Baseball Sets Television Pacts With Fox, TBS By BRIAN STEINBERG Wall Street Journal
July 12, 2006; Page B3 http://online.wsj.com/article/SB115266984549704229.html?mod=home_whats_news_us Major League Baseball reached new seven-year deals with News Corp.'s Fox Sports and Time Warner Inc.'s Turner Broadcasting System to broadcast various regular-season and postseason games. Under the new pacts, Fox will reduce the number of postseason games it airs while retaining the All-Star Game and the World Series through 2013. The network will pay around $250 million a year, or around $1.8 billion, compared with the $2.5 billion value of its last deal in 2000. Fox's decision reflects the network's desire to better establish its new primetime schedule in the fall. The network's need to pre-empt its entertainment schedule with postseason games has frequently hurt its ability to establish new shows in recent years. The entertainment division has tried to work around baseball by premiering shows as early as mid-August -- rivals wait until mid-September, when viewing levels are higher -- and developing shows that appeal more to the male audience that tunes in for baseball. Fox successfully launched the drama "Prison Break" last fall, for example. From next year, Fox is giving up divisional playoff games, and will show only one League Championship Series each year, starting in 2007. The network has a stronger entertainment schedule than it has in years past, says Ed Goren, president of Fox Sports, and the fall postseason is an important time to establish new programs. TBS will take some of the games that Fox is discarding. Starting in 2007, TBS will show Division Series Playoff games and, in 2008, 26 regular-season Sunday games. TBS will pay around $70 million a year, or around $500 million, according to people familiar with the matter. The LCS games Fox won't show are still available for purchase, and TBS is interested, and is "trying to find the right financial model that works," says David Levy, president of Turner Sports. In total, Major League Baseball expects to secure more than $3 billion over seven years from the Fox and TBS deals combined with payments for the remaining games to be sold, according to a person familiar with the situation. ================================ George Antunes, Political Science Dept University of Houston; Houston, TX 77204 Voice: 713-743-3923 Fax: 713-743-3927 antunes at uh dot edu Reply with a "Thank you" if you liked this post. _____________________________ MEDIANEWS mailing list [email protected] To unsubscribe send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
