NHL and Versus Each Can Opt Out of Deal

Both the NHL and Versus have options to opt out of their current rights deal, Multichannel News is reporting. Versus has already exercised an option to extend their deal through the upcoming 2007-08 season. They still have an option to extend the deal three additional years.

The NHL can also opt out of the deal at the end of this season if Versus does not meet certain subscriber benchmarks. It is not known exactly what these benchmarks are. However, Versus has increased its subscribers from 63 million in 2005, when it carried the NHL for the first time, to its current 72 million-subscriber mark.

If either party opts out of the contract, or if NBC decides not to renew after the 07-08 season, that would open the door for the NHL to return to ESPN. NBC says it is making money on their NHL contract, but the NHL has approached ESPN about securing NBC’s package. Another possibility is Versus renegotiating their deal and allowing some games to move to ESPN. The attractiveness of a renegotiation for Versus would be a lower rights fee, and cross-promotional exposure on ESPN.

from Thomas Umstead of Multichannel News

Versus can ice its National Hockey League deal after the upcoming season, a move that could allow ESPN to skate back into the pucks sport.

The Comcast-owned service has the right to end its NHL deal after the 2007-08 campaign, according to league deputy commissioner Bill Daly, who also said the hockey circuit can pull out of the deal based on whether Versus reaches certain distribution thresholds.

read more...

Nielsen Ratings for Glavine's 300th Win

The ratings for ESPN's coverage Sunday night of Tom Glavine's 300th victory have been released. Neil Best of Newsday is reporting the game was seen in 3% of the 94 million homes with ESPN. The total estimated audience is 2.89 million households and 3.83 million viewers. It was the biggest viewership for a Sunday night game since 1998, when the Braves faced Mark McGwire and the Cardinals.

How Much is Your Favorite Sport Covered in the News?

During the month of May, over 37% of ESPN's SportsCenter was devoted to covering MLB. The NBA playoffs took up 25% of the coverage. The NHL playoffs: less than 5 percent. Even the NFL offseason received more coverage than the NHL at 7%.

Street and Smith's Sports Business Daily has put together a chart detailing how much coverage each sport received from 5 major outlets during the month of May. The five outlets are the USA Today, the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, SportsCenter, and FSN's Final Score.

In another interesting comparison, coverage of Boxing exceeded that of MMA events in 4 of the 5 outlets. The only outlet that gave more coverage to MMA was FSN Final Score. Coincidentally, FSN has the television rights to the IFL.

Lovitz Beats Dick and Bud

First Jon Lovitz beats up Andy Dick, and now he beats up Bud Selig. At least this time Lovitz only used his words.

Erin Andrews interviewed comic Jon Lovitz during last night's Giants-Dodgers game on ESPN. (Why, I have no idea.) Speaking of the Barry Bonds-steroids scandal, Lovitz said that if Selig claims that he didn't know steroids existed in the game, he is 'full of crap".

Now maybe it's just coincidence, but that's two times that Lovitz has been in the news since he signed his lifetime contract to perform every Wednesday night at the Laugh Factory. For those of you keeping score, that's two more times than he's been in the news the last ten years. It looks like the publicity machine is in full motion.

Here is what "funny"-"man" Jon Lovitz had to say about Bonds. (Thanks to Neil Best of Newsday for the transcript.)

"I think he's the best hitter ever. All this talk about steroids is a bunch of crap. About seven years ago I was talking to a major baseball player in the league and I said, 'How many players take steroids?' And he said, '40 percent.'

"I'm not saying whether he took them or not, all I'm saying is the league totally allowed it, and anyway, whether he took it or not, out of all those players, three guys hit a lot of home runs - three. So obviously that's three out of 300 taking it. That's not the difference.

"The guy's just a great hitter. How many people get that many walks? He works the pitcher. Usually the pitcher is ahead of the batter, but this guy, he's ahead of the pitcher. He's unbelievably great. He was taught by his father, Bobby Bonds. He was taught by Willie Mays. Willie Mays was maybe the greatest player ever. Now he's the greatest player ever. It was Willie Mays himself who said he could be one of the greatest ever. If you've got Willie Mays saying you could be the greatest ever if you take it seriously, that's what happened and he started taking it seriously.

"The league is complaining about it and yet, you know, attendance is way up, a lot of it because of Barry Bonds. Wherever he plays, he sells out the stadium. So it's completely hypocritical.''

"Bud Selig, if he says he didn't know, is full of crap. If he didn't know he should resign, and if he did know, he should say, 'Yeah, I allowed it, so what?' But for him to say he didn't know, how did I know seven years ago and he didn't? Hello? Thank you.''

"I think he's one of the greatest hitters ever and I think it's fantastic. I think it's a shame he's getting booed everywhere. I think it's a wonderful thing to see. It hardly ever happens. And Hank Aaron is still as great as ever and Babe Ruth still is as great as ever. It's no reflection on them at all. It's another great guy. It's fantastic. If it wasn't for Babe Ruth and Hank Aaron, those guys set the bar. Everyone shoots for that. You can't take it away.''

ESPN and ABC Release 2007-08 NBA Schedule

ABC and ESPN released their 2007-08 NBA schedule today. The schedule features a total of 90 games, with 18 on ABC and 72 on ESPN. The NBA finals will be broadcast exclusively on ABC. Overall ABC will broadcast six NBA Sunday doubleheaders. Both ABC and ESPN will feature a flexible schedule.

ABC and ESPN will combine to present a Christmas Day tripleheader. It will open at 2pm on ABC with the Cleveland Cavaliers and LeBron James versus the Miami Heat with Dwyane Wade and Shaquille O’Neal. The game will be followed by Phoenix and Steve Nash visiting the Los Angeles Lakers and Kobe Bryant. The nightcap moves to ESPN, where the Portland Trail Blazers’ and Greg Oden face the Seattle SuperSonics’ Kevin Durant at 8 p.m.

ABC highlights:

• 18 exclusive broadcasts;
• a flexible schedule allowing for the best possible matchups throughout the season;
• a Christmas Day doubleheader with Miami at Cleveland and Phoenix at the L.A. Lakers with coverage beginning at 2 p.m.;
• a NBA Sunday regular-season schedule from Jan. 27 through April 13;
• multiple appearances from several of the league’s top teams, including defending NBA Finals champion San Antonio and runner-up Cleveland, along with Chicago, Dallas, Detroit, L.A. Lakers, Miami and Phoenix;
• two games between the Miami Heat, with Dwyane Wade and Shaquille O’Neal, facing the Cleveland Cavaliers and LeBron James – Christmas Day at 2 p.m. and April 13 at 1 p.m. (both games at Cleveland);
• Cleveland and LeBron James will host Denver and Carmelo Anthony Feb. 10 at 1 p.m. The matchup will be followed by the Lakers and Kobe Bryant visiting the Miami Heat and Shaquille O’Neal at 3:30 p.m.;
• 2006 NBA Finals rematch with the Miami Heat hosting the Dallas Mavericks March 16 at 3:30 p.m.;
• a Texas showdown with the San Antonio Spurs hosting the Houston Rockets and perennial

NHL talking to ESPN about replacing NBC

It's looking more and more as if NBC will not be renewing its contract with the NHL when it expires after this season. Heading into the final year of their contract, NBC is cutting costs every way it can. Instead of covering 3 regional games per week, there will be only one national game. Also reduced is the number of on air personalities, with Brett Hull, Bill Clement and Ray Ferraro gone this year. In their place, Pierre McGuire will perform double duty as both game analyst and "studio" host. Note that "studio" is in quotes, because NBC has also dropped its entire NHL studio at Rockefeller Center.

The good news is that if NBC does not renew its contract with the NHL, that will open the door for the league to go back to ESPN and ABC.

from William Houston of the Globe and Mail

The online publication SportsBusiness Journal reported this week that the NHL has started preliminary talks with ESPN about replacing NBC as a television partner in 2008-09.

In response, an NBC spokesman said it was premature to speculate on what the network will do with its 2008-09 option.

What's more, NBC will employ a flexible NHL schedule in 2007-08, from which it will pick the best matchup — a move that should push up ratings.

read more...

NHL and ESPN Talking

Street and Smith's Sports Business Journal is reporting that the NHL and ESPN are having talks about bringing the league back to the World Wide Leader in Sports. The league may be back on ESPN, ESPN2, and ABC as soon as the 2008-09 season.

Sources also say the league is negotiating its planned NHL Network with cable and satellite operators. The NHL is taking a page from MLB by tying carriage of its planned channel with the renewal of Center Ice. The U.S. channel will have a look and feel similar to the Canadian version, and will have 50 live games in 2007-08. Most of the content will be identical to what appears in Canada, although repackaged with some U.S.-based programming.

The NHL and ESPN are in discussions about bringing the league’s games back to ESPN2 as soon as the 2008-09 season.

Multiple sources described the conversations as preliminary. The two started talking the week of July 16 when the NHL approached ESPN about NBC’s nine-game regular-season schedule, plus the playoffs. NBC holds the rights to air the coming season as part of a revenue-sharing agreement, and the network holds a one-year option for the 2008-09 season.

It’s not certain that NBC would exercise that option, given the sport’s tepid ratings on the network. Regular-season ratings on NBC averaged a 0.9 during the 2006-07 season and a 1.0 during the 2007-08 season over nine telecasts.

The key to this whole scenario is Versus, which holds cable exclusivity to all of the league’s games through 2011 and is paying the league a rights fee in excess of $70 million annually. Sources close to the Comcast-owned network, however, indicated that Versus would be willing to waive that clause, but only if it gets something in return — either a lower rights fee, a stronger schedule or a deal extension.

read more...

AFL Nielsen TV Ratings on ESPN

from Neil Best of Newsday.

It's been five months since ESPN detonated its new Arena Football League deal with hype that included an ESPN Zone bash in Times Square attended by everyone from Jon Bon Jovi to John Elway.

With the Arena Bowl scheduled for Sunday on ABC, how has it worked out so far? The ratings suggest not so great.

The season-opening regional coverage on ABC drew 1.0 percent of all U.S. households, but 16 regular-season games on ESPN2 attracted an NHL-like 0.2 percent of the 94 million homes that have ESPN. (The playoffs have performed somewhat better.)

That is far behind the 0.8 percent of all U.S. homes the AFL averaged on NBC in its last season in '06, which itself was that network's lowest figure to date.

Leah LaPlaca, a VP for programming, said the ratings "are about what we expected them to be for this first season" and added ESPN - which owns 10 percent of the AFL - sees vast growth potential.

ESPN had better hope so.

Beckham's Overnight Nielsen Ratings on ESPN

David Beckham's MLS debut for the Los Angeles Galaxy earned a 1.2 overnight Nielsen rating on ESPN. The game was broadcast live on Saturday night, July 21. Beckham's first game was the highest rated MLS telecast ever on ESPN.

ESPN and the WNBA Team Up

The Sports Business News is reporting that the WNBA has agreed to an eight-year rights extension through the 2016 season with ABC, ESPN, and ESPN2.

The new contract includes a minimum of 18 regular-season games to be telecast on ESPN2 (approximately one per week) and two games on ABC. The postseason on ESPN2 will include a minimum of 11 games, including the entire best-of-five WNBA Finals. All ABC and ESPN2 telecasts will continue to have time-period exclusivity. In addition, the deal includes coverage of the first round of the WNBA Draft on ESPN2 and rights to coverage on ESPN Deportes, including: live simulcast rights for all ESPN2 regular-season and post-season games, as well as all studio and specials programming; SAP rights for all ABC games; and enhanced digital media rights for ESPNDeportes.com.

Although financial terms are not discussed in this article, it has been reported that the deal did include a rights-fee, and not a revenue sharing percentage. What does it say about the state of the NHL that the WNBA received more guaranteed money than they did? Of course, it is probably not a coincidence that the NBA recently also agreed to terms with ESPN and ABC. It would not be surprising to learn that David Stern made it clear that if you take the WNBA, you will get treated better by the NBA.

Dan Patrick To Launch Syndicated Radio Show

from Robert Feder at The Chicagio Sun-Times

Also on the ESPN beat, Dan Patrick, who's leaving the network after 18 years as one of its biggest stars, soon will announce his new deal: He'll continue in radio and launch a new nationally syndicated program via Chicago-based Content Factory.

read entire article ...

According to this report, Dan Patrick has already signed a deal to launch a new syndicated radio program. I haven't seen this reported anywhere else, and it has not been confirmed. I had previously speculated that Patrick might be leaving ESPN to take over the Don Imus radio show. Neil Best of Newsday is reporting that this will not be the case.

UPDATE - Read the official press release: Dan Patrick Adds ''Mo'' to ''Big Show"

Spike TV Looks to Gobble Up Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating Contest from ESPN

from Richard Sandomir at The New York Times

ESPN started carrying the Nathan’s event in 2004, and it drew 926,000 viewers. In 2005, it dipped to 860,000, but it leaped to 1.46 million last year, a level it probably reached on Wednesday.

“We’ve done other competitive eating contests,” said David Berson, an ESPN executive vice president. “But we focus on the hot dog. It’s the marquee event.” But with ESPN’s deal now expired, Spike wants to take gluttony (not entirely a male pursuit, as the M.L.E. star Sonya Thomas shows) to its male-focused network as a companion to its Ultimate Fighting Championship franchise. Spike has shown one Major League Eating event (the St. Patrick’s Day corned beef and cabbage, jalapeños and green doughnuts show from Savannah, Ga., attracted 739,000 viewers) and is scheduled to carry three more.

“We want to be known as the home of competitive eating,” said David Schwarz, a spokesman for Spike.

read entire article...

Last year the Nathans hot dog eating contest drew 1.46 million viewers, a total that was probably surpassed this year. On May 30, Anaheim's 3-2 victory over Ottawa in the opener of the Stanley Cup finals was watched in 523,000 households. Ouch.

Dan Patrick Announces He is Leaving ESPN

Dan Patrick has just officially announced he is leaving ESPN on August 17th. He did not elaborate on why he is leaving, or where he will be going to. He did say that he will be a "free agent", suggesting that he has not yet agreed to take another position.

The one hint Patrick dropped was that he "hopes to remain in radio." This would seem to rule out Fox Sports as a possible destination. The most likely possibilities now include Sporting News Radio and, as I previously speculated, the old Don Imus radio show on WFAN and MSNBC.

I think today's announcement supports the Don Imus theory. If Patrick was to take over the high profile Dom Imus show, his new bosses would not want him to announce it on rival ESPN radio. They would want to hold their own press conference to gain as much publicity as possible. Similarly, his current bosses at ESPN would not want him to promote his new show on ESPN radio.

Dan Patrick Leaving ESPN?: Announcement at 2:00 PM

During Dan Patrick's opening monologue on his radio show today, he said that he will be making his big announcement at 2:00PM EST. Dan, however, strongly hinted that he will be leaving ESPN. He said that while he his "happy" with his decision, he is not without "mixed feeling." I am not sure what else that could refer to, other than him leaving the network. Patrick did confirm that he did not audition for The Price is Right. (For the record, he also confirmed that he is not the father of Nicole Richie's love child.)

Let the Dan Patrick Countdown Begin

The countdown to the "Dan Patrick leaving ESPN" announcement on his radio show tomorrow has officially begun. There are plenty of rumors going around that Patrick will announce his departure from ESPN during his Monday radio broadcast. Various rumors have him leaving ESPN for Fox Sports, Sporting News Radio, satellite radio, or even to host The Price is Right.

On July 5th, I speculated that Patrick may leave ESPN to take over the Dom Imus show on WFAN and MSNBC. Patrick is exactly what they are looking for -- a recognizable name that can talk knowledgebly and with humor about sports, news, and pop culture. But here is another possibility: Dan Patrick flees to the flegdling Versus network to immediately become their most recognizable name and host a daily SportCenter-esque show. Sound crazy? Well, actually it has been done before by Patrick's good friend Keith Olberman, who once left ESPN for Fox Sports to host his own daily sports news show. (Which was trounced by SportsCenter.)

One interesting fact, reported by Sports Business Radio, is that the ratings of Patrick's radio show trail those of ESPN's other primary radio properties, Mike & Mike in the morning and "The Herd" with Colin Cowherd.

Odds & Ends: MLB Punishes ESPN and Beckham's First MLS Match

• MLB is punishing ESPN for reporting this year's All Star team selections while TBS was broadcasting their own selection show, for which TBS had acquired the exclsuive rights.
  
  
• David Beckham's first Major League Soccer match will be broadcast on ESPN Saturday, July 21. According to ESPN, the planned coverage of Beckham’s arrival represents ESPN’s most expansive initiative ever for a single U.S. domestic soccer event.
  
  

Dan Patrick Update!

I just listened to the first half hour of the Dan Patrick Show. I can now confirm (drum roll, please) that Dan Patrick is not in the studio today. Bob Valvano is guest hosting today, as he did on Tuesday. A half hour into the show, and there was no mention of this story. Apparently Patrick is on vacation, and will not be back until Monday.

The Dan-Patrick-is-Leaving Rumor Picks up Steam

from The Big Lead

When we left Tuesday, speculation about Dan Patrick leaving ESPN was turning from a whisper to a roar. For us, it’s what our contacts over at the four-letter weren’t saying: nobody would give us a straight answer. They either hadn’t heard or they couldn’t say. Which led us to believe Patrick was gone. It also sort of makes us wonder if Patrick’s agent planted the Price is Right rumors to fuel interest in the anchor. We do remain somewhat skeptical, though, because ESPN hands USA Today any meaningful scoop (not due to a relationship, but simply because the McPaper has the largest readership audience in the United States), and we found nothing about the announcement in that rag today. We’re guessing it’ll happen Monday, when the world returns to work.

read more ...

The Dan Patrick rumors are really picking up steam now. Most observers are guessing that he will move to Fox Sports. As far as I can tell, this is the only space guessing that he will be taking over Don Imus' old job.

Dan Patrick to Leave ESPN?

from Michael David Smith at aol.com's Fanhouse

Greenstein reports that a source said there is a "90 percent chance" that Dan Patrick will announce his farewell during his Thursday radio show. Although Patrick won't host The Price is Right, he has been rumored to have a number of other options, ranging from sports to news to entertainment.

read more ...

Earlier, I commented that WFAN and MSNBC would have to bring back Dom Imus if they could not replace him with "a Bob Costas." Well, what about a Dan Patrick? If Dan Patrick really does leave ESPN today, as is being reported, let me be the first to guess that he will be Dom Imus' replacement. Patrick is the perfect choice, in that he can talk knowledgeably about sports, news, and entertainment, has a great sense of humor, and already has a huge fan base that he can bring with him.

At ESPN, conflict of interest is business as usual

from Le Anne Schreiber of ESPN

Imagine The New York Times owning half of the Broadway theaters whose plays it reviews. Or imagine CNN paying billions of dollars for exclusive multiyear rights to cover the War in Iraq. Imagine the temptation to recoup investment by piquing advance interest and prolonging the runs of plays and wars.

That kind of temptation, almost inconceivable for other news organizations, is a chronic circumstance of journalistic life at ESPN, and has been since the day it first paid good money to televise an event while also covering it as news.

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After the NHL left ESPN for Versus in 2005, hockey fans have complained that ESPN's coverage of the sport has declined considerably. In contrast, coverage of NASCAR and AFL, whose rights ESPN recently acquired, appear to be way up. Le Anne Schreiber, ESPN's ombudsman, confirms that hockey coverage on SportsCenter has indeed dropped 28 percent in the last three years. Can "The Worldwide Leader in Sports" kill or build a sport by giving it more or less esposure? ESPN seems to think so.