Jon Wilner of the San Jose Mercury News is regularly breaking important news about Pac-12 athletics and Pac-12 finances. Wilner broke another significant story on Monday when he obtained a term sheet documenting the media rights fees the Pac-12 had hoped to get from ESPN/ABC and Fox Sports for coverage of football and men’s basketball.
Wilner posted the figure: $276.4 million.
The big drama: How much of that money will the Pac-12 get?
It obviously won’t be the full amount, but even half of that would be a significant chunk of change. What will determine how much the Pac-12 is able to recoup?
Wilner talked to experts such as Patrick Crakes, a former senior vice president for programming and content strategy at Fox Sports, who had this to say:
“I think (the networks) will prorate their rights fees to (the Pac-12), but I don’t believe it will be 100 percent of what they’re supposed to pay.”
Could the Pac-12 be left with nothing?
Crakes said this:
“If they don’t play in the spring, yes, the networks have contractual language that impacts what they pay in the event of lost game inventory. The language says they technically don’t have to pay.”
However, Crakes added that the networks are not likely to play hardball to the extent that they will leave the Pac-12 (and Big Ten) with nothing:
“The reality is, they’re married to the conference. What problems do (the networks) want to cause with the Pac-12 if they want to renew in 2024?”
Wilner also talked to Karen Weaver, a Drexel University professor who specializes in sports media rights.
Weaver had this to say:
“While we all acknowledge this is a business relationship first, it is also a partnership. How the parties work together to get through this crisis will be telling. I suspect the rights might be a little more valuable to Fox than ESPN, just because they are more oriented to college football’s regular season.”
Wilner noted in his report that Comcast, Cox, and other cable distributors pay ESPN and Fox Sports monthly fees for programming. Those fees, Wilner explained, are passed along by ESPN, Fox Sports, and other outlets to the Pac-12 and other conferences in media rights payments.
Major League Baseball — which went without games through mid-July, obviously did not give its regional sports carriers games to show on television for many months.
Wilner cited a Variety Magazine report that Comcast is going to provide a refund to customers who purchased sports channels which didn’t offer expected MLB game inventory.
You don’t have to think long or hard to realize that if this reality is replicated in college football programming, it would bust up the pipeline connecting distributors to television programmers to the conferences, including the Pac-12.
Crakes pointed out the obvious, looming problem:
“If the channel is negotiating with the distributor, this becomes part of its conversation with the conference.”
Here is the really big concern for the Pac-12 (along with the Big Ten): What if the SEC, ACC and Big 12 play football and manage to complete a season or come close to it?
Crakes weighed in:
“If the ACC, SEC and Big 12 play, the optics are poor because the Big Ten and Pac-12 could end up as the only Tier 1 fall sports that canceled.”
The Pac-12 would not be able to lean on Force Majeure arguments to claim that it should be owed the full (or close to full) amount of media rights fees. If other conferences pulled off football while the Pac-12 did not, how would a Force Majeure claim hold up in litigation?
That’s the $276.4 million question being asked by a nervous Larry Scott right now. It’s a very big deal in the midst of these media rights deals whose statuses are up in the air… and which depend on whether SEC football is ON the air in several weeks.