New York ? A businessman who made a fortune in billboards won unanimous approval Thursday to buy the Anaheim Angels from Disney, a deal that will make him the first minority with a controlling stake in a major league baseball team.

Arturo Moreno hopes to complete his $184 million purchase of the World Series champions next week, he said after the voice vote by baseball owners.

“Every guy’s dream is to own a baseball team,” he said. “It’s an opportunity I’ve always dreamed about.”

Moreno doesn’t plan any immediate changes for the Angels, who started play in 1961 and finally won their first title last year.

“It’s a learning process,” he said. “I’m going to sit back and listen. I’ve been very successful by surrounding myself with good people and keeping those people in place.”

After the vote, he went to Yankee Stadium to see the Angels play, He sat beside the team’s dugout and saw Alfonso Soriano lead off the bottom of the first with a home run.

Moreno, who is Hispanic and lives in Phoenix and La Jolla, Calif., doesn’t want to be thought of as a minority owner. Even when he was asked a question in Spanish, the fourth-generation American answered in English.

“The first thing is I’m an American,” he said. “I’m proud to be a Mexican-American, but as far as being the first minority, I think most of us are immigrants from some place, and I think we always try to do our best to be Americans.”

While the Seattle Mariners’ majority interest is owned by Hiroshi Yamauchi, who is Japanese, the team has been controlled by John Ellis and Howard Lincoln, both white Americans.

Several other baseball teams are for sale, including the Los Angeles Dodgers and Atlanta Braves, but Moreno said he isn’t worried that the sport is struggling to make money nowadays.

“I look at baseball and think about its history, that it’s been here for a long time,” he said. “It’s a fun thing. It’s a kids’ game.”

The Walt Disney Co. bought a 25 percent share of the Angels and took control of the team from founding owner Gene Autry in 1996, then purchased the remainder of the team after he died in 1998. The company also is trying to sell the Anaheim Mighty Ducks.

“Our primary goal during the time we were privileged to own the Angels was to make sure the team remained as a viable, exciting part of the Anaheim community,” Disney chairman Michael Eisner said. “This goal has clearly been achieved.”

Moreno, 56, once owned a small interest in the Arizona Diamondbacks and still owns a part interest in the Phoenix Suns. His net worth has been estimated at $940 million by Forbes magazine.