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ACC Network Done Deal?

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Raycom has been a syndication partner of the ACC for a long time, back to 1979...Raycom had the ACC basketball tournament and held a limited football and basketball package.

The ACC has no contract with Raycom,,,it sold the media rights to ESPN..who sublet some content to Raycom for distribution.

But no doubt, Raycom had a most favored nation status when ESPN looked to sublet material.
 
Fishy said:
The rights' fees do not grow - if it exists, it is a one-time payment.
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Maybe...a case could be made that the contract's called for five year "look ins" also provide an opportunity for increased rights fees.
 
I think this sentence says a lot....

“It might not look exactly the same,” he said. “The days of everything being just a rights-fee negotiation -- there still is some of that -- but there’s a lot more negotiations about developing businesses together under our partnership. As opposed to a guaranteed rights fee. …
 
billybud said:
Maybe...a case could be made that the contract's called for five year "look ins" also provide an opportunity for increased rights fees.
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Why would they increase it?
 
Fishy...I never could even figure out why they give a CEO a million dollar raise when the stock has tanked and the company's performance is down.

I don't think anyone has seen the media contract since it is between two non public entities and not subject to FOIA. We know that there are "look ins", we just don't know what the contract says about them.

Sometimes, in a long term contract, the market may move and one or both of the parties writes in a built in look in as a protection. The market is reset upward...or maybe downward, but the contract may contain an adjustment clause.

The question is..."If there are look ins, why?"
 
billybud said:
Fishy...I never could even figure out why they give a CEO a million dollar raise when the stock has tanked and the company's performance is down.

I don't think anyone has seen the media contract since it is between two non public entities and not subject to FOIA. We know that there are "look ins", we just don't know what the contract says about them.

Sometimes, in a long term contract, the market may move and one or both of the parties writes in a built in look in as a protection. The market is reset upward...or maybe downward, but the contract may contain an adjustment clause.

The question is..."If there are look ins, why?"
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When a company uses it cash position to buyback stock, the board loves it.
 
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jostar1 said:
Andrew Carter ‏@_andrewcarter 2h2 hours ago
Here's everything John Swofford said about the ACC's TV situation. He said more than you might think, actually:

Here's everything John Swofford said about ACC TV situation
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I think the odds of a dedicated cable channel are close to zero. I think the odds of increasing the streaming "ACC Network" and rebroadcasting more of that content on existing ESPN channels is pretty high. I can see ESPN using league branded content to gain subscribers for ESPNU/N, and using ESPNU or ESPNN to broadcast "ACC Network" and "Big 12 Network" content (and LHN), without creating dedicated channel.

In short, I can imagine ESPN looking at its two floundering channels, and inventory it has from the ACC and Big 12, and Texas, and finding a way to drive fans of all of those schools to demand carriage of ESPNU (maybe rebrand ESPN News to ESPN U2). It could probably provide a similar "network" to both leagues.

I also think Fox may regret the Big Ten deal. They need it to elevate themselves in the minds of sports fans, just like NBC needed to overpay for Thursday NFL games. But the deal after this deal is going down. It was a short term deal for a reason.
 
HuskyHawk said:
I think the odds of a dedicated cable channel are close to zero. I think the odds of increasing the streaming "ACC Network" and rebroadcasting more of that content on existing ESPN channels is pretty high. I can see ESPN using league branded content to gain subscribers for ESPNU/N, and using ESPNU or ESPNN to broadcast "ACC Network" and "Big 12 Network" content (and LHN), without creating dedicated channel.

In short, I can imagine ESPN looking at its two floundering channels, and inventory it has from the ACC and Big 12, and Texas, and finding a way to drive fans of all of those schools to demand carriage of ESPNU (maybe rebrand ESPN News to ESPN U2). It could probably provide a similar "network" to both leagues.

I also think Fox may regret the Big Ten deal. They need it to elevate themselves in the minds of sports fans, just like NBC needed to overpay for Thursday NFL games. But the deal after this deal is going down. It was a short term deal for a reason.
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Bingo!

“So with technology and so forth, you want to be with people that are progressive and that have flexibility, that are willing to adapt,” Swofford said. “And I think that’s who our partner is. And so we’re bullish about it, and I’d say they’re bullish about it. It might not look exactly the same.”

It looks like he's grooming conference members to view online streaming as a dedicated "network" equivalent.
 
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HuskyHawk said:
I think the odds of a dedicated cable channel are close to zero. I think the odds of increasing the streaming "ACC Network" and rebroadcasting more of that content on existing ESPN channels is pretty high. I can see ESPN using league branded content to gain subscribers for ESPNU/N, and using ESPNU or ESPNN to broadcast "ACC Network" and "Big 12 Network" content (and LHN), without creating dedicated channel.

In short, I can imagine ESPN looking at its two floundering channels, and inventory it has from the ACC and Big 12, and Texas, and finding a way to drive fans of all of those schools to demand carriage of ESPNU (maybe rebrand ESPN News to ESPN U2). It could probably provide a similar "network" to both leagues.

I also think Fox may regret the Big Ten deal. They need it to elevate themselves in the minds of sports fans, just like NBC needed to overpay for Thursday NFL games. But the deal after this deal is going down. It was a short term deal for a reason.
Expand ...

I think people need to stop thinking that ESPN is going to repurpose/rebrand ESPNU and ESPN News. These are successful channels that each bring in almost $200 million of revenues per year and are in ~74 million households each. LHN is now about breakeven so it's not a big loss maker for ESPN. Perhaps ESPN Classic, which is only available in ~25 million homes and has been in decline for years, could become an ACC Network.

In my opinion, an "ACC Network" can only come about as a new channel (highly doubtful), repositioning ESPN Classic, or as some sort of streaming network like ESPN3 (probable). It does make sense for ESPN to experiment with a streaming network with ACC content and see if it could generate sizable revenues as it wouldn't be too costly to start up.
 
CL82 said:
Bingo!

“So with technology and so forth, you want to be with people that are progressive and that have flexibility, that are willing to adapt,” Swofford said. “And I think that’s who our partner is. And so we’re bullish about it, and I’d say they’re bullish about it. It might not look exactly the same.”

It looks like he's grooming conference members to view online streaming as a dedicated "network" equivalent.
Expand ...

I think "just streaming" doesn't get it done. I think ESPN can re-purpose ESPN U as a dedicated channel, but across two conferences. Maybe rebrand ESPN News at the same time. If every ACC or Big 12 game on those channels has "ACC Network" and "Big 12 Network" branding, and if they make it clear that you need ESPNU to see that content (even when streamed, like ESPN3 requires ESPN), then they can drive carriage fees for ESPNU/N and have some money to send to the conferences. It would also allow the LHN to live alongside a B12 Network.

My guess is the Pac 12 Network gets converted to this model eventually.
 
junglehusky said:
Some Baghdad Bob style sound bytes?

Dave Teel: New Look ACC-ESPN collaboration sounds imminent
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The ACC played the CR gane well when it raided and killed the Big East. It's had played it poorly since, and both times we got hurt.

Letting BC blackball us was short sighted and dumb.
Picking Louisville over us (thanks FSU and Clemson) was shorter sighted and dumber. The B1G showed that the correct way to play the CR game was to expand territory, even if that meant adding less than stellar football programs. The ACC didn't learn from that and instead took what it thought was the best football program available. Nevermind that Louisville isn't the number team in it's own state.

I'm not saying that the ACC would have a network right now if they had added us a few years ago, but I am also not convinced that Swofford is as astute at David Teel thinks he is.
 
BlueHen said:
The ACC played the CR gane well when it raided and killed the Big East. It's had played it poorly since, and both times we got hurt.

Letting BC blackball us was short sighted and dumb.
Picking Louisville over us (thanks FSU and Clemson) was shorter sighted and dumber. The B1G showed that the correct way to play the CR game was to expand territory, even if that meant adding less than stellar football programs. The ACC didn't learn from that and instead took what it thought was the best football program available. Nevermind that Louisville isn't the number team in it's own state.

I'm not saying that the ACC would have a network right now if they had added us a few years ago, but I am also not convinced that Swofford is as astute at David Teel thinks he is.
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I completely agree with this. I'll even go farther and say that the ACC's biggest blunders are what they didn't anticipate and didn't prevent that hurt it the most.

Allowing the B1G to take Rutgers and get a footprint in the NYC DMA was a huge blow. The ACC grabbed Cuse and thought that was good enough, which nobody in their right mind would think that the Orange alone would deliver NYC. If Swofford really could play the game, he would have premptively taken RU or even UConn to claim the NYC DMA (at least with UConn the ACC could claim by virtue of Fairfield County to have a presence in the NYC DMA).

But I truly believe the most egregious thing Swofford allowed to happen was letting Maryland - with decades of history in the ACC and the conference's footprint in our nation's capital - leave to go to the B1G. Yes, I understand the economics behind the Maryland move but I cannot understand how Swofford could have let this happen.

Then to replace Maryland with a Louisville athletic department that has proven to be criminally corrupt and in a worthless DMA that they don't even own, that was just terrible.
 
UConnJim said:
I think people need to stop thinking that ESPN is going to repurpose/rebrand ESPNU and ESPN News. These are successful channels that each bring in almost $200 million of revenues per year and are in ~74 million households each. LHN is now about breakeven so it's not a big loss maker for ESPN. Perhaps ESPN Classic, which is only available in ~25 million homes and has been in decline for years, could become an ACC Network.

In my opinion, an "ACC Network" can only come about as a new channel (highly doubtful), repositioning ESPN Classic, or as some sort of streaming network like ESPN3 (probable). It does make sense for ESPN to experiment with a streaming network with ACC content and see if it could generate sizable revenues as it wouldn't be too costly to start up.
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I think they will start a new ESPN channel...ESPN The Ocho!
 
The ACC wasn't the brains of the Big East raids, that was ESPN. The ACC was a convenient tool for ESPN to use to consolidate the number of conference deals it had to buy.
 
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Louisville has a very good and loyal fanbase and they heavily invest in the two sports that matter most in CR: football and MBB. That's good for them and will help them maintain a power conference profile (Big 12) if/when the ACC ever disbands because of lack of conference network.

But what's more valuable to a network: 50% market share of Louisville or 100% marketshare of Hartford/New Haven PLUS (at least) 5% marketshare of NYC and Boston? And the ratings were in at a time when Louisville is in the ACC and winning and UConn its stuck in the AAC and struggling. Put a P5 schedule and winning programs in front of those DMAs and the interest only goes up. Nothing but good news for any conference aspiring to create or add to a conference network.
 
In football competition, nobody wants to again carry the labeling tag that hurt the BE.... the Big Least.

So adding a program or two that will be the bottom of a conference and water down content seems to be a sticking point...thus some Big 12 angst....

The Big Ten could afford to water down their schedule some....still...this year based on early ESPN FPI...

The easiest schedules of 2016 are...

1. Minnesota
2. Michigan
3. Purdue
4. Maryland
5. Nebraska

The Top Five all Big Ten...and Indiana and Iowa make the Top Ten.

http://247sports.com/Bolt/College-footballs-toughest-and-easiest-2016-schedules-44687841
 
billybud said:
In football competition, nobody wants to again carry the labeling tag that hurt the BE.... the Big Least.

So adding a program or two that will be the bottom of a conference and water down content seems to be a sticking point...thus some Big 12 angst....

The Big Ten could afford to water down their schedule some....still...this year based on early ESPN FPI...

The easiest schedules of 2016 are...

1. Minnesota
2. Michigan
3. Purdue
4. Maryland
5. Nebraska

The Top Five all Big Ten...and Indiana and Iowa make the Top Ten.

http:// /Bolt/College-footballs-toughest-and-easiest-2016-schedules-44687841
Expand ...

Great point ... I wonder if Fox had SOS data for the B1G prior to offering the annual GDP of Costa Rica for 50% of the TV deal ...
 
billybud said:
Fishy...I never could even figure out why they give a CEO a million dollar raise when the stock has tanked and the company's performance is down.

I don't think anyone has seen the media contract since it is between two non public entities and not subject to FOIA. We know that there are "look ins", we just don't know what the contract says about them.

Sometimes, in a long term contract, the market may move and one or both of the parties writes in a built in look in as a protection. The market is reset upward...or maybe downward, but the contract may contain an adjustment clause.

The question is..."If there are look ins, why?"
Expand ...

I can figure that out easily.

The CEO uses the cash position for a stock buyback which is why he/she gets a compensation increase.
 
billybud said:
In football competition, nobody wants to again carry the labeling tag that hurt the BE.... the Big Least.

So adding a program or two that will be the bottom of a conference and water down content seems to be a sticking point...thus some Big 12 angst....

The Big Ten could afford to water down their schedule some....still...this year based on early ESPN FPI...

The easiest schedules of 2016 are...

1. Minnesota
2. Michigan
3. Purdue
4. Maryland
5. Nebraska

The Top Five all Big Ten...and Indiana and Iowa make the Top Ten.

http:// /Bolt/College-footballs-toughest-and-easiest-2016-schedules-44687841
Expand ...

The ACC watered it down with BC, Syracuse, Pitt, Louisville too. Heck, everything in the conference outside of FSU and Clemson is now watery.
 
upstater said:
The ACC watered it down with BC, Syracuse, Pitt, Louisville too. Heck, everything in the conference outside of FSU and Clemson is now watery.
Expand ...

Gonna let you all in on a major bombshell revelation:

With the exception of FSU and Clemson more recently, the ACC has been the most overrated football conference year in and year out for the last decade plus.

Miami has done jack since joining the ACC and V-Tech has a win over Cincy in the Orange Bowl to hang their hats on.

The conference was 5-13 in BCS games, 1-4 pre-expansion and 4-9 after expansion.

The truth is the ACC has always been Florida State and the __ dwarfs.
 
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billybud said:
In football competition, nobody wants to again carry the labeling tag that hurt the BE.... the Big Least.

So adding a program or two that will be the bottom of a conference and water down content seems to be a sticking point...thus some Big 12 angst....

The Big Ten could afford to water down their schedule some....still...this year based on early ESPN FPI...


http:// /Bolt/College-footballs-toughest-and-easiest-2016-schedules-44687841
Expand ...

This makes absolutely no sense. The Big12 and the ACC are perceived to be the weaker, most vulnerable P5 conferences for one reason...they are earning less money than the SEC/BIG.

The ACC and Big12 compete in most sports as well as any P5 conference. IMO the label that really hurt the BE was not "the Big Least" but was "the Big Unstable." A perception of instability is what causes teams to leave for another conference when they have an opportunity. The current income disparity is what is causing that "unstable" label to be applied now to the Big12 and to a lesser extend, the ACC.

Any expansion by the Big12 or ACC that is not purely grounded in closing the financial gap is just plain silly. It was never about football...it was always about money. The ACC and Big12 need to figure that out...
 
This was posted on TechSideline:

Brett McMurphy, ESPN FB analyst, on radio this weekend

He said the reported $45 million payout from ESPN to ACC if there is no network is an annual payout, not a one time deal. So, it sounded like ESPN is really on the hook for getting this done one way or another.

McMurphy said this on Andy Staples Sunday show in SiriusXM.
 
jostar1 said:
This was posted on TechSideline:

Brett McMurphy, ESPN FB analyst, on radio this weekend

He said the reported $45 million payout from ESPN to ACC if there is no network is an annual payout, not a one time deal. So, it sounded like ESPN is really on the hook for getting this done one way or another.

McMurphy said this on Andy Staples Sunday show in SiriusXM.
Expand ...

If true, the state should be pulling any string we have with ESPN to get them to add UConn to the ACC. If ESPN is on the hook for the network anyway, why not add UConn? It will make the network more valuable to ESPN, and if they are going to pay one nickel more than the annual minimum, they should be able to get the conference they want.
 
nelsonmuntz said:
If true, the state should be pulling any string we have with ESPN to get them to add UConn to the ACC. If ESPN is on the hook for the network anyway, why not add UConn? It will make the network more valuable to ESPN, and if they are going to pay one nickel more than the annual minimum, they should be able to get the conference they want.
Expand ...

And that's why I liked the timing of JJ's article.
 
dwalks93 said:
This makes absolutely no sense. The Big12 and the ACC are perceived to be the weaker, most vulnerable P5 conferences for one reason...they are earning less money than the SEC/BIG.

The ACC and Big12 compete in most sports as well as any P5 conference. IMO the label that really hurt the BE was not "the Big Least" but was "the Big Unstable." A perception of instability is what causes teams to leave for another conference when they have an opportunity. The current income disparity is what is causing that "unstable" label to be applied now to the Big12 and to a lesser extend, the ACC.

Any expansion by the Big12 or ACC that is not purely grounded in closing the financial gap is just plain silly. It was never about football...it was always about money. The ACC and Big12 need to figure that out...
Expand ...


Well...that's the rub...I don't think it really is all about the money and getting cable box U.

At some date in the future, having games that people want to watch will be important. Rutgers and Maryland might be good for carriage fees...but in actual viewing, not so much. Paying for streaming will happen....and the way TV is watched will ever move towards streaming.

I do believe that the marquee match ups will drive...just like they do in the SEC. Have an interesting spectacle and folks will watch. As far as watching Wake play GT or Northwestern play Purdue, I'd rather watch a monkey screw a football.
 
We are almost in the same stage of competing technologies of times gone by - when there was both beta and vhs, then vhs and two types of CD technology, and then CD and downloading content. Live TV via cable is the final frontier ( at least for awhile) Apple TV had planned to replace cable companies by now, but they failed to get agreements with the broadcasters.

ESPN is trying to create a model where they can continue to make a lot of money by broadcasting sports on whatever technology the market screams for.

If the technology advances to where you can stream seamlessly to any TV (connected to a wifi) or PDA - and where the broadcaster can protect against illegal sharing or pirating - then its off to the races.

Anything is possible...
 
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