The MWC may not be able to get more TV money for 5 years

About how the MWC's TV partners have no big reason to give the MWC more TV money now since there are 5 years left on the TV contract, Lee H. Berke, president of LHB Sports, Entertainment & Media Inc. said:
"It is all in CBS/Comcast's court going forward. There's no compelling reason at this point, as I see it, for the current deal to be reopened. Certainly the conference can approach them but more, I think, they are at the mercy of (their partners)." (HSA)


Asked about the MWC getting more TV money to reflect the increases other conferences are getting, Tim Fitzpatrick, spokesman for Comcast, would only say that Comcast:
"is focused on getting ready for the 2011 football season." (HSA)


About the MWC's TV deal, Dean Jordan, senior VP at Wasserman Media Group that has been a consultant for the MWC said that:
"the conference is continually in discussions with its broadcast partners and everyone has the same objectives, and that is for the MWC to get as much exposure as it possibly can to generate revenue and for its networks to obtain the greatest amount of distribution as possible." (HSA)


HSA Note: "UH's membership agreement with the MWC says the conference "shall use its reasonable effort — but shall not be obligated to" secure the $2.3 million annual guarantee the school has been banking from its deal with Oceanic Time Warner Cable."


My commentary on the key numbers presented with this article:

Pac-12 $20.8 million
Big 10 $17.6 million
Southeastern $17 million
Big 12 $15 million
Mountain West $1.1 million

The Pac-12, Big 10, and MWC do *not* give local TV rights to their schools, so the money listed for them includes their local TV rights. The SEC and Big 12 schools *do* own their local TV rights. For example, Alabama, Florida, and Georgia make quite a bit of money for their local TV rights...those SEC schools will make more than the Pac-12 does from TV. Texas will be getting more than $12 mil/year (the deal averages out to $15 mil/year) from ESPN for their local TV rights, which they will get in addition to their conference TV money.

This is similar to have the MWC was making 3x the TV money that the WAC had been making, but UH was making about triple what all MWC teams made from TV because UH could sell its local TV rights to Oceanic/K5 while MWC teams couldn't sell their local TV rights.

When comparing TV money, the fact about whether or not schools own their local TV rights *really* does matter. UH's PPV deal is a great example of the $$$ difference, since UH has been making triple the TV money that TCU, BYU, and Utah have been making...that will change this season with Utah's Pac-12 membership and BYU's huge ESPN deal.

http://www.staradvertiser.com/sports/sportsnews/20110605_Playing_catchup.html