Big Ten saying Good-Bye to ESPN?

[eyekwah]

I titled this as a thought provoking question based on the story below. Anyone else ever notice how stories like this are linked to an Iowa newspaper before they hit the national media?

Fox Sports will be 'active participant' in Big Ten rights talks - CBSSports.com

 

[PhoenixHawk]

ABC. ABC likes the B10 games, they get big ratings and feature good teams with widespread, large, well off alumni bases. CBS has the SEC games. Who else will ABC get? ABC owns ESPN.

 

[Doublewide]

ABC. ABC likes the B10 games, they get big ratings and feature good teams with widespread, large, well off alumni bases. CBS has the SEC games. Who else will ABC get? ABC owns ESPN.

Lul wut? ESPN owns everything sports related on the ABC networks.

 

[PhoenixHawk]

Lul wut? ESPN owns everything sports related on the ABC networks.

And you're an idiot.

ABC and ESPN are both owned by Disney. Disney merged ABC Sports with ESPN, and made ABC the de facto premier ESPN sports outlet. Therefore, if ABC wants the best college football available (B10), so does ESPN.

CBS has a contract for their pick of the top SEC games every saturday, which means only the lesser SEC games are available for other outlets. ABC, being a premier outlet for featured college football, will continue to want the most popular and widely watched college football games, which would be the B10, (FACT!) not the B12 or P12 or ACC. What ABC wants ESPN wants.

 

[Haverhill]

Very interesting times ahead with Fox becoming a power player in collegiate athletics.

 

[DrKnipe]

With ESPN making it clear that they are SEC, I would welcome this.

 

[JonDMiller]

I would wager Fox will ultimately be the highest bidder...this is a land grab and the Big Ten is the last bits of land that are not already under long term contract. I just hope ESPN is interested enough in bidding, otherwise the rights for the games may not be as high as they would have been in a bidding war.

ESPN is not a fan of the BTN...but were it not for ESPNU, the BTN might not be around, or would not have been the pioneer....ESPN coming to Delany and wanting to put a lot of games on the U, and Delany then getting the idea for a BTN, that was a very good thing.

But in the end, I think Fox gets it...they own 49% of the BTN if I am not mistaken (haven't read this item) and they also have the regional Fox Sports properties....it seems like a better fit, IMO.

 

[enmaster]

How many games would be on local Fox Sports Net? I've never gotten FSN on any local cable. I would hope they could stick all their programming on Fox, FS1, and BTN.

 

[enmaster]

Also, I read that every Pac-12 Football and Men's Basketball game is going to be televised nationally (not just on internet- televised) thanks to Pac-12 network. Why can't the Big Ten do that? Why do they need hawkeye games on Mediacom?

 

[Section136]

I would wager Fox will ultimately be the highest bidder...this is a land grab and the Big Ten is the last bits of land that are not already under long term contract. I just hope ESPN is interested enough in bidding, otherwise the rights for the games may not be as high as they would have been in a bidding war.

ESPN is not a fan of the BTN...but were it not for ESPNU, the BTN might not be around, or would not have been the pioneer....ESPN coming to Delany and wanting to put a lot of games on the U, and Delany then getting the idea for a BTN, that was a very good thing.

But in the end, I think Fox gets it...they own 49% of the BTN if I am not mistaken (haven't read this item) and they also have the regional Fox Sports properties....it seems like a better fit, IMO.

FOX actually owns 51% of BTN. After the first 2 or 3 years of the BTN being around the FOX share went from 49% to 51%, IIRC.

 

[hawkfan340]

FOX actually owns 51% of BTN. After the first 2 or 3 years of the BTN being around the FOX share went from 49% to 51%, IIRC.

Seriously? Seems like a major screw-up for Delany to lose majority share for the confernce.