re: Whitlock: How a Gawker-Affiliated Website Made ESPN Politically Correct

quote:

---

If they aren't, they it's their own fault for not seeing these things when negotiating.

---

You have made some good points, this is not one of them, it's over simplistic and silly.

quote:

---

So what. These are two of the 3 biggest games of the year. They are bigger than Rose and Sugar bowl. They should be played on a Sunday or Monday or Thursday, the nights that give you the most viewers. I don't think anyone forced them to do it on NYE, that was their choice. They should have been played on the 2nd, which was a Monday, when everyone would be likely still off of work, but returning home for the holidays and what not and ready to get back to work the next day.

---

When Jan 1 is a Sunday then Monday Jan 2 is the official holiday and hence the Rose Bowl and Sugar Bowl got their traditional spots. And it was College Football, (the big conferences and Bowls) that said this is when the game will be, not ESPN. I guess they could have used the 20/20 hindsight to say the games would be ratings disasters and I think they will change it going forward. But bad ratings for any one game is not on and of itself a critical problem. That ratings were down across the board all at once may be a big issue, but still not close to the cord cutting. You yourself said sub fees was 60% of their revenue. When they lose that it's gone, it's not like they got no revenue from ads, any they may have had to give back pales to the cord cutting loses.

quote:

---

Well they need to learn how to negotiate. This is where their arrogance comes into play where they just assume people will watch it b/c it's MNF.

---

They grossly overpaid but it was the NFL that wanted the best games on Network TV on Sunday. Besides, live sports long lost money, the networks used to draw viewers for other programmin. Also The ratings for the NFL overall were down last year, that is also not ESPNs fault, you are also grossly over ratings the impact of lost revenue due to bad ratings. They don't expect the same as revenue for MNF that SNF gets for NBC.