East Coast.

Sports Authority, which was purchased by Leonard Green & Partners LP, in 2006 for $1.3 billion, has more than $1.1 billion in debt.