‘Big Picture’ powers NASCAR TV deals
"It's not about whether you're profitable in a particular time slot on Sunday," Pilson said Wednesday at the Sports Business Daily/Sports Business Journal Motorsports Marketing Forum.
"It's like going into a store and buying three bottles of Gatorade for $1 on special," Pilson said. "If that's all you buy, you beat the store. But the stores know when you come into buy Gatorade you're also likely to get eggs, cheese, milk, butter and bread. When you do that, the store beats you."
To find the true value of a television sports package, Pilson said, a network must consider what having a property – or, for that matter, not having it – means in the context of its entire programming picture.
When Pilson worked at CBS Sports, he said, he argued with the network president that CBS could not afford to allow Fox to outbid it for rights to NFL games. The president disagreed and Fox got the rights.
During the years CBS did not have NFL games, Pilson said, it lost affiliate stations to Fox and suffered a decline in ratings for all of its programming.
Pilson left CBS believing there was a direct link. But that opinion is not universally held in the television industry.
NBC decided in October to pull out of the current round of television negotiations, and its officials have declared their unwillingness to make any sports-rights deal they feel cannot be profitable. But Pilson noted that NBC is getting back into the NFL business after making the same decision CBS did years earlier. NFL telecasts return to NBC with a Sunday night package beginning next season.
NASCAR's television future will involve ABC/ESPN and TNT, and their deals are essentially done.
According to Sports Business Daily, ABC/ESPN will pay $270 million per year for the season's final 17 Nextel Cup races and the entire Busch schedule. TNT will pay $80-$85 million for six Cup races in June and July. More at ThatsRacin.com