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Officials at the companies and Mr. Tanenbaum were not available for comment.

MLSE, the private company that owns the Leafs, the Toronto Raptors of the National Basketball Association, the Air Canada Centre arena, Major League Soccer’s Toronto FC and the American Hockey League’s Toronto Marlies, had been for sale for eight months.

However, after a number of failed attempts to interest buyers willing to pay in the range of $1.6-billion-$1.8-billion, the Teachers Pension Plan announced last month that it had taken its interest off the auction block and would hold the investment “indefinitely.”

According to sources, Rogers and Bell have been trying to hammer out a shared bid for weeks because while neither wanted to pay the full asking price, the rivals also didn’t want to risk the valuable TV rights falling into the hands of a competitor.

Rogers and Bell already compete head-to-head in sports broadcast with Sportsnet and TSN respectively.

The telecom giants have been eyeing MLSE for its prized broadcast and Internet rights, especially for the Toronto Maple Leafs, a team that was recently valued at more than US$500-million and ranked as the most valuable hockey franchise by the influential U.S. business publication Forbes magazine.

The company also has a monopoly on teams in Canada’s largest and most lucrative sports market, except for the Toronto Blue Jays professional baseball team, which is owned by Rogers.