Pac 12 in talks with the CW?

[Kirk Van Houten]

News: Pac-12 rights, Diamond Sports and more

The Pac-12 may be the next property to test the waters at The CW. Plus: MLB is seeking to force Diamond Sports to pay the Twins and Guardians.

www.sportsmediawatch.com

The Pac-12 has held conversations with Nexstar’s The CW about a potential media rights deal, The Athletic reported Thursday. The CW this year began airing live sports for the first time with its acquisition of LIV Golf. Created in 2006 as a merger of netlets The WB and UPN, The CW is primarily known for its low-rated young adult primetime programming. Per the same report, the Pac-12 is now unlikely to reach a new media rights deal until later this spring or in early summer.

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[NextBigThing]

NHL needs to get the Cup Final on CW when TNT has the rights. Having the entire final on cable is a bad look for the league.

 

[GKJ]

News: Pac-12 rights, Diamond Sports and more

The Pac-12 may be the next property to test the waters at The CW. Plus: MLB is seeking to force Diamond Sports to pay the Twins and Guardians.

www.sportsmediawatch.com

The Pac-12 has held conversations with Nexstar’s The CW about a potential media rights deal, The Athletic reported Thursday. The CW this year began airing live sports for the first time with its acquisition of LIV Golf. Created in 2006 as a merger of netlets The WB and UPN, The CW is primarily known for its low-rated young adult primetime programming. Per the same report, the Pac-12 is now unlikely to reach a new media rights deal until later this spring or in early summer.

The PAC-12 probably won’t be around if the CW is going to be their media rights holder

 

[PCSPounder]

NHL needs to get the Cup Final on CW when TNT has the rights. Having the entire final on cable is a bad look for the league.

This year will be the year that more households are streaming than will have cable. And if you look at how the kids are doing it, antennas usually aren’t part of the deal. Part of the reason linear services overpaid for the B1G and SEC are because network affiliates (your good old local TV channels) are scared. It doesn’t help/hurt that the pace of cord-cutting has not slowed in the first 90 days of this calendar year (which could demonstrate how sports isn’t driving much of the bus).

On a broader note: anyone really believe the Pac had discussions with iON? This situation has actually become part of the culture war, judging by the number of people trying to slag on the Pac who use the word “woke” in ways clearly demonstrating that they couldn’t define the term when pressed. I’m not saying the Pac doesn’t have troubles, and I know darn well my Ducks want B1G money (which won’t be happening), but I doubt the veracity of this. More to the point, this subject has become quite the click generator.

What I suspect is happening is (1) the Pac is trying to make a deal with Apple, which (2) includes something of a transfer of the Pac-12 Network, requiring a substantial amount of time to sort out with a provider not used to doing something like this, (3) and probably a sublet of games to linear networks, (4) and probably a separate game of the week deal with Amazon. And probably more. And my Ducks probably are fretting about both distribution and keeping up with the B1G and are probably a hindrance. And if the Pac dies, it won happen until the next B1G contract is negotiated (schools don’t generally move in the middle of a contract, always near the end), so Oregon shouldn’t really fret.

The other side of my social universe might hold the key to another wrinkle. The NCAA doesn’t really monetize most of its sports; the contract with CBS encompasses most sports, but the payoff has been mens March Madness. The sublet to ESPN/ABC for the women has suddenly become lucrative. The best sport for the Pac the last few years has really been womens basketball. Maybe (in deference to Brett Yormark’s musings about somehow monetizing b12 basketball separately) the Pac actually has a basis by which it will pull that off.

 

[oknazevad]

NHL needs to get the Cup Final on CW when TNT has the rights. Having the entire final on cable is a bad look for the league.

A) Warner Bros Discovery doesn't control the network anymore with the sale to Nextstar. B) TNT gets more viewers by far, and is the far more prominent property. Being on the CW would plainly look minor league compared to TNT.

 

[nickp91]

“You are watching the PAC 12 football on The CW At the conclusion of SMU vs San Diego State please stay tuned for Gossip Girl nights”

 

[Big Z Man 1990]

UNLV would be a better geographic fit for the Pac-12 as well as a better travel partner for San Diego State than SMU, which should be in the Big 12 instead.

Las Vegas is a fast-growing market, having gained two major league teams in less than five years. A Power 5 athletic program would be the next step.

 

[Big Z Man 1990]

NHL needs to get the Cup Final on CW when TNT has the rights. Having the entire final on cable is a bad look for the league.

You'll have to wait until the next media rights deal for having the entire final on broadcast TV every year, where I could see CBS joining with Turner to produce NHL broadcasts on TNT as well as a limited schedule for CBS around the network's other sports commitments, with ABC and CBS alternating rights to the final every year. This would go with my proposal for CBS and Turner to start co-producing NBA games on TNT and adding Saturday night games, currently on ABC, to CBS, while keeping weekend afternoon games on ABC. Thus, every year, one network would air the Stanley Cup Finals and the other network would air the NBA Finals.

 

[GKJ]

You'll have to wait until the next media rights deal for having the entire final on broadcast TV every year, where I could see CBS joining with Turner to produce NHL broadcasts on TNT as well as a limited schedule for CBS around the network's other sports commitments, with ABC and CBS alternating rights to the final every year. This would go with my proposal for CBS and Turner to start co-producing NBA games on TNT and adding Saturday night games, currently on ABC, to CBS, while keeping weekend afternoon games on ABC. Thus, every year, one network would air the Stanley Cup Finals and the other network would air the NBA Finals.

There’s nothing suggesting CBS will ever be seriously interested and there never has been. Unless they get a new sports VP, they never will.

 

[HisIceness]

Does anyone watch the CW? I mean even the old WB Network wasn't a household channel but they did have a niche audience.

 

[GKJ]

Does anyone watch the CW? I mean even the old WB Network wasn't a household channel but they did have a niche audience.

It’s essentially the same network.

 

[No Fun Shogun]

I suppose it being readily available is a positive, but it'll take a lot of consumer training to get used to checking out that channel for sports of any kind. Seems like a move that non-Pac 12 fans would never notice.

Then again, the NCAA makes basketball fans annually remember that TruTV exists for a couple of days...

 

[DaBadGuy7]

There’s nothing suggesting CBS will ever be seriously interested and there never has been. Unless they get a new sports VP, they never will.

Pretty much, CBS could’ve crafted a limited OTA schedule and had the Cup Final on the years Turner had it like it was rumored, but they probably didn’t see the upside in that. As for the CW, it’s barely a OTA channel at this point so unless Nexstar makes a play for the NBA or next time NFL TV rights are up, I don’t see them as a major player in sports or TV world ever.

 

[HisIceness]

It’s essentially the same network.

I know that, but my point is the network as a whole had to have peaked a long time ago.

 

[GKJ]

Pretty much, CBS could’ve crafted a limited OTA schedule and had the Cup Final on the years Turner had it like it was rumored, but they probably didn’t see the upside in that. As for the CW, it’s barely a OTA channel at this point so unless Nexstar makes a play for the NBA or next time NFL TV rights are up, I don’t see them as a major player in sports or TV world ever.

Ever since RSN’s came to be, CW only ever got as far as, like, the original XFL and stuff like that. And now they can’t get that either.

 

[GKJ]

That’s the end of that

 

[Kirk Van Houten]

Pac 12 is basically dead

 

[GKJ]

Pac 12 is basically dead

They’re gonna end up on Apple i think. Maybe they can get a game on national TV. That is, until they dissolve. I don’t see how programs like Oregon stick around here, you still need national TV to recruit and be seen.

 

[oknazevad]

There’s nothing suggesting CBS will ever be seriously interested and there never has been. Unless they get a new sports VP, they never will.

Exactly. If CBS ever had any interest in the NHL they would have been involved with this last round of deals. They weren't. It's just more of this guy's fantasies.

 

[GKJ]

Exactly. If CBS ever had any interest in the NHL they would have been involved with this last round of deals. They weren't. It's just more of this guy's fantasies.

Fox was closer to getting the rights than CBS. And they didn’t even like hockey the first time around, couldn’t wait to get rid of it.

 

[DaBadGuy7]

Fox was closer to getting the rights than CBS. And they didn’t even like hockey the first time around, couldn’t wait to get rid of it.

Not true at all, FOX wanted to stick around and in fact wanted every SCF on OTA. ESPN/ABC simply outbid them. In classic NHL form, they took the money instead of the commitment that FOX was willing to make. This bite them hard especially post-lockout when nobody wanted them but NBC and OLN:

How Disney outfoxed the NHL.

 

[Big Z Man 1990]

And of course the FCC's anti-siphoning rules were struck down as unconstitutional decades ago which I think was a big mistake.

 

[Big Z Man 1990]

No other big 4 league has any part of their final playoff round exclusive to cable. There's a reason ESPN has never aired the Super Bowl despite paying more for the NFL than other rights holders. They will start airing it in the 2026 season and every four years after that but they have to share it with ABC.

 

[GKJ]

No other big 4 league has any part of their final playoff round exclusive to cable. There's a reason ESPN has never aired the Super Bowl despite paying more for the NFL than other rights holders. They will start airing it in the 2026 season and every four years after that but they have to share it with ABC.

All someone has to do is pay TNT for it. No one wants to.

 

[Big Z Man 1990]

All someone has to do is pay TNT for it. No one wants to.

Or we can have the ruling of the anti-siphoning law being unconstitutional reversed and thus the FCC can then require the Cup Finals be OTA every year.