(01-14-2019 02:01 PM)Hokie Mark Wrote:  

(01-14-2019 01:45 PM)arkstfan Wrote:  The fascinating thing is Fox apparently having a walk-away right.

Certainly presents an interesting situation.

Yeah, I thought the same thing. No mention of selling the rights - apparently Fox is just going to abandon them?

Wow.

Fox is in a real transition currently. This could be nothing more than a sneaky way to get ESPN/Disney the rights to a championship game without actually having a real rival bidder for the rights.

(01-14-2019 04:18 PM)OrangeDude Wrote:  

(01-14-2019 02:53 PM)Wedge Wrote:  

(01-14-2019 02:43 PM)bullet Wrote:  

(01-14-2019 02:18 PM)Wedge Wrote:  

(01-14-2019 12:45 PM)CliftonAve Wrote:  As pointed out in the article in the OP, the Big 12 sees this year's rating as the ceiling for the BXII CCG-- last year's game only garnered a 3.8 share. More often that not, the rating would be something in between.

The economic argument makes sense. At 3.8, it's delivering the same very-good-but-not-great audience as a top 20-30 regular season game. P5 regular season games on ESPN or Fox are worth an average of $4 to 6 million per game. Even if a 3.8 or 4.0 game might possibly be worth twice the average, that is still far below $20 million.

IIRC, the SEC is still paid separately for its CCG, while the ACC, Big Ten, and Pac-12 CCGs are included in the overall ESPN and/or Fox contract and don't get a separate fee over and above the annual contract amount. The Big 12 CCG was a special setup, presumably, because it was added midstream during existing TV deals.

The big 10 was separate on the last deal. They got roughly 24 million.

24 million is also too much.

Basing a CCG's valuation on how much a valuable regular season game costs seems like the right way to go. A game is a game, and a regular season game and a CCG that deliver the same number of viewers in similar time slots are worth the same amount.

Do we even know how valuable a regular season game is to the networks since the conferences are paid for 13 weeks of games not by individual game in a particular time slot week in and week out?

Obviously we can divide the amount they pay by the number of games they get. (See above.) Again, even if a game with a 3.8 rating is worth twice as much as the average regular season game purchased by ESPN or Fox (and that already excludes each conference's least valuable games from the Big Ten, Big 12, or Pac-12 contracts), $20 million is 4-5 times the average price for an ESPN or Fox regular season game.

IMO this is an indication that ESPN and Fox, or at least some of the folks at both networks, think that they are overpaying for college football in general, with this game being just one example.

Although...

(01-14-2019 04:23 PM)Hokie Mark Wrote:  The SEC on CBS TV contract is definitely undervalued, but this thing with Fox just ate away a little bit of that value, IMO. Why? It's now clear that Fox is not a bidder for college football rights, which eases the pressure on ESPN and CBS.

I wouldn't go that far. I would say that Fox might be more picky, going forward, about what to bid on.

The SEC package that is now on CBS is a select group of a limited number of games, all of them can be aired on Fox OTA (the only Fox channel where games get decent ratings), and that package is far more valuable per game than a package for all of a conference's football games. Fox might well bid on it, even if they are less enthusiastic about bidding on future contracts for all or half of a conference's games.

(01-14-2019 04:43 PM)Wedge Wrote:  IMO this is an indication that ESPN and Fox, or at least some of the folks at both networks, think that they are overpaying for college football in general, with this game being just one example.

To be a little bit more exact, the price structure created by ESPN, supported by 100M subscribers at very high monthly fees, is more than Fox is interested in paying.

The current Fox rights fees, I conjecture, are premised on investing money in building up FS1 into a version of ESPN, raking in huge subscriber fees. If that day has past, then a game is only worth what it's worth on OTA TV.

(01-14-2019 04:23 PM)Hokie Mark Wrote:  The SEC package that is now on CBS is a select group of a limited number of games, all of them can be aired on Fox OTA (the only Fox channel where games get decent ratings), and that package is far more valuable per game than a package for all of a conference's football games. Fox might well bid on it, even if they are less enthusiastic about bidding on future contracts for all or half of a conference's games.

Quote:The cost of the game to FOX, reported to be in the $20 million range...

Is this just the money paid to the B12, i.e. are there additional production costs for FOX? I'm sure producing a CCG with extra cameras, reporters, etc. has to be a significant cost.

(01-14-2019 04:43 PM)Wedge Wrote:  

(01-14-2019 04:18 PM)OrangeDude Wrote:  

(01-14-2019 02:53 PM)Wedge Wrote:  

(01-14-2019 02:43 PM)bullet Wrote:  

(01-14-2019 02:18 PM)Wedge Wrote:  The economic argument makes sense. At 3.8, it's delivering the same very-good-but-not-great audience as a top 20-30 regular season game. P5 regular season games on ESPN or Fox are worth an average of $4 to 6 million per game. Even if a 3.8 or 4.0 game might possibly be worth twice the average, that is still far below $20 million.

IIRC, the SEC is still paid separately for its CCG, while the ACC, Big Ten, and Pac-12 CCGs are included in the overall ESPN and/or Fox contract and don't get a separate fee over and above the annual contract amount. The Big 12 CCG was a special setup, presumably, because it was added midstream during existing TV deals.

The big 10 was separate on the last deal. They got roughly 24 million.

24 million is also too much.

Basing a CCG's valuation on how much a valuable regular season game costs seems like the right way to go. A game is a game, and a regular season game and a CCG that deliver the same number of viewers in similar time slots are worth the same amount.

Do we even know how valuable a regular season game is to the networks since the conferences are paid for 13 weeks of games not by individual game in a particular time slot week in and week out?

Obviously we can divide the amount they pay by the number of games they get. (See above.) Again, even if a game with a 3.8 rating is worth twice as much as the average regular season game purchased by ESPN or Fox (and that already excludes each conference's least valuable games from the Big Ten, Big 12, or Pac-12 contracts), $20 million is 4-5 times the average price for an ESPN or Fox regular season game.

And yet, the Sugar Bowl is being paid $40 million per conference for games that get less ratings than the SECCG. So there are obviously hidden values that a simple average or even a pro-rated average doesn't account for.

Cheers,
Neil

(01-14-2019 05:26 PM)OrangeDude Wrote:  

(01-14-2019 04:43 PM)Wedge Wrote:  

(01-14-2019 04:18 PM)OrangeDude Wrote:  

(01-14-2019 02:53 PM)Wedge Wrote:  

(01-14-2019 02:43 PM)bullet Wrote:  The big 10 was separate on the last deal. They got roughly 24 million.

24 million is also too much.

Basing a CCG's valuation on how much a valuable regular season game costs seems like the right way to go. A game is a game, and a regular season game and a CCG that deliver the same number of viewers in similar time slots are worth the same amount.

Do we even know how valuable a regular season game is to the networks since the conferences are paid for 13 weeks of games not by individual game in a particular time slot week in and week out?

Obviously we can divide the amount they pay by the number of games they get. (See above.) Again, even if a game with a 3.8 rating is worth twice as much as the average regular season game purchased by ESPN or Fox (and that already excludes each conference's least valuable games from the Big Ten, Big 12, or Pac-12 contracts), $20 million is 4-5 times the average price for an ESPN or Fox regular season game.

And yet, the Sugar Bowl is being paid $40 million per conference for games that get less ratings than the SECCG. So there are obviously hidden values that a simple average or even a pro-rated average doesn't account for.

Cheers,
Neil

Wasn't part of the NY6 deal that the bowls turned over their naming rights and top sponsorship deals to be sold by ESPN?

(01-14-2019 02:48 PM)bullet Wrote:  5.0, 7.3, 5.6, 5.3
Ratings for the last four big ten cogs. So it has averaged 5.8

(edit-if you go back one more year it was 3.5-the Ohio ST.-WI blowout-so over 5 years it averages 5.3, just slightly better than the two year Big 12 average of 5.0).

I find ratings share slightly misleading since they are calculated using the total number of viewers at that point in time which is not static time slot to different time slot, day to day, or week to week.

Last year the B1G's CCG had a ratings share of 7.3 while the B12CCG had a 3.8 ratings share. That is 52% of the B1G's share but the total number of viewers was only 46% of what the B1G game drew.

This year the B12CCG had a ratings share of 6.2 while the B1G's had a 5.0 rating share. This would seem to indicate if using rating share that the number of viewers for the B1GCCG should be 81% of the B12CCG, yet it was actually 85% using the Nielsen numbers but 84% if streaming numbers for B12CCG are used. As streaming likely become a bigger part of viewership numbers as we move forward, I prefer viewership numbers the better indicator than rating shares.

Lastly, as is usually the case, the B1GCCG bucks up against the ACCCG, whereas the B12CCG had the American CCG as college football competition last year and the Sunbelt CCG as its only college football competition this year.

But props to the B12 for getting their two best programs in the championship game this year. The ACC can't do that any year without a rules change.

Cheers,
Neil

(01-14-2019 05:11 PM)johnbragg Wrote:  

(01-14-2019 04:43 PM)Wedge Wrote:  IMO this is an indication that ESPN and Fox, or at least some of the folks at both networks, think that they are overpaying for college football in general, with this game being just one example.

To be a little bit more exact, the price structure created by ESPN, supported by 100M subscribers at very high monthly fees, is more than Fox is interested in paying.

The current Fox rights fees, I conjecture, are premised on investing money in building up FS1 into a version of ESPN, raking in huge subscriber fees. If that day has past, then a game is only worth what it's worth on OTA TV.

I think that's right. Going forward, Fox won't mind paying whatever "the going rate" is for OTA games. For FS1 games, they don't want to pay ESPN prices (which is what they're paying now) for one-third of ESPN's audiences and one-fifth of ESPN's subscriber fees.

Could this be an ominous sign for other content that FOX has taken a chance on that's not producing the ratings that they feel are necessary for the price they're paying? Should a conference like the NBE be worried. This seems like a similar situation where the actual product is good but the ratings although decent just aren't what they predicted. Is FOX blinking on spending more on less bang for the buck content?

(01-14-2019 07:06 PM)Tigersmoke4 Wrote:  Could this be an ominous sign for other content that FOX has taken a chance on that's not producing the ratings that they feel are necessary for the price they're paying? Should a conference like the NBE be worried. This seems like a similar situation where the actual product is good but the ratings although decent just aren't what they predicted. Is FOX blinking on spending more on less bang for the buck content?

The opposite could also be the case.

Maybe they pay 10% of the price to the AAC for 30% of the viewership and it makes it more profitable.

(01-14-2019 07:06 PM)Tigersmoke4 Wrote:  Could this be an ominous sign for other content that FOX has taken a chance on that's not producing the ratings that they feel are necessary for the price they're paying? Should a conference like the NBE be worried. This seems like a similar situation where the actual product is good but the ratings although decent just aren't what they predicted. Is FOX blinking on spending more on less bang for the buck content?

Fox pays a lot less for BE basketball than they paid for B12 football. Plus they get a lot more BE games to broadcast and sell advertising for than they did for B12 football. Seems to me that the BE is a cash cow for FOX.

(01-14-2019 12:00 PM)GoldenWarrior11 Wrote:  The Big 12 desperately needs a Texas/Oklahoma championship game each year just to keep interest up.

Your Big 12 Championship Game: Iowa State vs. KU!!! Would go over as well as a Jags vs. Cardinals Super Bowl...

(01-14-2019 07:46 PM)Love and Honor Wrote:  

(01-14-2019 12:00 PM)GoldenWarrior11 Wrote:  The Big 12 desperately needs a Texas/Oklahoma championship game each year just to keep interest up.

Your Big 12 Championship Game: Iowa State vs. KU!!! Would go over as well as a Jags vs. Cardinals Super Bowl...

Well if they were #1 and #2 in the country it would work pretty well.

(01-14-2019 07:46 PM)Love and Honor Wrote:  

(01-14-2019 12:00 PM)GoldenWarrior11 Wrote:  The Big 12 desperately needs a Texas/Oklahoma championship game each year just to keep interest up.

Your Big 12 Championship Game: Iowa State vs. KU!!! Would go over as well as a Jags vs. Cardinals Super Bowl...

Now, hold on there. If there was an Iowa State vs KU CCG in the current Big12, I'd go out of my way to see that ... Sooners vs Longhorns could happen again as soon as next year, but not likely to see a repeat of Cyclones vs Jayhawks Big12 CCG in a century.

(01-14-2019 07:06 PM)Tigersmoke4 Wrote:  Could this be an ominous sign for other content that FOX has taken a chance on that's not producing the ratings that they feel are necessary for the price they're paying? Should a conference like the NBE be worried. This seems like a similar situation where the actual product is good but the ratings although decent just aren't what they predicted. Is FOX blinking on spending more on less bang for the buck content?

Wonder if FOX will give up NFL rights also?? ABC/ESPN scoops up the NFC, IMO.

(01-14-2019 07:21 PM)bullet Wrote:  

(01-14-2019 07:06 PM)Tigersmoke4 Wrote:  Could this be an ominous sign for other content that FOX has taken a chance on that's not producing the ratings that they feel are necessary for the price they're paying? Should a conference like the NBE be worried. This seems like a similar situation where the actual product is good but the ratings although decent just aren't what they predicted. Is FOX blinking on spending more on less bang for the buck content?

The opposite could also be the case.

Maybe they pay 10% of the price to the AAC for 30% of the viewership and it makes it more profitable.

That's pretty much what the situation has been with ESPN for the past 5 years and I think it's fair to say that they've been financially ecstatic with the AAC ROI. Now it's time to see if it pays off for the league going forward. Everybody is looking for a bargain even the TV networks.

I would imagine the networks are going to be looking at all these conference championships going forward. A lot of the games the last few years have been less than exciting.

(01-14-2019 08:44 PM)Big Frog II Wrote:  I would imagine the networks are going to be looking at all these conference championships going forward. A lot of the games the last few years have been less than exciting.

Of course, the same is true of the NFL playoffs. Only one of the four games this weekend was close and it was pretty boring.

(01-14-2019 08:13 PM)DawgNBama Wrote:  Wonder if FOX will give up NFL rights also??

I would be extremely surprised if Fox gives up the NFL. Never mind the Big 12 CCG -- Last Saturday's Cowboys-Rams second round playoff game had 8 million more viewers than the Alabama-Clemson title game.