On Sun, May 22, 2011 at 1:22 PM, Joe Hass <[email protected]> wrote: > There was, I think, a sense within NBC Sports that they were only > interested in rights deals that were guaranteed profitable. Within > that mentality, there were only two items worthwhile: the NFL and the > Olympics. They had the NHL, but that was a revenue-sharing situation > with no rights fees. > > The spectacular loss on 2010 Vancouver, combined with that > out-of-the-blue, 10-year deal with the NHL a couple months ago, may > have signaled to Comcast that Ebersol et al seemed to have lost their > way (even if Versus brings the cable fees into the occasion).
Something about the timing of it bugs me. After the takeover Comcast announced that Ebersol would continue to be the head of NBC Sports. So if they were unhappy about revenues from the Olympics the takeover would be a natural time to announce the separation. Comcast was involved with the NHL deal so they couldn't simply blame Ebersol. Whatever happened to cause Comcast to lowball Ebersol on a new contract came after the NHL deal. My gut feeling is that Ebersol wanted a financial commitment from Comcast for either the NBC Sports budget or possibly bidding for upcoming Olympics and Comcast wouldn't commit, so he walked. -- TV or Not TV .... The Smartest (TV) People! You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TV or Not TV" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/tvornottv?hl=en
