Comcast Throwing Money at the NHL
Newsday’s sports media man Steve Zipay wrote today about the NHL finding a new national cable deal, possibly with Comcast’s possibly-soon-to-be-transformed OLN.
We have the mandatory flashback:
In April, ESPN opted out of its $60-million annual contract with the NHL, and ESPN executive vice president Mark Shapiro suggested that the network would only consider a revenue-sharing deal with the league when it reached a collective bargaining agreeement with its players. Since then, Shapiro has said ESPN would consider paying a rights fee, but a far smaller one.
And the interesting update:
Comcast can afford the acquisition, according to Prudential Securities. “Assuming that Comcast were able to win both the NFL and NHL contracts for a combined price of $480 million per year ($80 million for the NHL and $400 million for the NFL), this represents just 2 percent of revenues and 5 percent of operating cash flow,” a Prudential research note stated. “We believe it is possible for affiliate rate increases, combined with incremental advertising revenue . . . to largely offset the contract cost.”
So not only is ESPN not willing to match the old contract of $60 mil per season, but Comcast has topped it by offering $20 mil more per year? Sounds like a decent deal to me - but the NHL should make a call over to the NFL offices and find out how serious the NFL is about possibly making a deal with Comcast. Being on OLN isn’t ideal. Being on an ESPN competitor with a major league like the NFL just might be (plus some extra cash to top it off).
Thanks to Eric McErlain for the pointer.
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