Goodell Finds Way Out of NFL Network Jam
At an owners' meeting in late October in Philadelphia, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell was asked if he thought affected fans would blame the league more or the cable companies more if they were unable to watch the New England Patriots try to complete an undefeated regular season in a Dec. 29 game against the New York Giants.
Goodell said he thought fans, under those circumstances, would blame both sides.
That, in essence, is why the NFL performed the maneuvering that produced Wednesday's announcement of the unprecedented arrangement in which NBC and CBS will simulcast the NFL Network's coverage of Saturday night's Patriots-Giants game at Giants Stadium.
Goodell found a way to avoid the league taking a potentially significant public relations hit.
The problem arose because the league remains embroiled in disputes with several large cable companies, including Time Warner and Comcast, over pricing and distribution of the league-owned NFL Network. The league wants its television channel carried on basic or digital basic cable. The cable carriers want to put it on a sports tier with an additional charge for interested viewers. That's why the NFL Network is in only about 35 million U.S. households, by Goodell's October estimate.
Under NFL rules, games on the NFL Network are carried on over-the-air channels in the main markets of the two competing teams. But with the Patriots on the verge of making history, Saturday's game promised to be the most important contest in recent league history that most of the country couldn't watch.
Pressure from Capitol Hill increased in recent weeks. Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) wrote a letter urging a resolution. Sens. Patrick Leahy (D.-Vt.) and Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) wrote a letter last week to Goodell threatening to reexamine the league's exemption from federal antitrust laws if games on the NFL Network were not made available to more viewers.
The NFL has tried, unsuccessfully so far, to lobby the Federal Communications Commission to intervene. Last week, after receiving the letter from Leahy and Specter, Goodell wrote a letter to Glenn A. Britt, the president and chief executive officer of Time Warner Cable, proposing that the two sides submit their dispute to binding arbitration. Time Warner could carry the Patriots-Giants game, Goodell wrote, as long as it had accepted the arbitration offer first. A similar offer was not made to Comcast, a league official said, because the NFL's agreement with the cable carrier already allows Comcast to carry the NFL Network on its digital basic package if it chooses.
Britt wrote a letter back to Goodell the same day, rejecting the offer and urging Goodell to put the Patriots-Giants game on another network.
Goodell did one better, putting the game on two other networks. It was a win for the networks, which gained highly attractive programming on a night that usually generates low ratings, and it certainly was a win for the NFL, which now isn't in jeopardy of testing the goodwill of its fans by having most of them unable to watch the Patriots' bid for 16-0.
It was a problem of the NFL's own making, with the owners and former commissioner Paul Tagliabue having decided before last season to pass up rights fees from another network to put an eight-game package of prime-time games on Thursday and Saturday nights on the NFL Network. The owners and Tagliabue thought they had enough TV money coming in from outside networks and wanted to create a business asset. That decision, at least so far, hasn't turned to gold, the way that most business decisions made by the NFL do. It's a decision that created a dilemma, thanks to the Patriots' success, but Goodell came up with a temporary solution that works.
By Mark Maske |
December 27, 2007; 9:12 AM ET
| Category:
Television
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Posted by: tbisson | December 27, 2007 10:03 AM
From the Thurs WSJ: "The game is airing on both networks because CBS normally would have had the rights if the game were played on Sunday afternoon but NBC has prime-time broadcast rights. NBC and CBS will each be permitted to sell 18 30-second ad spots, out of 70 available."
So, that should explain how all parties are making money through this arrangement.
Posted by: bigboid | December 27, 2007 11:55 AM
I don't care how they did it. I am thrilled to death tht I'll be able to watch the team I love make the attempt to go 16-0, I hope Tom Brady sets a new record for touchdown passes. If I could have my dream, it would be to see the Pats play the Seahawks in the Super Bowl.
Posted by: patsfaninwashington | December 27, 2007 1:33 PM
Re: patsfaninwashington
Rick Gosselin, the excellent sports columnist for the Dallas Morning News, raised the specter of a Super Bowl XXXI rematch this year (Pats v. Packers). How many Pats fans would love that?
Except everyone outside New England would be rooting for the old man (Favre) to win the game and cement his HOF credentials and legacy. And even those people who hate the Pack (i.e., Vikes and Bears fans) would be rooting against the Patsies on general principle.
Posted by: bigboid | December 27, 2007 4:39 PM
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Who makes money on this deal? I assume the NFL Network collects the ad revenue it sold for the game. If so, how do CBS and NBC make money by broadcasting the game? Are there ad slots available to them? If not, won't they lose money because it wouldn't be able to run the ads it already sold for their regular programming. Are they just happy having a big audience even though there might not be any revenue in it? Will the advertisers be charged a premium because their ads will be seen by millions more people?