Bush joins Romney bid for team; Mas makes separate bid

Jeb Bush is still interested in buying the Miami Marlins and has partnered with Tagg Romney to make a bid that competes against Derek Jeter’s, a source with knowledge of the situation confirmed to the Sun Sentinel.

The source also confirmed that prominent South Florida businessman Jorge Mas is making a separate bid for the team.

Bloomberg was first to report Friday that former Florida Gov. Bush has joined forces with Romney and New York financier Wayne Rothbaum to make a bid of more than $1.1 billion for the Marlins.

The Miami Herald was first to report Mas’ interest.

Friday’s news comes a day after Derek Jeter met with MLB and Marlins officials in New York and told them he hasn’t yet raised the necessary money to buy the team.

Jeter’s group bid about $1.3 billion to buy the Marlins from Jeffrey Loria. A similar bid had been submitted by a group led by Tagg Romney, a Massachusetts businessman and son of former Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney.

Romney has also met with MLB this week regarding the sale, according to FanRag Sports. He joins a Romney group that also includes Hall of Fame pitcher Tom Glavine and former major league pitcher and Arizona Diamondbacks general manager Dave Stewart.

Last week, baseball commissioner Rob Manfred said there were other interested buyers, but that the Jeter and Romney groups were furthest along in the process.

Mas is the Chairman of the Board and Co-Founder of MasTec, an infrastructure engineering and construction company based in Coral Gables, and Chairman of the Board of the Cuban American National Foundation. He’s one of three sons of the late Jorge Mas Canosa, a CubanAmerican immigrant who founded MasTec and CANF.

Bush and Jeter joined forces on a bid in April, and they had an agreement in principle to buy the team from Loria. But as their group sought to raise capital to fulfill the bid, Bush withdrew from his partnership with the legendary New York Yankees shortstop last month.

Rothbaum, founder of Quogue Capital, had been part of a separate previous bid.

Loria, 76, bought the Marlins for $158.5 million in 2002 from John Henry. The Marlins confirmed in February the team was for sale.

The commissioner’s office wants the purchasing group to demonstrate it has enough cash both to close the deal and operate the team.

Manfred said last week that he was hoping to know the identity of a new Marlins owner by late July.

“I’m hoping that we get some clarity well before the [July 31] trading deadline and the most active weeks in July,” Manfred said on SiriusXM Fantasy Sports Radio with Craig Mish and Jim Bowden. “I have no reason to believe the Marlins are going to be quote-unquote sellers in the player market at this point. But I think it would be best for all concerned if we got to the point if we knew who the new owner was going to be before that happened so they could have some input in that process.”

The Marlins host the All-Star Game on July 11.

Mas