Kirk Van Houten
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- May 7, 2019
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NASCAR announces new deals with Fox, NBC, Amazon and TNT
NASCAR is getting a big payday and two new partners in its new media rights deal, at the cost of fewer Cup Series races on broadcast TV.
www.sportsmediawatch.com
NASCAR is getting a big payday and two new partners in its new media rights deal, at the cost of fewer Cup Series races on broadcast TV. Per Sports Business Journal, the new seven-year agreements will be worth a combined $1.1 billion per year, including a previously announced rights deal with Nexstar for Xfinity Series races. Under the new deal, Fox and NBC will scale back their race inventory to 14 apiece, down from 18 and 20 respectively. Notably, only nine of those races will air on broadcast television — less than half the 19 that aired on broadcast this past season — with FOX carrying five and NBC four. The sharp reduction in Cup Series races on broadcast TV comes as the entire Xfinity Series slate is set to air on broadcast “netlet” The CW.
Amazon Prime Video and TNT will split the remaining ten races, with the Amazon deal marking the first time NASCAR has ever distributed races exclusively via a streaming service. Amazon and WBD will also split the full season of practice and qualifying sessions, with the first half of those airing on Prime Video and the second half airing on the WBD streaming service Max and truTV.
The 40 percent increase in rights fees is something to monitor in the following media deals.
