Christine G. Lazatin is a partner in the Corporate Department.
Christine is one of the nation’s leading sports finance attorneys, advising professional sports teams, leagues and owners, corporate borrowers and financial institutions on many of the industry’s most critical and complex financings.
Christine regularly represents several major sports leagues (including the National Basketball Association, the National Hockey League and Major League Soccer), as well as a number of NBA, NHL, National Football League and Major League Baseball teams, in connection with acquisition and stadium financings, working capital facilities, league-wide and league-level credit facilities, workouts and restructurings. She has also represented financial institutions in structuring financings for teams and team affiliates.
Over the past several years, Christine has worked on the deals that are at the cutting edge of the business of sports. As the industry grappled with the disruption caused by COVID-19, she advised numerous leagues, teams and other clients on financings to address their short- and long-term liquidity needs.
In addition to her financing work, Christine represents sports clients on a full range of corporate matters, including many expansion and ownership transactions for the NHL, the NBA and MLS. Recently, she advised MLS in launching an affiliated Division III professional men’s outdoor league known as “MLS Next Pro” and continues to advise the new league on governance and expansion matters.
Christine has been recognized as an elite lawyer by a variety of sports and legal publications. She was named a “Game Changer” by Sports Business Journal in 2022, and she is one of only four women ranked by Chambers USA in the Sports Law category.
Education
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Boston University School of Law, J.D.
cum laude
Editor-in-Chief, Boston University Annual Review of Banking and Financial Law
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Yale University, B.A.
Admissions & Qualifications
- New York
Awards & Recognition
Sports Business Journal Game Changers: Women in Sports Business 2022
Sports Business Journal Power Players: Outside Counsel 2021
Chambers USA: Nationwide: Sports Law 2019-2024 (Associate to Watch, 2019-2020; Up & Coming 2021)
The Legal 500 United States: Industry Focus: Sports 2024
Matters
Some examples of Christine’s work include:
- Representing the NBA with respect to its $5.5 billion league-wide team facilities
- Representing Soccer United Marketing, an affiliate of MLS, in its $25 million financing with a syndicate of Black-owned banks organized by the National Black Bank Foundation, the first major commercial deal in which a U.S. sports league transacted exclusively with Black-owned banks
- Representing two major sports leagues in upsizing and extending their league level financings ($900 million and $575 million, respectively)
- Representing JPMorgan as agent in credit facilities for the Chicago Cubs, the New York Mets, the Arizona Diamondbacks and the Tampa Bay Rays
- Representing the Philadelphia Eagles in financing the team’s renovation of Lincoln Financial Field
- Representing a global financial institution in upsizing and extending a $230 million line of credit for the largest minority owner of an MLB club
- Representing an MLB club in an aggregate $350 million term loan and revolving facility from a subsidiary of a global asset manager
- Representing various NFL owners in financings with JPMorgan and Wells Fargo