Matt's College Sports Media Blog

Economics of Sports A-La-Carte: Would You Pay and Does It Tilt The Playing Field?

2013-05-10T13:31:00.001-04:00

Consider this post a discussion point. Something to make you think.

John McCain introduced a bill on Thursday in the Senate and part of the goal of the bill is to allow consumer choice when selecting the programming they desire to pay. Many other countries, like Canada and the UK, have various versions of a-la-carte offerings with the pay TV providers that serve households.

ESPN is an obvious target of the bill. Per a Variety article on the bill citing SNL Kagan research, ESPN costs a cable provider $4.69 per subscriber, per month (here's a chart with several sports channels as of 2011). As you can see from the chart, that's just the main ESPN as ESPN2, ESPNU and other networks have a much lower price. In the case of ESPN2, it costs a cable provider just 13% of what ESPN costs.

If a-la-carte ever becomes a possibility for consumers, the question then becomes "What am I getting for my money?" on a channel-by-channel basis. And let's not assume that we'll continue to pay $4.69 for ESPN. Assume you'll pay more. Even if 20% of cable subs opt-out of ESPN,the person that wants ESPN is likely paying at least 20% more to cover the loss of customers who don't want ESPN, assuming that Disney wants to maintain a consistent budget level and profit margin. Let's be honest too. If you elect not to pay for ESPN, you probably aren't paying for ESPN2, ESPNU, etc. either. Maybe you are. Maybe some of the niche items on those channels interest you like some of the action sports coverage, the NHRA or something else.

For all of us, we'd have to make decisions. College sports is fairly unique because a large majority of the major conferences have their games delivered to us via national means. Most of us aren't fans of just college sports though.

We luck out with the NFL, because its available on the broadcast networks. There are out-of-market packages. If you're in-market for the team playing on Monday or Thursday night, you're in luck because the game is on a local channel because the NFL mandates a local channel carrying those games as long as they aren't under a blackout. So if you're out of market, you ask yourself "Can I do without those games".

MLB you can luck out with because of the alternate distribution means of RSNs for many ESPN games. The out-of-market fan suffers very little and has multiple choices with MLB.TV and Extra Innings, with the exception of Sunday nights on ESPN...and most of the playoffs.

The main ESPN channel gets the prime content. We can still point to UNC-Duke airing on ESPN2 over 15 years ago as a driving force behind more homes picking up ESPN2, but with the exception of the NHL's tenure on ESPN and concurrent events which necessitates moving an event to ESPN2, pro sports tends to stick on the main channel. Even the college events that end up on ESPN2 are seen as lesser events when airing there, compared to whatever is on ESPN. I really can't think of many concurrent college games lately, now that both ESPN and ESPN2 are in roughly the same number of homes, when looking over the games "on paper" (since we know once a game is played it can be a dog or not) and say "Wow, ESPN2 got the better game than ESPN."

The flipside of ESPN getting those prime events: the need for other channels. Not a fan of any of NBCSN's or CBSSN's properties? You probably aren't paying for them, and they probably are less willing spending the money to become more widely viewed and gain more television rights. Even if NBCSN is willing to pay a premium compared to ESPN for a property, someone like MLB or the Big Ten might be less inclined to move because they know that a fan will have to move their TV subscription with them. Diehards will move, diehards will pay. Will the alum who isn't versed in the nuances of TV rights but discovers on Saturday morning that they now need to pay for a sports channel for one big property, and at a higher rate than they would today in a bundle, be willing to do so?

Another way to look at it: if I'm paying $8-$10 for 1-2 sports channels, and to get one more channel it will push my price to $13-$15 AND I don't intend to drop either of the original two channels because there is still plenty of other content that I find worthy, is it truly worth it? And how would that compare to today's system if I'm paying $11-$12 for all of the content even if I'm only watching 3-4 of the 10-12 sports channels offered to me?

I can't say that bundling or a-la-carte is the right way to go. I can find positives and negatives to each based on my personal situation, and so can you. I can see where the variety of a channel will appeal to more consumers compared to a niche channel. The goal is to be an educated consumer regardless of the system in use.

Recent TV scheduling updates (B1G/SEC/C-USA)

2013-05-08T10:13:00.000-04:00

Some of this may be redundant to things posted on my Twitter timeline. Consider this a recap of sorts.

SEC Network
Going back to this list of questions in a previous blog post, we have a few answers.

AT&T U-Verse was announced as the first provider to carry the network
There will be a specific online component, where content not shown live on the network will air through a dedicated SEC Network online package
Per the Wall Street Journal, ESPN owns the network 100%.
The SEC network will be wholly owned by ESPN, source tells @wsj (paywall). w/@mynameisshalini: online.wsj.com/article/SB1000…
— Rachel Bachman (@Bachscore) May 2, 2013
Per Sports Business Journal, profits will be split 50-50 between ESPN and the SEC
A content board will exist of pIeople from both the SEC office and ESPN. They will determine which games will air on a particular network. We can probably infer that a game was selected by the SEC Network ahead of ESPN/ESPN2/ESPNU, but we probably will never know those games.
It appears that the national cable properties (ESPN/ESPN2/ESPNU) will continue to see the same number of football and men's basketball games
Alterations were made to the CBS contract. Their game window is no longer exclusive. The SEC Network can air a game at the same time as as a game on CBS. Does not appear that right was afforded to ESPN/ESPN2/ESPNU. In addition, the ESPN contract with the conference now extends out to the 2033-34 athletic year.
At least the CSS regional cable package is moving to the SEC Network in 2014. The FOX Sports RSN package will move over in 2015
@mattsarz ESPN did not buy back the FSN games. It has to wait for that contract to end.
— John Ourand (@Ourand_SBJ) May 6, 2013

What isn't known yet

If every SEC school has to appear on the network a specific number of times
If the 12:21pm syndication package is truly going away. Have heard from multiple people that the SEC schools haven't been explicitly told that, but to maintain a consistent level of coverage on ESPN/ESPN2/ESPNU and provide the SEC Network with up to 45 games, you would think they would be going away in 2014.

Big Ten

The conference, ABC/ESPN and BTN selected their night games for 2013. My list differs slightly from the ESPN & Big Ten releases as they list the Notre Dame at Michigan game as possibly airing on ABC/ESPN/ESPN2. Their NASCAR schedule conflicts with that, but maybe something is brewing on the NASCAR side of the house. Hasn't been the first time a race on ESPN Networks has switched to a different channel, but that is usually a Nationwide Series race.

The use of a 6pm window on 9/7 and 9/14, along with the 9pm window on 9/14 is something new. Don't know if that means that the conference will stack the window before the 6pm games, whether its at 12pm or at a later time, with multiple games if ESPN chooses not to take many games for those two weeks.

As for "regional coverage" for the Indiana games on 9/7 and 9/14, that may be more relevant to non-satellite subscribers. I've asked around about those and haven't received an answer from the conference or network. Could be that BTN2Go is required for those outside of Indiana for systems that only have one alternate BTN game-only channel.

Up next, and probably within the next week or so, should be the Big Ten setting the game times for its homecoming games. ABC or ESPN may elect to choose one of these games for either 12pm or 3:30pm if it desires, but most of these will not have TV set for them. With the night game selections, only the homecoming games for Northwestern and Michigan were selected.

Conference USA

A preliminary TV schedule was released for the 2013. At first was a little surprising to see FOX Sports take nearly all of the Thursday and Black Friday games (CBS Sports Network ended up with one game on Black Friday as part of a C-USA & MWC doubleheader). But when you look into the C-USA press release and see that, at a minimum, at least 10 of the 20 games currently selected have to air on FOX Sports 1, it makes a little more sense.

C-USA had nine games scheduled for Thursdays or Black Friday specifically for their TV partners (the Jackson St.-Tulane game was moved by Tulane, not TV). CBSSN took their Black Friday game, and it leaves FOX Sports with eight games. There were only one or two Thursdays where a C-USA game also had a competing Big 12 or Pac-12 game. Assuming they were serious about a weekly Thursday night game, those games should be plugged into the FOX Sports 1 count immediately. That leaves FOX to pick up a 2-4 C-USA Saturday games for FOX Sports 1 to hit their minimum.

Also, the number of games on FOX Sports and CBSSN didn't increase in proportion to the increase in members from 12 to 14 members. CBSSN actually decreased their number of national games to 13 while FOX stayed at 20, though FOX could increase their number though games exclusively on FOX College Sports if they desire to add some. Otherwise, regional partners outside of CSS can start working with individual schools to pick up games. Maybe FSN would look to back fill games lost to FOX Sports One with some regional games.

CBS Sports Network

Looking over the CBSSN schedule of C-USA, Division II, Mountain West and service academy games and they will have a minimum of 49 games on their network for 2013, at least seven more games than last year. Some of that can be attributed to the extra week of the season, but the network still have to account for a 2x increase in the number of MW games. How did they do it?

There a few more late evening (ie. 10-10:30pm ET) kickoffs specifically to account for the MWC
A doubleheader of C-USA and the MWC on Black Friday
Using a pair on Friday night windows outside of Black Friday, specifically one for an Army game
Filling time on the Sunday of Labor Day weekend with Colorado-Colorado St.

The 9/21 3:30pm window is open, presumably for a Patriot League game. They have to carry at least one PL game each year. They could also sublicense an Ivy League game from NBC Sports Network, which they did last year.

Even if the Air Force-Navy game ends up on CBS instead of CBSSN, the addition of their PL game should put them at 50 games for the year. Who knows. Maybe they'll add a couple more CBSSN and MW games too.

Questions I have for SEC Network

2013-05-02T09:45:00.003-04:00

"Project X" gets a real name today. Here's what I'm curious to find out.

Will there be any announced carriers today?
Is there an online component to this channel? I assume so since there is one to Longhorn Network & other ESPN properties.
Will the channel be a multi-screen operation with alternate feeds when multiple games are ongoing in football or basketball? Will it be regional like the Pac-12?
What are the terms of ownership, specifically the conference's stake in the network?
How many times will the SEC Network jump ESPN, ESPN2 or ESPNU?
Will there be less games on the national cable properties?
Besides the institutional game that is being committed to the network, are there any requirements around the number of times each school must appear on the network?

If there is a requirement, will it apply specifically to conference games? In other words, will a school have to appear on the SEC Network in football for at least one conference game like BTN?

Have there been any alterations to CBS's contract which allows for games to be spread out throughout the day? In other words, will CBS's content in football remain non-exclusive with the exception of one window a year, the 12pm window.
Will all the syndication packages go away? I've heard two different responses to that question and it may not yet be resolved.

Let's see if any of these questions get answered.

Quick TV Schedule Notes From the Past Week (4/19/13 - 4/26/13)

2013-04-26T22:26:00.001-04:00

* I thought there was still a slight chance that NBC Sports Network would still end up with some MWC games, particularly after seeing NBCSN's English Premier League plans where most games on their network on Saturday would air before noon ET and, at least with what was announced, no replays/tape delayed airings of games on Saturdays. CBS Sports Network ended that speculation on their side by taking 21 of their 22 possible games. They also happened to take the vast majority of these games (17) as Saturday games. I don't expect ESPN to sublicense any of their MWC content.

* Is there a 22nd CBS Sports Network game? Possibly. I am checking with the conference regarding the status of the conference championship game. CBS Sports Network had the first crack at negotiating to carry the game. It could be considered the 22nd game.

* CBS Sports Network didn't select the Rutgers-Fresno St. game and neither did ESPN. I would guess that ESPN will be picking it up, probably for ESPNU. I don't know if there is interest on either side on moving the game to Friday or Saturday, or if ESPN is trying to move other games to Thursday or Friday to match up with this game on ESPNU.

* The MWC contracts with ESPN and CBS Sports Network allows for ESPN to trade the rights to one Boise St. home game in exchange for a MWC-controlled Boise St. road game. Boise St.'s home game with Nevada ended up on CBSSN and it appears ESPN traded for the BSU road game at Fresno St.

* So far, Hawai'i has four national telecasts, all on CBS Sports Network. Three as part of the MWC schedule and the road game at Navy. If it is true that Hawai'i receives no monetary compensation as part of the MWC television deal, but is allowed to retain its local PPV deal which requires four telecasts, they have at least seven available games right now. ESPN could certainly take another game or two if they desire.

* For "bonus" revenue purposes, both Boise St. and San Jose St. so far have each earned an immediate $600K out of the MWC TV revenue. Boise St. is guaranteed at least three ESPN, ESPN2 or ABC appearances through the MWC every year and one of those appearances looks like it will be on a Saturday unless another MWC controlled BSU game is moved to a weeknight by ESPN, so their minimum of "bonus" revenue is $1.1 million. Air Force, Fresno St., San Diego St., Nevada and Utah St. each earned $300K off the top. Assuming a pool of $20 million in television revenue for 2013, currently $3.2 million is earnmarked for bonuses, with the remaining $16.8 million currently as the amount to be shared equally amount 11 teams. Again, this assumes Hawai'i is not a party to the television contract and keeps its PPV money instead.

Boise St., for the new payout system, would take home approximately $2.643 million in TV money. San Jose St. would earn $2.127 million. The five teams with one national appearance would receive $1.827 million each and the other four teams without a qualifying bonus TV appearance would each earn $1.527 million

* After looking over the available slots for CBS Sports Network, there should be at least 13-18 Conference USA games on the network. That assumes three things:

All open mid-afternoon & primetime go to C-USA
2-3 of the weeknight games end up with CBS Sports Network with the other going to FOX Sports 1
Maybe 1-2 noon EST kickoffs

* NBC announced a shiny new TV deal with Notre Dame, the first time the two entities have contracted with each other beyond a five year term. NBC Sports Network will now end up with select games. The previous deal allowed games to be moved to pay TV, but didn't specify the network and didn't allow NBC to guarantee that a game would air on cable.

Three days later, the ACC announced their grant of rights for the remainder of their TV deal. Particularly with the football scheduling agreement ND has with the conference, it is protection for both sides, even if ND isn't committing the biggest piece of their pie to the deal. ND gets the peace of mind of knowing that the schools currently in the ACC should be around through the remainder of this current TV deal to help them with football scheduling. The grant of rights keeps ND tied to the conference as each football playing ACC member stands to make close to $20 million per year from ESPN, up from slightly over $17.1 million per year, per school.

FOX Sports 1's inaugural Thursday night schedule

2013-04-24T12:58:00.002-04:00

Plenty of ambiguity exists in the initial FOX Sports 1 Thursday night football schedule. FOX's schedule should include a mix of Big 12, Conference USA and Pac-12 games.

8/30:
9/5: FAU at East Carolina or TBA
9/12: TCU at Texas Tech or Tulane at Louisiana Tech
9/19:
9/26: Iowa St. at Tulsa or TBA
10/3: Texas at Iowa St. or UCLA at Utah
10/10: Arizona at USC or TBA
10/17:
10/24: Marshall at Middle Tennessee or TBA
10/31: Arizona St. at Washington St. or Rice at North Texas
11/7: Oklahoma at Baylor or Oregon at Stanford
11/14: Marshall at Tulsa or TBA
11/21:
11/28: Texas Tech at Texas
12/5:

See, ton of ambiguity. A few of these games could be locked in 100%, but there's always the possibility of CBS Sports Network taking a C-USA game or the Pac-12 Network taking a Pac-12 game.

With the current number of games, there could be as many as six C-USA games, 2-4 Pac-12 games and 0-4 Big 12 games, but that leaves some Thursdays not filled. FOX alluded to every Thursday having a football game, and they have Pac-12 and C-USA games to choose for 8/30. Conversely, those two conferences aren't available on 12/5 because of conference championship games, so if there will be a Thursday night game on 12/5 it would have to be a Big 12 game.

The only dates with two game choices for FOX that I feel somewhat certain of the choice are 9/12 and 10/31. On 9/12, ESPN only has a choice of TCU at Texas Tech right now, so if they take that then FOX should have Tulane at Louisiana Tech. For 10/31, ESPN already has USF at Houston, leaving FOX to choose between Arizona St. at Washington St. & Rice at North Texas. CBS Sports Network does not have rights to the Pac-12, so it should end up with Rice at North Texas, leaving Arizona St. at Washington St. for FOX.

ESPN's Thursday night schedule still needs work

2013-04-24T09:23:00.003-04:00

The ESPN Thursday night schedule is less set than the Friday night schedule. Some of this has to do with the forthcoming switch by FOX to FOX Sports 1, who will have the option to select some of these Pac-12 & Big 12 games listed below.

8/29: North Carolina at South Carolina & Ole Miss at Vanderbilt (SEC)
9/5:
9/12: TCU at Texas Tech or TBA (likely Big 12)
9/19: Clemson at NC State (ACC)
9/26: Virginia Tech at Georgia Tech (ACC)
10/3: Texas at Iowa St. OR UCLA at Utah (Big 12 or Pac-12)
10/10: Rutgers at Louisville (American)
10/17: Miami (FL) at North Carolina (ACC)
10/24: Kentucky at Mississippi St. (SEC)
10/31: USF at Houston (American)
11/7: Oklahoma at Baylor OR Oregon at Stanford (Big 12 or Pac-12)
11/14: Georgia Tech at Clemson (ACC)
11/21: Rutgers at UCF (American)
11/28: Ole Miss at Mississippi St. (SEC)
12/5: Louisville at Cincinnati (American)

ESPNU also has five Thursday night games. Four from the Sun Belt and one from the MWC. There will also be some MEAC and SWAC games in the mix to fill out that channel's Thursday schedule.

I don't think you'll see any doubleheaders on ESPN on Thursdays besides the opening weekend, so the Arizona St. at Washington St. game on 10/31 will probably end up on FOX Sports 1. The same goes for the Thanksgiving game involving Texas Tech & Texas.

So who ends up on 9/5? I thought Houston at Temple was likely because there was no NFL schedule announcement until last week. It also happens to be the opening night of the NFL season, so it could be a night ESPN is trying to stay away from, though they are scheduling against the Thanksgiving night NFL game along with all the other Thursday night NFL games. I don't think its going to be the Sacramento St.-Arizona St. game. Then again, F/X ended up televising Portland St. at Washington last year early in the year. Maybe ESPN gets stuck with it and puts it on ESPNU.

The only other conference I would consider targeting for 9/5 is the Big Ten, but they did move a couple games to 8/30, presumably at least one or both to air on BTN.

So who do you think ends up on 9/5? Your choices are here.

ESPN's Friday night schedule

2013-04-24T07:47:00.000-04:00

ESPN's main Friday night schedule (ie. excluding Black Friday, where there's multiple games during the day) seems to be close to taking shape. Here it is:

8/30: Texas Tech at SMU (American)
9/6: Wake Forest at Boston College (ACC)
9/13: Air Force at Boise St. (MWC)
9/20: Boise St. at Fresno St. (MWC)
9/27: Utah St. at San Jose St. (MWC)
10/4: Nevada at San Diego St. (MWC)
10/11: Temple at Cincinnati (American)
10/18: UCF at Louisville (American)**
10/25: Boise St. at BYU (BYU)
11/1:
11/8: Louisville at Cincinnati (American)**
11/15:
11/22: Navy at San Jose St.*
11/29: Black Friday
12/6: MAC Championship*

* Airs on ESPN2
** Either ESPN or ESPN2

The 11/1 & 11/15 games appear to be a pair of Pac-12 games. USC at Oregon St. is scheduled for 11/1 and Washington at UCLA is on 11/15. There is also one ESPNU Friday game currently scheduled and that is the Air Force at New Mexico game on 11/8.

ESPN is also listing the Wake Forest-Boston College and Temple-Cincinnati games as airing on ESPN or ESPN2. Their NASCAR press release says the Nationwide race those evenings will air on ESPN2, so I think the games will air on ESPN unless something changes.

There are a handful of other games scheduled for Fridays during the season currently not set for television, again excluding Black Friday. Here's the games between FBS schools:

8/30: FAU at Miami (FL) - ESPNU or ESPN3
8/30: Western Michigan at Michigan St. - I think this ends up airing on BTN
9/27: Middle Tennessee at BYU - ESPN2 or ESPNU
10/4: BYU at Utah St. - I lean towards CBS Sports Network since ESPN didn't take this one initially

Realigning your TV now that your school is changing conferences

2013-04-02T12:55:00.001-04:00

So your school has elected to move to a new conference. You might be asking yourself "Where can I find my team this season" (maybe you aren't, but humor me). Here's where you need to look.

ACC: Incoming for new football members Syracuse & Pittsburgh. ABC and ESPN Networks will handle the bulk of the content on a national basis, so not much has changed for those two schools. Raycom handles a syndicated package of football games that airs at 12:30pm ET every week called the ACC Network. Think of it like the Big East Network's main 12pm game. There's also a 3pm ET game most weeks that airs on regional cable networks like FOX Sports South, NESN and Comcast SportsNet Mid-Atlantic. RSNs like SportsNet New York, MSG, MSG Plus and ROOT Sports Pittsburgh could end up airing those games. Keep an eye out on the ACC spring meetings and media days as more information re: the RSN in your area could be revealed.

The regional games also air on ESPN3/WatchESPN, and the 12:30pm game is also streamed at the ACC website.

After the 1st three weeks of the season, the conference has its television selections made 12 days before kickoff. There are also four options that ESPN can use to determine kickoff times as little as six days beforehand.

Big East: Four new members of the conference are coming in from Conference USA. ESPN is the primary rights holder and there will be games on ABC, ESPN cable networks and ESPN3. The last year of the football contract stays intact, you'll also have a syndication package known as the Big East Network that ESPN manages. The games are carried in local markets of all the schools plus some surrounding areas and two RSNs that have carried the games in prior years include SNY & MASN.

Unlike C-USA, many Saturday kickoff times are determined 12 days in advance by television. ESPN has at least 1-2 options to set kickoff times as little as six days in advance.

C-USA: Welcoming schools from the WAC, Sun Belt, FCS (Old Dominion is considered part of the TV package this year, even though they are a transitioning school)...its a melting pot. FOX Sports is the primary C-USA television partner, with games expected to air on FOX Sports 1 and FSN. I know that FSN isn't in every market, particularly those Old Dominion fans, so keep an eye out on that and hope that most C-USA games air on FOX Sports 1. CBS Sports Network also has a contract with the conference for at least 15 football games. There are also some regional games airing on CSS, Comcast SportsNet Houston and probably some other cable based RSNs in the conference's footprint.

If previous seasons are an indicator, some kickoff times will be set before the season starts. CBS Sports Network and the regional partners were usually firm in setting their times in advance, while FOX Sports was more flexible with their Saturday times as they were scheduling games around Big 12 and Pac-12 games.

MWC: For San Jose St. and Utah St. (and I guess for Boise St. and San Diego St. as partial refresher), CBS Sports Network is considered the primary rightsholder and ESPN will also have rights to pick up football games. With the new deals, I'm a little in the dark as to whether there will be selections by either network during the season. It is known that ESPN will have the rights to Boise St. home games and that CBS Sports Network will be able to choose eight games to air, excluding Boise St. home games (though there is an exception to that rule), in a "game draft" of sorts.

Sun Belt: For the Georgia St. and Texas St. fans, ESPN is the primary rightsholder and they tend to select nearly all of their telecasts before the season starts, often as weeknight telecasts. There will probably be some ESPN3 games selected during the year, and the Sun Belt Network package co-managed by Comcast & Cox remains intact. Most Sun Belt kickoff times are set before the season starts and they generally do not change, even for ESPN3 games.

New Mexico St. and Idaho: You guys are on your own for this year, so you have some freedom to choose who should air your games and, for the most part since neither of you appear to be tied to a network, when your games will kick off. New Mexico St. is in a better position because they have their AggieVision production facilities to use for home games, so they may be able to strike a deal to have those carried via out-of-market services like ESPN3, ESPN Game Plan or FOX Sports Go.

Early Season CFB TV Schedule Guesses

2013-04-01T10:53:00.000-04:00

Didn't want to wait around for the MWC to finish its schedule. Also didn't want to wait for the NFL schedule on April 16th. Here's what I'm thinking for the 1st three weeks of the 2013 CFB season when it comes to TV scheduling. I don't plan on revising at this point.

Expect it to be incorrect. Don't use this as a guideline. Have some fun with it.

Week One

Week Two

Week Three

Week Three CFB Guesses

2013-04-01T10:52:00.002-04:00

Thursday
TCU at Texas Tech, 7:30pm ESPN
Tulane at Louisiana Tech, 8pm FOX Sports 1

Friday
MWC Game, 9pm ESPN

Saturday
UCF at Penn St., 12pm ESPN
Louisville at Kentucky, 12pm ESPN2
Georgia St. at West Virginia, 12pm FOX Sports 1
Mississippi St. at Auburn, 12pm ESPNU
Kent St. at LSU, 12pm SEC Network
Southern Miss at Arkansas, 12pm SEC/FOX RSNs
Stanford at Army, 12pm CBS Sports Network
Bowling Green at Indiana, 12pm BTN
Akron at Michigan, 12pm BTN
Georgia Tech at Duke, 12:30pm ACC Network
Boston College at USC, 3pm Pac-12 Network
Fresno St. at Colorado, 3pm Pac-12 Network
Southern Utah at Washington St., 3pm Pac-12 Network
Vanderbilt at South Carolina, 3:30pm CBS
Ole Miss at Texas, 3:30pm ABC/ESPN
Washington vs. Illinois, 3:30pm ABC/ESPN
Iowa at Iowa St., 3:30pm ESPN2
Kansas at Rice, 3:30pm FOX Sports 1
Maryland at Connecticut, 3:30pm ESPNU
Delaware at Navy, 3:30pm CBS Sports Network
Western Illinois at Minnesota, 3:30pm BTN
Youngstown St. at Michigan St., 3:30pm BTN
Western Michigan at Northwestern, 3:30pm BTN
New Mexico at Pittsburgh, 3:30pm ACC RSNs
Ohio St. at California, 7pm FOX
Tulsa at Oklahoma, 7pm FOX Sports 1
UCLA at Nebraska, 7pm ESPN
Nevada at Florida St., 7pm ESPNU
Massachusetts at Kansas St., 7pm FOX Sports Midwest
Lamar at Oklahoma St., 7pm FOX Sports Southwest
Northwestern St. at Cincinnati, 7pm FOX Sports Ohio
Tennessee at Oregon, 7:30pm ESPN2
Virginia Tech at East Carolina, 7:30pm CBS Sports Network
Notre Dame at Purdue, 8pm ABC
Alabama at Texas A&M, 8pm CBS
UTSA at Arizona, 10pm Pac-12 Network
Oregon St. at Utah, 10pm Pac-12 Network
Wisconsin at Arizona St., 10:30pm FOX Sports 1

Saturday ESPN3 Exclusives
Eastern Michigan at Rutgers
FAU at USF
Fordham at Temple
Wagner at Syracuse
UL-Monroe at Wake Forest

Week Two CFB Guesses

2013-04-01T10:51:00.000-04:00

* My thought on Houston-Temple being a Thursday night game is that we're waiting for final confirmation on the NFL schedule. The Eagles aren't expected to play the opening Thursday night, but ESPN and the conference may be waiting for the NFL to give the go-ahead to officially set the date.
* ABC has NASCAR in the evening on Saturday, so there will not be a primetime game. Notre Dame-Michigan is expected to air in primetime on ESPN.

Thursday
Houston at Temple, 7:30pm ESPN
UCF at FIU, 8pm FOX Sports 1
Sacramento St. at Arizona St., 10pm Pac-12 Network

Friday
Wake Forest at Boston College, 8pm ESPN

Saturday
West Virginia at Oklahoma, 12pm ESPN
USF at Michigan St., 12pm ESPN2
UL-Lafayette at Kansas St., 12pm FOX Sports 1
Navy at Indiana, 12pm ESPNU
Toledo at Missouri, 12pm SEC Network
Eastern Michigan at Penn St., 12pm BTN
Southern Miss at Nebraska 12pm BTN
San Diego St. at Ohio St., 12pm BTN
Duke at Memphis, 12pm Big East Network
Middle Tennessee at North Carolina, 12:30pm ACC Network
Hawai'i at Oregon St., 3pm Pac-12 Network
Weber St. at Utah, 3pm Pac-12 Network
South Carolina St. at Clemson, 3pm ACC RSNs
Florida at Miami (FL), 3:30pm ABC
Texas at BYU, 3:30pm ESPN2
Miami (OH) at Kentucky, 3:30pm ESPNU
Oklahoma St. at UTSA, 3:30pm FOX Sports 1
Missouri St. at Iowa, 3:30pm BTN
Syracuse at Northwestern, 3:30pm BTN
Tennessee Tech at Wisconsin, 3:30pm BTN
Stephen F. Austin at Texas Tech, 3:30pm FOX Sports Southwest
Norfolk St. at Rutgers, 3:30pm SNY
South Carolina at Georgia, 4pm ESPN
Washington St. at USC, 7pm FOX
Oregon at Virginia, 7pm ESPN2
Buffalo at Baylor, 7pm FOX Sports 1
Western Kentucky at Tennessee, 7pm ESPNU
UAB at LSU, 7pm SEC/FOX RSNs
Cincinnati at Illinois, 7pm BTN
Indiana St. at Purdue, 7pm BTN
Southeastern Louisiana at TCU, 7pm FOX Sports Southwest
South Dakota at Kansas, 7pm Jayhawk Network
Sam Houston St. at Texas A&M, 7pm PPV
Southeast Missouri at Ole Miss, 7pm PPV
Alcorn St. at Mississippi St., 7pm PPV
Samford at Arkansas, 7pm PPV
Austin Peay at Vanderbilt, 7:30pm SEC/CSS
Notre Dame at Michigan, 8pm ESPN
FAU at East Carolina, 7pm CBS Sports Network
Central Arkansas at Colorado, 10pm Pac-12 Network
Portland St. at California, 10pm Pac-12 Network
San Jose St. at Stanford, 10:30pm ESPN2
Arizona at UNLV, 10:30pm CBS Sports Network

Saturday ESPN3 Exclusives
Old Dominion at Maryland
Richmond at NC State
Western Carolina at Virginia Tech
Montana St. at SMU
Eastern Kentucky at Louisville

Week One CFB Guesses

2013-04-01T10:49:00.002-04:00

I figure if they can keep scheduling, I can keep writing these articles guessing their TV decisions for the early season. Revision of week one now that we know the full Big East schedule, a few weeknight schedule adjustments, some MWC games will air on ESPN networks and the creation of a network known as FOX Sports 1. I'm also assuming that ESPN2 will be unavailable on Thursday & Friday due to US Open tennis commitments, along with Saturday night for NASCAR Nationwide Series racing.

All times Eastern. If a game isn't listed, assume a regional telecast, web video from the school or ESPN3.

Thursday
North Carolina at South Carolina, 6pm ESPN (confirmed)
Akron at UCF, 7pm ESPNU
UNLV at Minnesota, 8pm BTN
Indiana St. at Indiana, 8pm BTN
Utah St. at Utah, 9pm FOX Sports 1
Ole Miss at Vanderbilt, 9:15pm ESPN (confirmed)
Rutgers at Fresno St., 10:15pm ESPNU
USC at Hawai'i, 11pm CBS Sports Network

Friday
Morgan St. at Army, 7pm CBS Sports Network (confirmed)
Western Michigan at Michigan St., 7:30pm BTN
Texas Tech at SMU, 8pm ESPN (confirmed)
North Dakota St. at Kansas St., 8:30pm FOX Sports 1 (confirmed)
Northern Arizona at Arizona, 10pm Pac-12 Networks

Saturday
Penn St. vs. Syracuse, 12pm ESPN
Purdue at Cincinnati, 12pm ESPN2
Old Dominion at East Carolina, 12pm FOX Sports 1
Ohio at Louisville, 12pm ESPNU
UL-Lafayette at Arkansas, 12pm SEC Network
Massachusetts at Wisconsin, 12pm BTN
Central Michigan at Michigan, 12pm BTN
BYU at Virginia, 12:30pm ACC Network
Louisiana Tech at NC State, 3pm ACC RSNs
Nicholls St. at Oregon, 3pm Pac-12 Network
Buffalo at Ohio St., 3:30pm ABC
Northwestern at California, 3:30pm ESPN2
Temple at Notre Dame, 3:30pm NBC
Washington St. at Auburn, 3:30pm ESPNU
Northern Illinois at Iowa 3:30pm BTN
William & Mary at West Virginia, 4pm ROOT Sports or Moutaineer Sports
Miami (OH) at Marshall, 3:30pm FOX Sports 1
Virginia Tech vs. Alabama, 5:30pm ESPN (confirmed)
Austin Peay at Tennessee, 6pm PPV
Boise St. at Washington, 7pm FOX
UL-Monroe at Oklahoma, 7pm FOX Sports 1
Rice at Texas A&M, 7pm ESPNU
Toledo at Florida, 7pm SEC/FOX RSNs
Wofford at Baylor, 7pm FOX Sports SW
Wyoming at Nebraska, 7pm BTN
Southern Illinois at Illinois, 7pm BTN
McNeese St. at USF, 7pm Bright House Sports
Murray St. at Missouri, 7pm PPV
Georgia at Clemson, 8pm ABC (confirmed)
Colorado vs. Colorado St., 8pm CBS Sports Network
Northern Iowa at Iowa St., 8pm CyclonesTV
New Mexico St. at Texas, 8pm Longhorn Network
LSU vs. TCU, 9pm ESPN (confirmed)
Nevada at UCLA, 10pm Pac-12 Network
Eastern Washington at Oregon St., 10pm Pac-12 Network

Sunday
Mississippi St. vs. Oklahoma St., 3:30pm ESPN - With Reliant Stadium unavailable on Friday due to Southern-Houston, the date for this game may depend on how quickly they need to turn over the stadium and if the Texans are scheduled for a preseason game at home on August 28-29

Monday
Florida St. at Pittsburgh, 8pm ESPN (confirmed)

ESPN3 Exclusives (Saturday unless noted)
Presbyterian at Wake Forest (Thursday)
Towson at Connecticut (Thursday)
FAU at Miami (FL) (Friday)
Southern at Houston (Friday)
FIU at Maryland
Elon at Georgia Tech
NC Central at Duke
Villanova at Boston College
Kentucky vs. Western Kentucky

Appearances vs. Games In Basketball Contracts

2013-03-26T12:06:00.000-04:00

There is some confusion out there regarding the current Big East extending their contract with CBS Sports to show men's basketball games on CBS broadcast network. Both the Big East and CBS press releases note "up to 12 appearances". 12 appearances though do not equate to 12 games.

A conference game for the purpose of the contract counts as two appearances. Further, CBS can count a team playing in a non-conference game, regardless of where it is played, as one appearance. CBS isn't alone in phrasing contracts for basketball as appearances vs. games. ESPN does this too as this press release with the WCC shows (see the part re: 48 appearances).

Anyways, here's how appearances broke down for the regular season (ie. not part of a conference tournament) on CBS. Note that CBS sublicenses games from ESPN from ACC, Big 12 and Pac-12 home arenas, so that muddles the numbers even further. This was mangled here as well.

ACC - 6
A-10 - 4
Big 12 - 8
Big East - 13
Big Ten - 18
Pac-12 - 4
SEC - 13

Note the ACC appearance number of six matches what the Sporting News articles says with respect to games.

33 regular season games, 66 appearances.

Units Earned in 2013 NCAA Tournament by Conference

2013-03-25T12:32:00.000-04:00

Its not always about TV. Here are the units earned by conference.

A conference or independent school earns a unit for each game they participate in for the entire tournament except the national championship game. A unit earned this year will be worth approximately $245.5K.

EDIT: Was able to confirm from Greg Shaheen that the First Four games are treated equally when it comes to earning a unit.

@mattsarz First 4 counts the same. So, the Explorers have earned 4 units so far for the A10. Ea unit=approx $245,500 for 6 yrs
— Greg Shaheen (@gashaheen) March 26, 2013

ACC = 10
Atlantic 10 = 12
Atlantic Sun = 3
Big 12 = 8
Big East = 19
Big Ten = 20
CAA = 2
C-USA = 2
Ivy League = 2
MEAC = 2
MVC = 7
MWC = 7
Pac-12 = 10
SEC = 7
Sun Belt = 2
WCC = 4

All conferences not listed each earned one unit.

A few MWC related items from their ESPN contract

2013-03-22T10:33:00.000-04:00

A few items about the MWC deal, at least for the 2013 football season and a basketball scheduling thought.

MWC Release

ESPN Release

Boise St. Release (because it has some BSU specific info)

* You can call this a backpedal if you want. When I saw that CBS Sports Network had rights for up to 22 MWC football games, that really felt like a lot for a single channel that also has to carry football games from Army, Navy, a Division II package and C-USA. They certainly can be creative with their scheduling of C-USA and the MWC, plus the D-II package is typically Thursdays. But I guess that NBC Sports Network could still be in the game for a portion of the MWC games, just not directly from the conference. If CBSSN has the ability to sublicense any of their content, and they very well could, NBCSN could be a destination for some of it provided they have the room and desire to carry it around their other properties. With that said, if I'm CBSSN, I don't sublicense my content. I keep it, build my network and not help anyone else. Particularly now that the MWC has a partner in ESPN who is in plenty of homes with all of their properties, even ESPN3.

With that said, I don't think anyone in the conference would be upset if CBSSN licensed some of their games to a network which is in more homes like NBCSN. Either way, we will probably know more in the next few weeks as the TV partners build the schedule.

* Going back to CBSSN and sublicensing, the same holds true for the football championship game, which the conference says they are negotiating with CBSSN for telecast rights. If CBS can convince the SEC to move their start time to 6pm ET, you could probably place the MWC title game at 2pm ET / Noon MT / 11am PT / 10am Hawai'i time. I know that isn't the best time in the world for Hawai'i to host at, but I think you have to look at them as the outlier.

* ESPN's MWC rights this year include the following Boise St. home games: Southern Miss, UT-Martin, Air Force, Nevada, New Mexico and Wyoming. Colorado St., Fresno St., San Diego St. and Utah St. are the road games. Per the agreement, ESPN can trade one BSU home with CBS Sports Network for a road game. I'd strongly consider doing that this year and try to grab one of the road games in California or the Utah St. game and dump one of the home games. Just don't expect CBS to be willing to do that if the home game offered up is the UT-Martin game. Have to believe ESPN is stuck with that for ESPN3.

* CBS Sports Network gets to pick the top eight MWC games. I don't think they are limited to a certain number of non-conference or conference games. If I were to draft eight games off the top, it would look something like this:

USC at Hawai'i

Notre Dame at Air Force (with possibility of CBS broadcast network)

Boise St. at San Diego St.

Boise St. at Fresno St.

Boise St. at Utah St.

BYU at Utah St.

Fresno St. at San Diego St.

Colorado vs. Colorado St.

I don't think that CBSSN can take both Rutgers at Fresno St. and USC at Hawai'i because of the possibility of starting one of the games in the late afternoon locally, so if I'm making the choice, I go for USC-Hawai'i. Taking three Boise St.'s best road games is a no brainer, especially if you have to bargain with ESPN for one of their home games. Same with Notre Dame at Air Force, and that's a game I'd look to consider for a CBS broadcast window if AFA is cool playing at 9:30am or 10am local time.

* ESPN getting some MWC basketball games during the season will be interesting. If the conference retains its conference scheduling format of games on either Tuesday or Wednesday plus Saturday, they could certainly slide in a weekly game on Tuesday nights on ESPNU at 11pm ET (9pm MT/8pm PT) without much trouble. CBSSN could retain its weekly Wednesday game and they each take a game on the weekend, plus whatever they elect to choose from the non-conference portion of the schedule.

Reading tea leaves from the Big East and ESPN

2013-03-19T18:42:00.000-04:00

ESPN Press Release
Big East Press Release

Do you think these press releases are contradictory at times and intentionally vague? I do. I guess we've been spoiled with shared deals from the SEC, Pac-12, C-USA and Big 12 in recent years where the number of games for national distribution was clearly spelled out. Reads a lot more like the ACC press release in 2010, except it doesn't even feel like both releases are on the same page.

ESPN: Every conference-controlled football game will be available via a television or digital platform.
Big East: Nearly 90 percent of the games will be carried on national broadcast or national cable.

The Big East release made a point to note that this deal would have an increased minimum in terms of the number of games. The current deal had a staggered set of minimums. 17 games on ABC/ESPN/ESPN2 with at least three on ABC, plus a minimum of five games on ESPNU. Note that when the deal was written ESPNU was in far fewer homes than it is today.

Let's say that the deal is now for 27-28 games as a minimum on those networks and I'm basing that on 22 games over 8 teams now being 27 games over 10 teams, possibly increasing to 33 over 12 teams (note: Navy's home games remain with CBS until possibly 2018). One thing that ESPN has done with the recent deal with the Big 12 for example is to say they have 18 games and they could air anywhere across ABC/ESPN/ESPN2. The difference was that between FOX and ESPN was the requirement of national distribution on their various networks.

Next question is how you define the word "televise". The ESPN release notes the use of digital platforms and it isn't mentioned with respect to football & men's basketball. Even if you have a larger number of national television exposures on those platforms, does national distribution include ESPN3? Most folks aren't fans of that because ESPN3 can be tied to subscribing to the right TV or ISP provider. But I can tell you that many schools and conferences will use the word "televise" instead of "webcasted" or "webstreamed", though I think equating ESPN3 with television is disingenuous. Most of us can't turn on our TV and find ESPN3 unless our cable provider has access to show some ESPN3 games like Time Warner does, or if you have the right infrastructure on your home network to show those games on your big screen (ie. cable from the laptop, using an XBox or software to stream to a PS3).

ESPN: Brief notes about sublicensing to national & regional networks
Big East: Sublicensing was not noted, but syndication & local games are going away.

There has been some rumors about FOX licensing content, probably football, for FOX Sports 1. How much of that content they can pick up remains to be seen. Let's say there are 70 football slots (5 per week, four on Saturday, one on Thursday for 14 weeks). If C-USA continues to take 20 (no word on if this changed with the changes in membership, assuming for now it didn't), Pac-12 takes 10 & Big 12 takes up 30. That would leave the around ten slots for the Big East.

If a regional package does remain, or we see a blended version of regional/national exposure, FSN works quite well, especially if the SEC Network starts up in 2014-15 because those RSNs will lose some football content, in addition to whatever they lose when FOX Sports 1 starts up in August. Nearly every market is covered via FSN or an affiliate of their network

Tulane, SMU, Houston = FOX Sports SW & the New Orleans sub-feed
UCF & USF = FOX Sports Florida & Sun Sports
East Carolina & Memphis = FOX Sports South & SportSouth (though SportSouth is limited in eastern NC)
UConn = MSG & MSG Plus (as affiliate of FSN)
Cincinnati = FOX Sports Ohio

Only Temple is out of luck when it comes to FSN either with an affiliate or a FOX owned RSN. Comcast SportsNet does license ACC games from Raycom using a FOX-like production (maybe FOX sells the games to RSNs for Raycom??). Last year, FSN games were infrequently cleared WMCN (channel 44) in the area.

ESPN: Discussion that 170 men's basketball games will be aired across various platforms
Big East: At least 107 men's basketball games will be televised on national broadcast or national cable

Goes back to the football discussion. Which is it? The 107 number seems rights when you multiple 170 * .63, so what happens to the rest? Also with the conference tournament, the conference release says the entire thing will be on national TV. The ESPN release doesn't have that info, but both releases mention that the championship game will be on ESPN or ABC.

By the way, in the ESPN press release, they note that CBS will have a men's basketball package. On the media conference call, Mike Aresco sidestepped the question, but noted that his former employer has been a good partner and they would have an announcement with a broadcast network next week.

I'll be a little fair now. After finishing the conference call, it is abundantly clear there are details to be fleshed out. That doesn't necessarily surprise me. I remember emailing Pac-12 officials after their media rights deals were signed and received replies that included the words "We haven't decided that yet", "Still working on TV", "Our partners will be discussing that with the conference soon". I hope they are positives for the conference and its members.

Seeding guesses for 2013 NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament

2013-03-17T11:13:00.003-04:00

My guesses on seedings for tonight's selection show. Looked over top 50 wins, RPI, BPI, Ken Pomeroy's rankings and made a few adjustments here or there. This is what I'm going with. I'm not assigning anyone to a site or a particular game. Too many rules and I have a headache.

The first four games I have are:

James Madison vs. LIU Brooklyn - 16 seed
North Carolina A&T vs. Liberty - 16 seed
Illinois vs. California -12 seed
LaSalle vs. Southern Miss - 12 seed

The way I initially ranked the teams on the 12 line would have had LaSalle facing Temple. I'm guessing the tournament selection committee would not attempt to place teams from the same conference in the First Four, so Temple got a pass.

Bold = Automatic qualifiers

1 - Louisville, Indiana, Kansas, Gonzaga
2 - Duke, Florida, Miami (FL), Ohio St.
3 - New Mexico, Michigan St., Michigan, Georgetown
4 - Arizona, Saint Louis, Oklahoma St., Marquette
5 - Memphis, VCU, Creighton, Wisconsin
6 - Syracuse, Colorado St., UNLV, Kansas St.
7 - Butler, North Carolina, UCLA, Pittsburgh
8 - NC State, San Diego St., Missouri, Wichita St.
9 - Belmont, Oregon, St. Mary's, Notre Dame
10 - Middle Tennessee, Minnesota, Colorado, Iowa St.
11 - Cincinnati, Oklahoma, Ole Miss, Boise St.
12 - Akron, Temple, LaSalle/Southern Miss, Illinois/California
13 - Bucknell, Valparaiso, New Mexico St., Davidson
14 - South Dakota St., Iona, Northwestern St., Harvard
15 - Montana, Pacific, Florida Gulf Coast, Albany
16 - Western Kentucky, Southern, James Madison/LIU Brooklyn, North Carolina A&T/Liberty

Provisionally listing Saint Louis, Miami (FL), Florida & Ohio St. as winning their conference tournaments. Shouldn't affect seeding if they lose in my opinion

Under consideration: Kentucky, Villanova, Baylor, Stanford, Tennessee, Maryland, Denver, Alabama, Iowa, Virginia.

Even if one of the four provisional champions lost today, it would not affect the field.

Multiple bid conferences (19 single bid conferences)
ACC - 4
Atlantic 10 - 5
Big 12 - 5
Big Ten - 7
Big East - 7
C-USA - 2
MVC - 2
MWC - 5
Pac-12 - 5
SEC - 3
Sun Belt - 2
WCC - 2

Hawai'i not part of MWC TV deals?

2013-03-11T12:59:00.001-04:00

This is culled from a series of tweets. You may have already read some of these.

A few days ago I wrote about the forthcoming MWC TV deal with ESPN and that we needed to see some finalized details before any judgments could be made whether a school like Boise St. would benefit more than 11 other schools.

Let's knock that down to ten other schools.

The Honolulu Star-Advertiser reports that Hawai'i will not share in this new TV deal as they are not a full member of the conference. SBNation's MWCConnection provides a synopsis of the S-A's article. And for the moment, let's not go down the road of whether they desire to be a full member nor whether they MWC wants them to be one. Leave realignment out of this for the moment. Fact is, Hawai'i and the MWC have a "quid pro quo" relationship. Under the new playoff rules, the highest ranked conference champion for the "group of five" will play in an access bowl, so the MWC provides UH a place to win a conference. On the flipside, UH provides the conference a 12th member, which is still the magic number of members needed to hold a conference championship game in football, which the MWC will hold in '13 and monetizing as part of their TV deal.

Instead of being part of the monetary portion of the TV deal (apparently UH will remain a participant with respect to providing their games), UH will continue its pay-per-view package with Oceanic Time Warner cable. By not sharing in the conference TV contract, more money could be left behind in the shared pool of revenue if UH is not participating, particularly if UH has any of their games which would have qualified for the TV bonuses of playing on a national network.

The school requested four MWC games. The MWCConnection article states that UH already has two non-conference games for the PPV package, but I honestly can't figure out where that comes from. Of the four non-conference games:

UH controls TV rights to two games. I can't see the USC game being on PPV. The Army game I think is a possibility.
The road games at Oregon St. and Navy are on broadly distributed networks. I'm assuming that Oceanic has access to both the Pac-12 Networks and CBS Sports Network.

UH may be continuing to work towards adding a 13th game against an FCS team. That could be a 2nd non-conference PPV game.

If UH is asking for four MWC games to be made available for PPV, that leads me to believe that the MWC could be done with negotiations for national TV partners and that a regional package could be on the horizon. When CBS adjusted their TV contract with the conference, they allowed for two packages to be sold. I don't know how the packages were defined (ie. if CBS or the conference agreed that a package was 10 games in size) or if what ESPN bought was both packages or a single package. If it was a single package, the regional package could still be in play for someone to step up, produce & syndication to various networks.

The UH football schedule should be finalized with the remaining MWC games in April. My guess is that until all TV partners are finalized, they don't want to release a schedule where game dates could change. The UH PPV package usually includes multiple football games along with some women's volleyball matches and a few men & women's basketball games. Many UH events, including the bulk of the men's basketball home schedule, are also locally broadcast on Oceanic's Channel 16.

A few items re: MWC TV & Thursday nights

2013-03-08T10:24:00.000-05:00

* The terms of the ESPN contract with the MWC have not come out yet. Lets take a breath here.

It is for "up to" 22 games, so they is probably some minimum number of games that ESPN has to carry across their networks. It will include Boise St. home games.
Until we see the terms of the agreements in a press release or have details leak out, let's not assume that every game is on ABC, ESPN or ESPN2. The bonus pool, as indicated in the term sheet leaked to the Idaho Statesmen, narrowly defined the bonus pool towards six networks that were in 90 million homes. ESPNU is in 73 million homes and not part of the bonus pool. There's time to fill in the late Saturdays evenings most weeks on ESPNU and many Thursdays & Fridays. In short, until a schedule comes out, I don't know that we can assume that every Boise St. home game is going to put them in the bonus.
The biggest bonus provided with the pool is a Saturday game on one of the six networks ($500K). A smaller bonus of $300K is paid for weeknight games on those networks. Again, lets see a schedule. We should be able to quickly figure out from there whether Boise St. makes out like a bandit or not.
I think the bigger key is the "up to" 25 men's basketball games. The MWC has improved as a basketball conference over the past few years, in some ways out of the spotlight. That spotlight should return and can only benefit the conference when it comes to recruiting.
I'll need it explained to me how CBS is still the "primary" rightsholder if their games are on CBS Sports Network and appear to be paying less money than ESPN. Only thing I can come up with is that CBS is paying for only a handful of games and ESPN is getting more games, but not necessarily top tier. No, not every Boise St. home game is a top tier game. Going to be hard to get "bonus" money out of the UT-Martin game.
They still need to hash out getting paid for non-conference games outside of the TV deal. I'm having a hard time figuring out how they can get paid for games their contract has no control over.

* The news of the MWC signing the ESPN deal wasn't completely surprising because it was the goal to sign a deal with a network that the conference could use to pay out the bonus money. And that meant NBC Sports Network was going to be left behind with it only at 78 million homes. The MWC still has a package of games to sell. The next package could end up as a regional network package, and if that happens, it would leave NBC Sports Network/Versus without FBS football for the 1st time since 2005, when it was OLN.

I feel conflicted about that. MWC fans don't have any love for the folks at Comcast but believed things would be different with the NBC branding. They went after the Pac-12 extremely hard, but were beat out by the ESPN & FOX dual bid. Never had a chance with the Big 12 as those rights never went to the open market. Seemed to be in it to win it when it came to the Big East, but the moving parts of realignment may have given them pause in regards to how much they were willing to offer. They're left with the CAA & Ivy League, plus will have Saturdays filled with the English Premier League & MLS, plus open wheel racing programming from Formula One & the IRL. They've become the alternative at this point. Not the worst thing in the world.

* When FOX said that FOX Sports 1 would have regular Thursday night, they weren't messing around. With respect to the Big 12, Pac-12 & C-USA, we won't know who will be televising those teams Thursday night games. In the case of the former two, ESPN & FOX and for C-USA, CBS Sports Network or FOX. I do think its interesting that when the NFL started their regular Thursday night series that it would kill off scheduling top games on Thursday nights. If anything, ESPN and FOX are doubling down.

8/28: North Carolina-South Carolina & Ole Miss-Vanderbilt (ESPN), ??? (FS1)
9/7: ??? (ESPN & FS1, I think Sacramento St.-Arizona St. ends up with the Pac-12 Network)
9/14: TCU-Texas Tech (ESPN or FS1)
9/21: Clemson-NC State (ESPN), ??? (FS1)
9/28: Virginia Tech-Georgia Tech (ESPN), Iowa St.-Tulsa (FS1 or CBSSN)
10/3: UCLA-Utah & Texas-Iowa St. (ESPN or FS1)
10/10: Rutgers-Louisville (ESPN), Arizona-USC (ESPN ?? or FS1)
10/17: Miami (FL)-North Carolina (ESPN), ??? (FS1)
10/24: Kentucky-Mississippi St. (ESPN), Marshall-Middle Tennessee (FS1 or CBSSN)
10/31: USF-Houston (ESPN), Arizona St.-Washington St. (ESPN ?? or FS1)
11/7: Oregon-Stanford & Oklahoma-Baylor (ESPN or FS1)
11/14: Georgia Tech-Clemson (ESPN), Marshall-Tulsa (FS1 or CBSSN)
11/21: Rutgers-UCF (ESPN), ??? (FS1)
11/28: Texas Tech at TCU & ??? (ESPN or FS1)
12/5: Louisville at Cincinnati (ESPN), ??? (FS1)

In the case of most of the Pac-12 games on Thursdays, I'm not expecting the Pac-12 Network to be carrying those games.

A quick take on FOX Sports GO & MWC secondary packages

2013-03-06T08:57:00.002-05:00

* I think its interesting that FOX announced that FOX Sports 1 would be in 90 million homes at launch. Just so happens that 90 million is the magic number that the Mountain West defined as a "national network" for bonuses in their TV package. I believe its a cue to the conference that any other package of MWC football or basketball has more than one option on cable. If those rights haven't been sold off to ESPN or ESPN2 yet, I believe the MWC and FOX owe it to either other to have a chat. Let's face it, the goal of being able to sell these packages is to get extra revenue for all members to fund these bonus packages. In some ways, its to keep Boise St. happy too, since its widely assumed that the Broncos will be the ones benefiting the most from the sale of these rights. If ESPN is the only bidder, or NBC says they pay for 2-3 home games, I think you have to knock on FOX's door & ask them for an offer.

* FOX Sports GO, the authenticated streaming service that FOX will make available to all providers, is a huge deal that a lot of folks missed on at the FOX upfront, not to mention that it was buried at the end of the press release touting FOX Sports 1. Its in the same vein as WatchESPN, ESPN's streaming service for its cable networks, including its RSNs. One difference will be that FOX intends to allow all events on its broadcast network to be shown via the service, where national events on ABC like the NBA and full national college football are not shown to protect their affiliates.

FOX could be using this service to stream their NFL games as well as they'll have the some digital rights to the games they broadcast in 2014 (there has been some conjecture that this could start in 2013). I believe those rights are online only rights, so they would not extend to mobile phones as the NFL sells those rights separately.

I would suspect that blackout rules will apply with RSN content.

NBC also has their Live Extra mobile/table app which streams events on the broadcast network like the PGA and Notre Dame football. They have shown their NFL Sunday night football games online (again, only on laptops, not on mobile devices). The app also has the ability to authenticate to a service provider to watch NBC Sports Network content, but it only has 3-4 companies signed up at this time (Xfinity, Verizon FIOS, Optimum & Suddenlink). It doesn't yet appear that NBC Sports Network content is available via a web solution.

FOX Sports One, Thursdays and Friday CFB

2013-03-05T21:11:00.000-05:00

FOX Sports 1 Announcement

* FOX Sports 1 was unveiled today and we know one of the 1st games to air on the network will be North Dakota St. at Kansas St. on Friday, August 30th at 8:30pm ET. You might say to yourself "Hey, that's K-State's institutional game". You might be right. Its also possible that the Massachusetts game is the 3rd tier game (I don't think its the UL-Lafayette game). What FOX may be doing is trying to spread out those 3rd tier telecasts over a few weeks so that FOX Sports Midwest & FOX Sports Southwest are not jammed with multiple games in the same timeslot. Both of those RSNs are also covering MLB games and that could factor into when those games could be televised and receive coverage in the entire RSN area, even if its using an alternate feed.

* FOX says they'll have regular Thursday night games on FS1. We know there are six Pac-12 Thursday night games out there. Four in the middle of the season, one on the opening week and one more on September 5th. Let's set aside the Sacramento St.-Arizona St. game because I think that ends up on the Pac-12 Networks. Oregon-Stanford at one point was listed as being on ESPN by the Ducks website. That has been removed, but its possible that it was right, especially if you consider Notre Dame at Stanford was announced today to appear on FOX's broadcast network. One Big 12 game, Texas at Iowa St., was designated to possibly move to October 3rd, the same date when UCLA-Utah is scheduled. If Texas-Iowa St. moves, ESPN could certainly do a doubleheader. Its also possible that one ends up on FS1 and one on ESPN.

There are also three Conference USA games scheduled for Thursday dates with CBS Sports Network eligible to pick up any of those. The Big East football schedule is being released tomorrow. We may know more at that time in terms of what ESPN is doing. The MWC might have a Thursday game too on FS1, ESPN or CBS Sports Network now that the MWC can sell packages of games on their own. BYU could have a Thursday game too.

* Re: BYU - Thursday might not be in the cards for them. The home game vs. Middle Tennessee (September 27th) and the game at Utah St. (October 4th) are Friday games. AD Tom Holmoe strongly hinted that the Boise St. game could end up on a Friday (October 25th ??). Excluding Black Friday (November 29th), the ACC has one Friday night game on September 8th and the Pac-12 has two on November 1st and November 15th, respectively. Connecticut let it slip that their game vs. Louisville is on Friday, November 8th. FOX didn't say anything about Friday night games, and let's note that the BYU-Utah St. game is a MWC game and belongs to CBS. There are around seven Friday nights that ESPN could be looking to fill. There is also a Western Michigan-Michigan St. game sitting out there on Friday 8/30 that could end up on one of ESPN's networks if it isn't on BTN.

* So what becomes of college football on FSN? I think it lives on in a reduced form. Maybe one game a week natioally. When I look over last season, there were probably 4-5 weeks where even if you took all the games from FSN and tacked on the game(s) on F/X, you'd end up with the need to put one game on FSN. That doesn't include any of the FOX College Sports exclusive games either from C-USA or the Big 12. Several RSNs also pick up the ACC and SEC RSN packages too.

* I'm calling the football playing conference that was supposed to be the Big East by the name "Conference X" and the non-football playing conference the Catholics. It sounds like the Catholics will have their own version of Big Monday, pairing games with the 22 from the Pac-12 and at least 10 from Conference USA. Remember that FOX in the spring of 2014 will have the Pac-12 men's basketball championship in addition to the Catholics conference championship, whenever that gets announced.

As for "Conference X" it sounds like they'll have some football games on FS1 and they could also help keep football games on FSN, depending on the dates they are picked up for.

* FOX Sports 2 apparently was not mentioned as part of the discussion today per the tweets and reports I've read. It is probably forthcoming, but they need to get FS1 off the ground first.

The possibility of a Big East & Catholic 7 void on ESPN

2013-02-14T09:52:00.001-05:00

With a second report from the AP regarding the Big East accepting an offer from NBC to move their sports programming over there and off of ESPN is interesting, more from the ESPN point of view. The Big East due to the size of the conference, particularly in men's basketball, represents a huge amount of programming from September - March. Let's look at various programming items.

Football

The Big East doesn't necessarily alter ABC or ESPN programming very much when it comes to Saturdays. Virtually all of the ABC slots the conference has taken up have been regional, usually paired with a Big Ten or Big 12 game. The conference fill around 4-6 Saturdays slots during the year on ESPN or ESPN2 and those could be replaced by games from other conferences. They also filled around seven Saturday ESPNU slots per year and those could end up being extra ACC, Big 12, Big Ten or SEC games.

The weeknight slots will be somewhat tougher to fill. The ACC and Pac-12 will allow for a limited number of Friday games as will BYU, but the Big 12, Big Ten & SEC typically do not. It is possible that more games from the MAC & Sun Belt will show up on Fridays instead of mid-week. If ESPN successfully bids on a subset of MWC games, possibly the Boise St. home games or another package, they could also fill Fridays.

Basketball

Basketball is the bigger hole to fill when you look at is as losing games from the 10 team Big East plus the Catholic 7. Some of those slots will come back to ESPN as they pick up additional ACC games with the addition of Syracuse and Pittsburgh to the conference. As Louisville enters the ACC and Rutgers & Maryland shift to the Big Ten, the networks could get a few more slots, but that doesn't seem like its enough to fill all the time available. Its possible that they'll take additional ACC games from inventory, maybe from Raycom's ACC package along with their own regional SEC package before they announce the 24/7 SEC Network, but its a huge hole. Around 5-7 games.

Regional Syndication

RSNs like SNY and MASN would lose some key programming supplied from ESPN Regional TV, but don't be surprised if SNY maintains a Big East presence, particularly with its connection to NBC Sports Regional Networks. A network like MSG may be out in terms of taking on a portion of the regional package from SNY but could end up aligning itself with the Catholic 7 as could MASN.

But there's a catch...

Always is. It is possible that ESPN could match the offer NBC presented the conference and keep this content. There would still be a hole in men's basketball, but a much smaller hole and one that can be easily filled. The AP article also noted that NBC would have the ability to sell games to other networks, which could mean that ESPN could buy some Big East content for their networks. Same with the Catholic schools if FOX elects they want a variety of programming. Trading games with ESPN? Maybe. Who knows.

The Value and Negotiating Power of the new Big East

2013-02-12T13:18:00.002-05:00

By now you've probably read the media reports coming from ESPN that NBC has made an offer to the Big East for a rights fee of $23 million per year. Feels like a low number, and it may well be a low number, but apparently it is a number that the conference does feel willing to accept and must take back to ESPN for them to accept or reject.

There's a few contractual things here at work that adversely affect the Big East's negotiating power

1) What they must offer third parties after exclusive negotiations with ESPN end - Please accept the premise that I am using another conference's old TV contract. I'm using C-USA's old TV contract with ESPN that was entered into evidence in their lawsuit against the conference, plus the outcome of the Pac-12 television negotiations.

The C-USA contract from 2005 (Big East was signed in 2006) states the following

(a) Negotiating Period. Conference shall negotiate exclusively with ESPN·for a
period of 30 days (the "Negotiating Period") commencing on a date selected by ESPN
(but not later than Aprill, 2010) with respect to the acquisition by ESPN for one or more years of rights to the package of Events set forth herein. It is of the essence of this Agreement that Conference offer ESPN the same package of rights set forth in this Agreement, and, should the parties not reach agreement, that the Conference make the exact same package of rights available to third parties.

The key part is in bold. If the ESPN contract states that their contract encompasses all rights not granted to CBS for men's basketball plus some rights CBS Sports Network has for women's basketball, they have to give other third parties that same rights package. In the case of the Big East, I believe that includes national and regional rights. I don't think they are separate deals.

If you look at the before & after of the Pac-12 television negotiations, materially you end up with the same total number of football games (44) and men's basketball games (65) that were granted to ABC and FOX Cable in both cases. FOX Cable had nearly all the basketball games and had the majority of the football games (24) in the old deal. I suppose its possible that both parties co-signed a deal, then have their own contract between those two parties to divide up the content.

A key note with the Pac-12 deal. In both the old contract and the new deal(s), the conference never provided exclusive rights to all events or any form of "umbrella" contract where the number of available events to the rightholder(s) was vague. It provided concrete numbers of games it provided to their national rightsholders with the schools retaining a portion. The school retained portions are what was pooled into the Pac-12 Networks.

2) The requirement to provide ESPN the ability to match an offer - When the Big East allegedly requested $300 million per year from ESPN for them to retain their existing TV rights, it was done before several future membership changes were set in motion. The problem now with a number that high, so high that it is apparently more than any conference gets from their TV contract(s) today, is that they had to hit that number in an offer so they didn't have to offer ESPN the ability to match. With the marketplace as it stands, it looks like ESPN will always be at the table, at least in a position to allow the Big East to move on or not.

From the C-USA contract:

(b) Offer/Reoffer Procedure. If ESPN and Conference have not reached an agreement by the end of the Negotiating Period, Conference shall make a written offer (the "Offer") within three days thereafter to ESPN of the monetary consideration on which it is willing to license such rights to ESPN. With the exception of monetary consideration, Conference's Offer shall not contain any terms or conditions which are different from those contained in this Agreement("Nonconfonning Terms") other than as permitted by section (d), below. If ESPN does not accept the Offer within fourteen days of its receipt by ESPN, Conference may then enter into an agreement with a third party with respect to the same package of events set forth herein, but not for monetary consideration less than that contained in the offer without first offering to ESPN the same monetary terms as offered to the third party ("the Reoffer"). ESPN shall accept or reject a Reoffer by Conference no later than seven days from its receipt.

3) Nonconforming Terms - This is the wildcard. It is mentioned prominently in the First Negotiation/First Refusal portion of the contract and as the contract language states, section (d) provides the allowable Nonconforming Terms. The problem with this C-USA deal, and maybe it was because the C-USA deal did not cover exclusive rights to all conference events, is that section (d) doesn't exist. Why it doesn't exist and why they didn't clean up this contractual language, I'll never know and no one probably will give me a good reason for it. This is the sliver of hope the Big East could hang on to, provided their contract has this section. Maybe they are allowed to divide up their packages. For their sake, I hope they can.

Revised CFB Opening Week TV Guesses

2013-02-01T13:11:00.000-05:00

EDIT: 2/2/13 - I'm taking a mulligan on New Mexico St. at Texas. The change is listed below.

You will probably ask yourself "Why does this look so different from what you published in December?". Well, the Pac-12 & C-USA schedules were announced, four conferences changed membership for 2013-14, some schools completed their non-conference schedules and overall it tightened up the matchups for the opening week.

I'll look over weeks two (9/7) & three (9/14) after the ACC & Big East schedules are announced. There's enough holes in those two where conference games can fit in. Same w/the Mountain West, although they've stated that their schedule might not come out until April.

Notes
* It sounds like Ole Miss-Vanderbilt will be one of the Thursday night opening games, instead of UNC-South Carolina.
* I split the Rutgers-Fresno St. and USC-Hawai'i games onto different networks With both games out west, in the case of Hawai'i far out west, it doesn't lend itself well to a doubleheader. Yes, its possible that USC-Hawai'i could end up on ESPN as part of a package of games sold to them from the Mountain West.
* I went with Utah St.-Utah as the 2nd half of the ESPN doubleheader.
* Someone is going to have to bite the bullet like FOX did and take a FCS vs. Pac-12 matchup when they took Portland St. vs. Washington for an F/X game. This year ESPNU gets that honor.
* Georgia-Clemson deserves its own slot without being regional or a reverse mirror option.
* I'm making an assumption that the Pac-12 Network will jump up and take one of the three available games between FBS teams
* I moved the Oklahoma St.-Mississippi St. game played at Reliant Stadium to Sunday to fit it in. I don't think it has the requirement that the Chick-Fil-A Kickoff and Cowboys Classsic games where they are currently tied to primetime on ABC or ESPN.
* The final weekend of NFL preseason games could affect date/time of some of these games. Not necessarily in places where stadiums are shared either. A school like Cincinnati could have their opener's date affected based on when the Bengals close their preseason, if they are at home that week.
* I don't know what the ESPN will do for a primetime game on Labor Day. It is supposed to be an ACC game. Every ACC team is scheduled to play out of conference, so some games need to be moved around. It is possible ESPN will consider another conference's game(s). Five ACC teams currently do not have a game set for 9/7 and could move their FCS opener to that date leaving 8/31 open (Boston College, Florida St., Georgia Tech, Pittsburgh & Wake Forest). Whether the FCS team has the ability to move the game to another date is another story.

Thursday
7pm ESPN: Ole Miss at Vanderbilt
7:30pm Big East: Towson at Connecticut
8pm BTN: UNLV at Minnesota
9pm CBSSN: Rutgers at Fresno St.
10:15pm ESPN: Utah St. at Utah
11pm NBCSN: USC at Hawai'i

Friday
8pm ESPN: Purdue at Cincinnati
10pm Pac-12: Northern Arizona at Arizona

Saturday
12pm ESPN: Penn St. vs. Syracuse
12pm ESPN2: Central Michigan at Michigan
12pm ESPNU: BYU at Virginia
12pm BTN: Indiana St. at Indiana
12pm BTN: Western Michigan at Michigan St.
12pm FOX Sports 1: UL-Monroe at Oklahoma
12pm CBSSN: Morgan St. at Army
12pm SEC Network: UL-Lafayette at Arkansas
12:30pm ACC Network: Louisiana Tech at NC State
3pm ACC RSN: FAU at Miami (FL)
3pm Pac-12: Eastern Washington at Oregon St.
3:30pm NBC: Temple at Notre Dame
3:30pm ABC: Georgia at Clemson
3:30pm ESPN2: Buffalo at Ohio St.
3:30pm ESPNU: Washington St. at Auburn
3:30pm CBSSN: Miami (OH) at Marshall
3:30pm BTN: Wyoming at Nebraska
3:30pm BTN: Southern Illinois at Illinois
4pm FOX Sports 1: Northwestern at California
4:30pm ESPN: North Carolina at South Carolina
6pm PPV: Austin Peay at Tennessee
7pm ESPNU: Rice at Texas A&M
7pm SEC/FOX RSNs: Toledo at Florida
7pm FSMidwest: North Dakota St. at Kansas St.
7pm ROOT Sports: William & Mary at West Virginia
7pm PPV: Murray St. at Missouri
7:30pm FOX: Nevada at UCLA
8pm ABC: Virginia Tech vs. Alabama
8pm ESPN: LSU vs. TCU
8pm CBSSN: Colorado vs. Colorado St.
8pm BTN: Massachusetts at Wisconsin
8pm BTN: Northern Illinois at Iowa
8pm Longhorn: New Mexico St. at Texas
8pm CyclonesTV: Northern Iowa at Iowa St.
10pm Pac-12: Boise St. at Washington
10:30pm ESPNU: Nicholls St. at Oregon

Sunday
3:30pm ESPN: Oklahoma St. vs. Mississippi St.
~~7:30pm FSN: New Mexico St. at Texas~~

Monday
4pm ESPN: Texas Tech at SMU

ESPN3 Exclusives (all on Saturdays unless noted)
FIU at Maryland
Stony Brook at Boston College
Wofford at Florida St.
Elon at Georgia Tech
McNeese St at USF
Southern at Houston
Ohio at Louisville
Kentucky vs. Western Kentucky
Akron at UCF (Thursday)
NC Central at Duke
Presbyterian at Wake Forest

A few thoughts on the ACC considering its own TV network

2013-01-14T13:09:00.001-05:00

http://www.sportsbusinessdaily.com/Journal/Issues/2013/01/14/Colleges/ACC.aspx

* Wasserman Media Group is known in college sports circles. They represented conferences for the TV contract in the four team CFB playoff. Per the article, they were also brought in when the ACC renegotiated its deal after the additions of Pittsburgh & Syracuse.

* As noted in the SBJ article, Raycom pays ESPN for a set of ACC content. Some of it airs on over-the-air stations and the rest is placed on regional sports networks, many who are owned by FOX. This content is around 27 football games, 70 men's basketball games, 20 women's basketball games plus content from other sports. The count does not include the men's basketball tournament games that coexist with ESPN. I would expect the coexists to end if a separate channel gets off the ground.

This does not include any content that ESPN3 airs exclusively, which was around 60 men's basketball games and 18 more football games. So the content is available that they desire.

* The re-air rights is interesting. Either some schools have those rights in hand, the ACC does as a conference or it is negotiable with ESPN. Nearly half of the existing ACC schools (Florida St., Maryland, Virginia Tech, Georgia Tech, Clemson, Miami) have their football games replayed during the season on RSNs, most of those RSNs have the name "Comcast" in their full name.

Anyways, both the SEC and Big Ten now control their games by owning the copyright to the telecast (pay attention to the very end of a telecast, it may not say ESPN anymore). I know that ESPN has the copyright when I've see the final credits roll on their RSN telecasts. That should be easy for the ACC to negotiate, if they haven't already.

* Sports networks are now being targeted. Or to term it better, customers are now being targeted with the increasing number of sports networks. DirecTV is now asking new customers in areas with more than one RSN to pay a $3 sports surcharge. Most of the ACC footprint is covered by multiple RSNs. Add another RSN, who pays for it? I believe the SEC channel would be treated as an RSN and I think that's what DirecTV wants for the Pac-12. I can't see the ACC escaping that either. I also don't see DirecTV being the only one charging for sports content. They've opened the door. Others will walk through.

* In my opinion, the ACC is really late with this. They needed to get this off the ground before the SEC thought of it. With the addition of Louisville, there are now four states with both ACC & SEC schools (Kentucky, South Carolina, Florida, Georgia). In at least three of these states (SC might be the exception), the SEC fan base seems to outnumber the ACC fan base. There's already one state where the Big Ten Network would coexist with an ACC one if this ever came up (Pennsylvania) and New York City would also be targeted by the ACC.

If the content in the end belongs to ESPN and the article says ESPN is not enthused about this, it could have trouble getting off the ground.