Can Sheriff Bezos Save Sports TV?

We Chicagoans live in a double-edged sports world. On one hand, not a single one of our major teams has made the playoffs in the past year unless you count the Bulls’ one-game play-in loss to the Heat last April. Other than that, (in alphabetical order) Bears, Blackhawks, Bulls, Cubs, Fire, Sky (I know, they won the 2021 season) and White Sox fans watch while other cities’ teams hoist their respective league’s trophies. On the other hand, at least we don’t have any chaos while watching our teams’ failures. That’s not the case in many other places as viewing MLB, NBA and NHL games on local TV has become as murky as the White Sox starting pitching staff's prospects. By the way, the NFL is in a league of its own. Outside of a few preseason games, it can’t be bothered with something as trivial as individual team TV rights.

Back in the day, independent television stations like WGN aired most local games. Then, with the foresight(?) of the late White Sox co-owner, Eddie Einhorn, games started moving to pay and cable services. For a long time, all four of our teams were shown over a combination of WGN and a series of Regional Sports Networks that eventually became NBC Sports Chicago. Over time, everyone left WGN and in 2019, the Cubs started their own Marquee Sports Network while the other three teams stayed at NBC Sports Chicago. This is how our teams currently call TV home – but not for long. That’s because the current Bulls, Hawks and upcoming Sox seasons will likely be the teams’ last on NBC Sports Chicago. So, while Chicago has yet to feel any tremors, it won’t be long until the Bulls, Hawks and Sox experience a broadcasting "Sportsquake" that several other markets have been experiencing since last year.

Last March, I wrote a couple of posts about major issues with two Regional Sports Networks (RSNs), AT&T SportsNet and Diamond Sports Group, which has been operating under the name, Bally Sports. At the time, SportsNet had the broadcast rights to 4 MLB teams, and 3 each in the NBA and NHL. Diamond owned the TV rights for a whopping 15 NBA teams, 11 NHL teams and 11 MLB teams. The posts were about financial problems at those networks and a coming Sportsquake in TV play-by-play. Here are links to those posts:

https://www.lowertechbills.com/post/major-league-problems-with-sports-play-by-play

https://www.lowertechbills.com/post/well-that-was-quick-the-sportsquake-of-2023-has-started

Since then, AT&T SportsNet is no longer in existence. But only 10 teams in 9 markets were part of AT&T SportsNet, so all of its teams have been able to find new TV homes. The broadcast rights for those teams are now either held by the teams themselves via their own or another team's RSN or through a deal with the league in which they play. And since I don't live in places like Denver, Houston, Las Vegas, Phoenix Pittsburgh, Portland, Salt Lake City or Seattle, I'm not too concerned about how to watch games from those cities' teams. If you are, I suggest you subscribe to one of the subscription services that MLB, NBA and NHL offer.

But the real 9.0 Richter Scale Sportsquake is at Diamond Sports Group, the regional sports operator for those 37 MLB, NBA and NHL teams. After declaring bankruptcy in March of 2023, they recently dropped a bombshell, announcing a partnership with Amazon that, if approved in court, would place local games on Prime Video and allow the company to emerge from that bankruptcy in a reimagined state. Diamond revealed that it had secured $450 million from creditors to fund a reorganization plan, plus an additional $115 million provided by a new minority investor, Amazon. In exchange, Amazon would have access to all 37 MLB, NHL and NBA teams for which Diamond possesses streaming rights, giving fans in nearly two dozen markets Direct-To-Consumer (DTC) streaming access. And to be sure, streaming is why Amazon is investing in Diamond Sports, much to the dismay of the leagues, who did not see this coming. In fact, the deal has the potential to undo previous agreements the leagues had negotiated with Diamond when it declared bankruptcy. So, here comes the judge.

With more and more of us cutting the cord, streaming via DTC is going to become more and more valuable to the rights-holders. That’s why last season, the Cubs and Marquee Network started broadcasting directly to households priced at $19.99 a month. No cable, satellite or third-party streaming service needed. It’s also why the other three major Chicago teams will likely be joining the DTC party with a network of their own when the NBC Chicago Sports deal ends after this year’s White Sox season. In fact, last May, Jerry Reinsdorf became the majority owner of "Stadium", a national network that is rumored to become the new local broadcast and streaming home for the Bulls, Sox and Hawks. A broadcasting and streaming partnership between the Reinsdorf (Bulls/Sox) and Wirtz (Blackhawks) families just makes too much sense.

Streaming is the new Sports TV fronter. Almost every service has stuck its toe in the water from Amazon owning the exclusive rights to NFL Thursday Night Football to Apple and Peacock's airing MLB games to Paramount+ and Peacock's various soccer deals to ESPN+ and its large number of college games. However, the Amazon/Balley deal, along with Amazon's recent 7.7-billion-dollar deal to air all NASCAR Xfinity and some NASCAR Cup races, and Netflix's 5-billion-dollar WWE deal is really starting to show the muscle of the streaming services. What would have been unthinkable just a few years ago, like the Super Bowl being only available on a streaming service, is now quite thinkable. I don't expect that in the near future, but money has a way of talking.

As with any new frontier, there’s a certain amount of lawlessness and perhaps a new sheriff in town. That’s why we're likely going to see a lot of this in a court where they don’t play basketball. Exactly who will own those streaming rights? The teams? The Leagues? The broadcast rights holders? Will Jeff Bezos be that new sheriff?  Buckle-up because this is not gonna end until a lot of attorneys make a lot of fees. In the meantime, for us Chicagoans, while the Cubs broadcast situation is pretty stable, all eyes will be on the South and West Sides. If Chicago gets hit by a Sportsquake, the epicenter will be located somewhere between 35th and Shields and Madison and Wood Streets.

My company, Lower Tech Bills saves households from hundreds to even thousands of dollars a year on TV, Cell and Internet costs. For a free "Tech Check" analysis of your bills, e-mail hmwellsradio@gmail.com or visit lowertechbills.com because you may not have the time to keep up with all this stuff, but I do.