DeepSummary
In this episode, Derek Thompson discusses the economics of sports media rights with John Ourand, a sports correspondent with Puck News. They focus on the NBA's new media rights deal, which is set to triple the league's annual revenue despite declining regular season ratings. Ourand explains that while ratings are down, the NBA playoffs remain a highly valuable and desirable product for media companies.
Ourand notes that the rise of streaming services has changed the calculus for these deals, as companies like Amazon and NBC see exclusive sports content as a way to drive subscriptions and retain customers. He suggests that the NBA's deal reflects the increasing value of live sports programming in the age of cord-cutting and media fragmentation.
The conversation also touches on the NFL's media rights deal, the potential impact of the WNBA's growing popularity, and the future of sports media rights negotiations as leagues and companies jockey for position in a rapidly changing landscape.
Key Episodes Takeaways
- The NBA's new media rights deal, which tripled the league's annual revenue despite declining regular season ratings, reflects the increasing value of live sports programming in the age of cord-cutting and media fragmentation.
- The rise of streaming services has changed the calculus for media rights deals, as companies view exclusive sports content as a way to drive subscriptions and retain customers.
- While regular season ratings may decline, the playoffs and marquee events remain highly valuable properties for media companies.
- Sports leagues and media companies are jockeying for position in a rapidly changing landscape, with the potential for further shake-ups in future media rights negotiations.
- The growing popularity of the WNBA and women's sports could lead to increased media rights valuations and potentially separate deals from the NBA in the future.
- Live sports programming offers a level of predictability in terms of viewership that is valuable to media companies in an era of uncertainty surrounding scripted content.
- Savvy negotiation tactics and the ability to create bidding wars among media companies can lead to significant revenue increases for sports leagues.
- The value of different sports and their respective media rights deals may shift as consumer habits and viewing preferences continue to evolve.
Top Episodes Quotes
- “When you talk about regular season, nobody's watching regular season baseball really. And that's one of the, and ESPN has Sunday night baseball. They have no real baseball playoffs, so they have room for the, but they don't care about baseball players because they have college football and they have the NFL in the fall. And so when that comes up, where's baseball going to fall on either side of this? And that's going to be a fascinating topic to follow.“ by John Ourand
- “And the other corollary to that is that if NBC does a deal and Warner Brothers doesn't match peacock, their streaming service is going to be a big part of that deal. ESPN streaming service is going to be a big part of that deal. So what you're seeing from these traditional media companies are not the same kind of deals that they used to do, but they're deals that have a pretty big streaming component to it that is allowing them to try to build another part of their business.“ by John Ourand
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Episode Information
Plain English with Derek Thompson
The Ringer
5/28/24