Recently, we had heard the 60-70 million Fox was offering was upped to 90million. The men donned sack cloth, and rubbed ash on themselves. There was great mourning, beating of chests, and gnashing of teeth over the loss of what seemed like a likely SEC move.
However, upon further inspection, the 90 isn't exactly a cut and dry 90 million dollar offer. First, lets keep in mind that you better believe Beebe and the Big 12 are leaking this to keep the pressure on A&M and any other members thinking of leaving. The SPD article proclaimed, offer upped to 90 million. Courtesy of Spider Rico, we got the other portion of the article. The thread it is in was removed/deleted so I will paraphrase.
Fox will retain cable exclusivity.
Fox would double their games/year from 20 to 40.
The pecking order would change from
ABC -> ESPN -> FSN
to
ABC -> FSN -> ESPN
Now Rico was saying that this appeared to be a great offer since it wont modify existing contracts and that ESPN already pays fox for the games they air.
Respectfully, I disagree with his assessment. Now, it is my understanding that indeed, if ESPN picks up a big 12 game (not ABC, ESPN), the do pay FSN. But what if they lost those 20 games? Now, we dont have access to the specifics but I would have to assume that since this FSN renegotiation has those new perks in there, they wouldnt affect the ESPN/ABC contracts. Thus, it must be for every game ESPN shows, they will pay FSN. But if FSN sucks up a good lot of those games, they are cutting out ABC/ESPN of this deal, and thus, that aspect of the contract, worth $60million, greatly diminishes. I would say that losing all those games they would potentially show would make up the ground we saw in the 60-70 jump to 90.
If Im understanding this right, FSN just made a move, without ruining existing agreements that will basically tell ESPN to pay up to keep a foot in the door of what would largely become a FSN conference (and ignored by ESPN except tu). Not only that, they would likely meet that 20 million mark still, as I said with the other post I wrote about the subject. FSN is cutting ESPN out. ABC still has the first pick of the big games like tu-ou etc, but FSN would basically take everything else.
-Why this sucks dick-
FSN's coverage and their sports channel as a whole is like a damn high school club effort.
The deeper FSN ties and knowing that ESPN is unlikely to steal the Big 12 (especially with FSN talking long term deal) plus all those games that would have been on ESPN now going on FSN means much less press. We already lost a big national name in nebraska, this will just hurt us more. Look at the ESPN coverage of the Cotton Bowl if you dont believe me.
The FSN offer isnt much more in effect than the original 60-70 mil overpaying.
Do you really need to be reminded of the tier-3 deals OU and tu will sign? tu and ou are very likely to make as much if not more than us in this conference and then will also have their own networks to boot. We are sitting here patting ourselves on the back for getting a big heaping number while no one seems to get that we will be making much less than both OU and tu. We are cheering for getting third place in about the 4th most powerful conference. Way to settle.
Money is not everything. What we gain from a move to the SEC is worth losing a few million, and Id be willing to be we dont even do that if they renegotiate their TV as they are likely to do as per Slive's comments. There are some idiots and apologists who keep bring up the journeyman money we, and other schools like Kansas and Mizzou, are getting and saying this is the best deal. **** that. Image, perception, home schedule, guaranteed paychecks versus appearance based systems (hello 5 games on tv last year). There are so many benefits to the SEC. Ive been to the SEC games, seen the atmosphere. It is where A&M needs to go to actively lock in their future, and not sit on their hands and settle for sitting at the kids table like we look like we will.
[This message has been edited by TexasAggies57 (edited 3/21/2011 3:48p).]
However, upon further inspection, the 90 isn't exactly a cut and dry 90 million dollar offer. First, lets keep in mind that you better believe Beebe and the Big 12 are leaking this to keep the pressure on A&M and any other members thinking of leaving. The SPD article proclaimed, offer upped to 90 million. Courtesy of Spider Rico, we got the other portion of the article. The thread it is in was removed/deleted so I will paraphrase.
Fox will retain cable exclusivity.
Fox would double their games/year from 20 to 40.
The pecking order would change from
ABC -> ESPN -> FSN
to
ABC -> FSN -> ESPN
Now Rico was saying that this appeared to be a great offer since it wont modify existing contracts and that ESPN already pays fox for the games they air.
Respectfully, I disagree with his assessment. Now, it is my understanding that indeed, if ESPN picks up a big 12 game (not ABC, ESPN), the do pay FSN. But what if they lost those 20 games? Now, we dont have access to the specifics but I would have to assume that since this FSN renegotiation has those new perks in there, they wouldnt affect the ESPN/ABC contracts. Thus, it must be for every game ESPN shows, they will pay FSN. But if FSN sucks up a good lot of those games, they are cutting out ABC/ESPN of this deal, and thus, that aspect of the contract, worth $60million, greatly diminishes. I would say that losing all those games they would potentially show would make up the ground we saw in the 60-70 jump to 90.
If Im understanding this right, FSN just made a move, without ruining existing agreements that will basically tell ESPN to pay up to keep a foot in the door of what would largely become a FSN conference (and ignored by ESPN except tu). Not only that, they would likely meet that 20 million mark still, as I said with the other post I wrote about the subject. FSN is cutting ESPN out. ABC still has the first pick of the big games like tu-ou etc, but FSN would basically take everything else.
-Why this sucks dick-
FSN's coverage and their sports channel as a whole is like a damn high school club effort.
The deeper FSN ties and knowing that ESPN is unlikely to steal the Big 12 (especially with FSN talking long term deal) plus all those games that would have been on ESPN now going on FSN means much less press. We already lost a big national name in nebraska, this will just hurt us more. Look at the ESPN coverage of the Cotton Bowl if you dont believe me.
The FSN offer isnt much more in effect than the original 60-70 mil overpaying.
Do you really need to be reminded of the tier-3 deals OU and tu will sign? tu and ou are very likely to make as much if not more than us in this conference and then will also have their own networks to boot. We are sitting here patting ourselves on the back for getting a big heaping number while no one seems to get that we will be making much less than both OU and tu. We are cheering for getting third place in about the 4th most powerful conference. Way to settle.
Money is not everything. What we gain from a move to the SEC is worth losing a few million, and Id be willing to be we dont even do that if they renegotiate their TV as they are likely to do as per Slive's comments. There are some idiots and apologists who keep bring up the journeyman money we, and other schools like Kansas and Mizzou, are getting and saying this is the best deal. **** that. Image, perception, home schedule, guaranteed paychecks versus appearance based systems (hello 5 games on tv last year). There are so many benefits to the SEC. Ive been to the SEC games, seen the atmosphere. It is where A&M needs to go to actively lock in their future, and not sit on their hands and settle for sitting at the kids table like we look like we will.
[This message has been edited by TexasAggies57 (edited 3/21/2011 3:48p).]