New Big Ten TV Deal Poised to Break $1B Per Year Barrier
"SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. -- Big Ten commissioner Kevin Warren expects to have an agreement in place on a new media rights deal for the conference in about one month's time, he told CBS Sports on Monday.
The new deal, which would begin in 2023, could be worth a record-setting $1 billion per season, according to Sports Business Journal, which reported that Fox Sports already has a deal in place to renew its part of the deal. Warren did not confirm that report."
So, yeah...
And for $1B/yr we get the word that the NCAA cannot provide a viable stipend to all athletes. So, instead, we get an unmanaged but 'legalized' bag system free-for-all.
If I were a millionaire donor, I'd be asking how much the school AD is chipping in from it's TV revenue.
But I bet we all get more TV commercials and piped-in music to keep the crowd lively during the commercial breaks!
Actually, even worse, there is a small stipend allowed (just breadcrumbs but it is a start) but Michigan has chosen not to participate.
It's more than fair to criticize the NCAA for dragging its feet for years on compensation opportunities for student athletes and that is ultimately why the entire system was blown up by student athletes. But at this point, the NCAA has near zero ability to do anything.
The Supreme Court has upheld the decision that declared the NCAA a monopoly. And nearly every significant state in the country has enacted laws allowing student athletes to generate income off their athletic ability in contravention of NCAA rules. The NCAA has been totally neutered. The worst part is that the state laws are all over the place, with many SEC states adopting a total free for all approach.
As I see it, the only solution at this point is for Congress to enact national legislation to fix this mess. Until then, there are literally no enforceable rules. I don't even think the NCAA can enforce its rules against schools directly paying players at this point. That would arguably be an antitrust violation as an unfair restriction on commerce. The NCAA is dead. Other than running championships, it has zero power to do anything.
"...there are literally no enforceable rules."
Bingo. I've been saying this to anyone that complained about schools like Miami, UT, and ATM 'breaking NIL rules'. There are no rules! The NCAA says you can't pay players to play - but there is no way in hell they're ever going to try punishing any program for doing just that. Nobody in the NCAA's office wants to end up in front of SCOTUS again - they like that money train from the various tournaments.
Lol. You want Congress to fix this? Every GOP Congressman from the SEC would laugh at any bill.
Are there any Democratic congress people from SEC country?
I don't want to dispute a good gripe session, but the issue is not M specifically or the B1G in general.
The B1G and SEC represent "the 1%" of college athletics and yet even in the B1G several ADs lose money without support from the college and/or student mandatory fees. (I recall seeing something in the range of $1k annually per student for RU, UMD and others)
The real issue is with the smaller schools and conferences that have equal votes in the NCAA as the P5 schools. Schools like EMU cannot afford to give out 5k per athlete (on top of scholarships etc.). This is why so many believe it is inevitable that the P5 conferences - (or even just the B1G and SEC) - will split to form their own association that can create it's own rules and control it's own revenue streams.
Also - Stipends from the schools would have to be for ALL athletes per my understanding of Title IX. --For the person below...M already does a stipend for athletes of maybe $2-3k per year iirc -- Given that MGoBlue lists "over 1100" student athletes receiving some sort of Aid from M that could be over $3MM already paid in stipends. As for the TV money, my bar-napkin math puts that "only" around $60k per student (with minimal overhead) if ALL the revenue was given to the athletes.
1B billion and Warde can't figure out NIL
Amen!
Had the impression that M started a dept. or team of people to do nothing but get ahead of the game on NIL. Maybe I got that wrong.
I just visited their NIL "platform" or site and it seems pretty primitive.
Warde is both a smart AD and an astute politician. So, I would really like to understand the political currents inside the University that make it so difficult to "get ahead of the game" on NIL.
I'm certain it will upset me but I would like to know anyway.
Alonzo Mosely: Is this gonna upset me?
Most Everyone Else: I think it's safe to say that.
Have you ever spoken with him?
I have spoken to him to seek his advice. I am a faculty rep on the athletic committee at a different school and I worked with Warde when he was at UConn. If it were up to him, he would rather not touch it and this is true for almost all ADs, including my school. However, he knows that this could give other schools a competitive edge over UM if other ADs decide to become active facilitators. He is going to have a plan in place soon but people are going to be disappointed as UM is not going to be an active facilitator. He has to deal with the Board which is keeping a close eye on this. There will be resources available for players and there will be full-time people to advise players about what is available but UM is not going to act as players' agents or lawyers. Some schools do, and I think that crosses multiple red lines and at some point schools could get sued by students for bad advice. Also, UM is going to be restrict in how players use its trade marks and images (e.g., Block M). Edit: I think UM makes more money from selling its trade marked products than any other schools.
This is the correct answer...but it also goes well beyond Warde.
Free markets shows us what we value. I am not at all offended by this amount. My attention to sports and frequent viewing / clicking contributes to this. Your attention does too.
Agreed - the pie getting bigger isn't a bad thing, as long as everyone (especially the players) gets their fair share of said pie.
Not bothered by the Big Ten making $1B a year, bothered by what they do with that money, which is decidedly not free market. If history is a guide, coaches, administrators and overpriced facilities will absorb the vast majority.
How is it not free market?
If my company received a huge windfall from a tax code change, I expect the majority of that money to go to things the investors would like, which is decidedly not "pay the employees more".
I think college sports is completely broken and a complete overhaul is needed. Until then, I'll agree the athletes should get as much NIL money as they can, as I will be indifferent about how the rest of the money gets spent. Being mad about one part of a completely broken system seems odd.
College sports programs don't have to pay their chief form of revenue-generating labor. That is only true because their governing association says they can't. An alternative doesn't exist (or barely exists) because the pro sports monopolies say that the same labor must spend one to three years in college before being eligible for any employment alternatives. I'm struggling to understand how you think any part of this is free market.
The part where athletes freely choose to take part in it and there's little governance???
The NFL decided they only want people of a certain age to legally be able to join the league. There is no college requirement. Many (most?) businesses in the U.S have some form of education or work experience requirement.
Colleges are under no obligation to pay people to play sports as part of attending school to get an education, which is still the primary objective of most institutions of higher education.
Athletes get a tremendous upside attending a college for three years until they are eligible to join the league. They get access to expert coaching, nutritionists, trainers, medical care, living facilities, eating facilities, world class educators, publicity, and more. This is why athletes freely choose to play sports in college instead of working out and training for three years out of high school and then entering the draft. And now, thankfully/finally, athletes are able to earn money based on who they are and what they are able to accomplish playing sports.
I'll pose a different question, why does the existing free market of sports need more regulation?
The choice of participating is not what determines if it is a free market. Government regulation is not the only inhibitor of a free market, monopolistic actions also limit the free market. In this case both factors are at play. Government regulation on the part of the NCAA saying schools can't pay players, which some would choose to do, and the NFL trust dictation that college age players are not eligible for any reasonable alternative to the college game (which the NFL does so that they don't have to fund their own development system).
While athletes technically have a choice to participate, they realistically have no other option if they want to play professional football. This is such a flagrant violation of free market principles that it can only exist because courts/legislatures have explicitly stated that professional sports need some exemption to antitrust laws in order to operate.
Coach/administration/facilities spend is only as high as it is because college players may not be paid and those players do not have a viable alternative. This is not a rational result of a free market.
And your last question has it backwards. The obvious next step from my argument is less regulation. Eliminating the regulation forbidding paying college players and/or eliminating the draft eligibility requirements. I'm not sure either result is "good" but it would reflect an actual free market.
They get their tuition covered, sometimes even a master's degree or equivalent, room and board, great training table food and facilities. That may not be cash, but it's certainly being paid.
People love college sports and want to watch them, that's certainly true. Unfortunately, the people we tune it to watch don't get a dime of this huge sum. Instead, that money goes to grown men in suits - and they make six or seven figures. That's the problem.
$1B per year and ticket prices will still go up
You can't tell me that the athletes themselves aren't entitled to significant portion of this.
I can tell you anything I want! But I won't disagree with you here. 😊
This is why I never got people complaining about NIL. This one conference is apparently worth $1B/yr just for its media rights but the notion of the players who are responsible for a decent chunk of that valuation wanting a piece of it is seen as some violation of amateurism.
Even if every conference team wrote a $50k check per year to every scholarship athlete it wouldn't be close to the value they actually generate. I long ago accepted that college athletics is just pro sports with more personalized gear and actually like seeing more of it being transparent.
I think your math is off there, bronx. I did a quick google that says there are 1,122 student-athletes at Michigan (I believe, but am not 100% certain that number represents athletes on scholarship).
At 50k/per, that would be $56M - on top of their existing scholarship benefits including tuition/R&B, academic assistance, medical/athletic trainers/doctors/coaches. All told, it would probably add up to close to $100M direct benefit to student-athletes - even keeping in mind not all athletes get full rides.
That doesn't include facilities, infrastructure and other athletic dept. functions/costs.
A billion/year in TV money means $71M per school.
A college golfer is not worth $50k a year to the school/athletic department. Hell, they're not even really worth the scholarship. If you limit this to athletes that actually make Big Ten TV rights worth $1B a year there's more than enough to pay those athletes.
Right, and then guess what? Those coaching salaries come down. Those AD, execs and administrators' salaries come down. And those ridiculous facilities expenses come down. Those are all bloated now because none of that $ goes to the players.
And that's why paying college athletes has been enormously complicated. Most D1 athletes bring no profit to their university, some bring in a little profit, and a few bring in a TON of profit. There's no clear cut way to compensate athletes fairly from TV deals
Wow the big 10 is worth that much, imagine if one of the schools actually won a National Championship in one of the big revenue bearing sports.
Geez, I differ pretty dramatically from many here. I think this is awful.
Wringing EVERY LAST DOLLAR from networks does what, exactly?
- Moar commercials. Direct connection between media deals and number/length of commercials
- Less emphasis on in-game environment. TV matters more, in-game atmosphere matters less
- Moar corruption. Even more ridiculous salaries and absurd facilities
- Greater spotlight and rationale for player compensation - minor league professional sports
- Greater power for media entities to influence decision-making
- Further separates athletics/athletes from the rest of the university
- Further stratifies universities/conferences into haves/have nots
IMO money is wrecking college sports. I will assert again - universities are not private commercial businesses. Their mission is not to maximize revenue. Michigan is a public university, not a for-profit corporation. Messed up priorities, IMO.
Money is not wrecking college sports. Humans are wrecking college sports and they have been for 100+ years.
It would not be hard to design a new systems where there was actual governance to create an even playing field, money was fairly distributed, education mattered, the welfare of student athletes was a priority, and fans enjoyed the game.
It would be impossible to implement this plan because the second it was created, someone would be trying to cheat it, someone would decry some part as unfair, and it would all fall apart because of the same reasons the current system is messed up...people.
100% agree.
Now we wait for the player boycott at the CFP and/or the Final Four. It’s a matter of time now.
Honestly, thats what we need. Unionize and we can get some regulation, maybe? Possibly? Hopefully?
If I had the skill and the drive to succeed at that level, I'm not sure I could walk away from an opportunity to compete at the pinnacle of my sport.
And most hockey games will still an additional cost (BTN+) with terrible quality.
1B/yr TV deal. BTN now charges us $19.99/month for the stationary view from a 1995 camcorder setup in the press box
Haha, 17 since the BTN began and the B1G Channel app is complete garbage, the SiriusXM daily show is awful, and the daily BTN content isn't great. Sorry but this most likely won't improve much.
Oh thank goodness. Now we can afford to replace the not even installed yet terribly not good enough new scoreboards.
More huge piles of money pouring into something that is already suffering from the effects of huge piles of money will not be a solution.
We need WD to fire Warde, like he did Brandon.
I always said if I was the commissioner I would sell the rights to every network like the NFL. Get top dollar from all of them and make the conference more visible to everybody.
Time to sell Michigan stadium and Crisler arena to Ross and let him put minor league teams in Ann Arbor called the wolverines. College sports are dead.. use money from sales of buildings to support non revenue sports.
More money to be used to schedule games where ever and when ever without regard for student players
There are going to be soooooo many commercials. Games will be 5 hours by 2024, but hey, schools can build a third practice facility if they want.