Whenever a sports league is able to secure a major payday, it’s usually great for the sports industry as a whole. If television networks and streamers can dish out a premium for one set of rights, the logic is that they’ll probably have enough money to pay a deluxe value for the next sport whose rights are set to expire. That paradigm changed though when the NBA secured $76 billion in rights fees from ESPN/ABC, NBC and Amazon.
According to Puck’s John Ourand, the NBA’s deal irritated NFL executives. One particular detail that especially made leaders at the league mad was that NBC was paying $400 to $500 million more per year for NBA rights vs. NFL rights. NBC’s Sunday Night Basketball package was the most watched Sunday NBA package in 13 years and most watched NBA window since the 2015-2016 season but only averaged 3.4 million viewers compared to the 23.5 million that tuned in to NBC’s Sunday Night Football.
Because of this, the league has decided to accelerate renegotiations for games with all of their television rightsholders despite the fact that their opt out can’t be triggered until 2029.
When you’re the NFL, you can do whatever you want. And they’re clearly setting a precedent. The league is asking for networks and streamers to pay up to 50 or 60 percent more than what they already currently pay.
It’s likely that each rightsholder may have to drop one or two sports leagues which they currently carry in order to find the money they need to afford NFL rights. Here are the two properties we believe each network could drop to save money for their ongoing negotiations with the Shield.
NBC
- Premier League: the soccer league based in England served as a backbone for Peacock when it first launched. It drove subscriptions to the streamer and some games served as some of Peacock’s highest rated programming early on. Many Peacock-exclusive games averaged between 200,000 to 500,000 viewers. Currently, the Premier League is experimenting with cutting the middle man out and launching its own streaming service in Singapore. If that interest affects how the league looks at their American rightsholders, it might give NBC a clean get away from the PL. It is unlikely that NBC would help the PL start a separate streamer taking programming away from Peacock. NBC has already partnered with the USL’s division 1 women’s league and could easily acquire rights to USL’s division 1 men’s league (which launches in 2028) along with MLS games or a European country cup competition for a much cheaper price if they wanted to stay in the soccer business. Don’t be surprised if NBC is even a contender for English and Spanish language rights to the next World Cup, which could prove more valuable for the network than continuing to air the Premier League.
- Big Ten: NBC has been frustrated by the restrictions they’ve faced scheduling Saturday primetime football games. Major brand names such as Ohio State and Michigan have clauses that prevent them from playing late season night games. This has affected the quality of games aired on the network and it’s apparent in the ratings as NBC trails ABC and Fox averaging 3.1 million viewers vs. the 8 million that watch ABC’s Saturday Night SEC game and the 6.3 million that watch Fox’s Big Noon Kickoff telecast. NBC even had the rights to the 2026 Big Ten Championship but recently sold it to Fox for $45 to $55 million. NBC still has Notre Dame football and Big East basketball if they wanted to pare down their college sports in exchange for keeping its pro football rights.
CBS
- Serie A: RedBird, one of CBS’ new owners, is heavily invested in the success of Serie A as the owner of AC Milan. But the league doesn’t air many games on big CBS, doesn’t make a major dent ratings-wise, doesn’t produce many major storylines in the sports world and doesn’t have many stars compared to other soccer leagues across the world. CBS has declared UEFA rights as a cornerstone of their ongoing operation and don’t need Serie A rights to prove their bonafides in soccer once their rights expire in 2027
- PGA Tour: Losing PGA rights could cause Jim Nantz to say “Goodbye Friends” but the property is in a state of flux after LIV Golf raided their clubhouse a couple of years ago. With the upcoming shutdown of LIV and the hiring of Brian Rolapp, it looks like there will be a repatriation of stars to the Tour sooner rather than later. But CBS Sports’ potential upcoming merger with TNT Sports may not leave much room to wait for who could emerge as the next Tiger. Between the commitments TNT already has with MLB and the NHL along with emerging leagues like the WNBA and Unrivaled that are cheaper to pay for and more popular with a younger audience, it may be easier to cut losses with the PGA. CBS is already home to the Masters, the Super Bowl of golf. Do they really need to show the Tour? Especially if it’s worth keeping the NFL as well?
FOX
- World Cup: Over the last couple of years, FIFA has recently aligned itself with Netflix, DAZN, YouTube and even TikTok. The Women’s World Cup is now on Netflix and the Club World Cup was played on DAZN. It is clear that the governing body is looking to move aggressively into the streaming world. Both outlets were willing to pay a premium to serve as a voice for FIFA. Other than the occasional MLS game, Fox isn’t a year-round destination for the beautiful game. If anything, Fox has established its ground as a major force for American football. There’s no point in losing that space to broadcast a tournament that’s played every four years and doesn’t come with any other rights even if it proved to be a ratings juggernaut this summer. Fox got lucky only paying $400 million for this year’s events. They won’t get that lucky next time around. Would it be worth paying billions for the next World Cup which only comes around every four years if that money can be spent on a more consistent piece of programming?
- MLB: Baseball has served as a major cornerstone for Fox’s sports division since its founding. Playoff games are what keep FS1 valuable to cable companies and the World Series has been a dependable championship available on Fox every year. But as we mentioned earlier, Fox has established major grounds as the home for some of the biggest football games of the year in the college and pro game. Fox is a major stakeholder in Big Ten decisionmaking and has an inside track to acquire college football playoff games should the playoffs expand. College football and the NFL are the nation’s two biggest sports now and the price tag MLB is looking for may not be worth losing that ground.
ESPN
- La Liga and the FA Cup: The Spanish league was a great addition for ESPN as it was entering the streaming world. It opened a new frontier for the Worldwide Leader and provided a new base of fans since the network wasn’t allowed to move major NFL, MLB or NBA games to their streamer yet. Now that ESPN has ubiquitous rights to each of those sports, the fans of this league and the United Kingdom’s nationwide soccer tournament do not provide the network’s streamer with any inside edge. Most American sports fans don’t identify as La Liga or FA Cup fans and La Liga’s attempts to increase their US fan base by hosting regular season games in Miami have been rejected. ESPN doesn’t discuss these games during their weekday talk show programming lineup and they don’t serve as much of a hub for soccer after losing World Cup and MLS rights to Fox.
