Author Topic: WP: Nats MASN deal renegotations will have a huge impact  (Read 204295 times)

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Offline KnorrForYourMoney

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Basically, most of the Brawltimore metro area is a giant suburb of the "DC Vortex" and I-95/295 is living proof.

Probably better for them than the alternative.  If it weren't for the federal teat, Harm City might have turned into Toledo or Green Bay by now.

Offline IanRubbish

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If it weren't for the federal teat, Harm City might have turned into Toledo or Green Bay by now.

Yup.  Metro Baltimore's largest employer, Fort Meade, is a barely two miles from being in the DC Metro area.   

Offline Senatorswin

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With respect to the Os and Nats followings, I think a psychological difference between PG and a chunk of Montgomery county vs NoVA is that you don't have to go by Nats Park or the Woodrow Wilson Bridge in order to go the park.  Traffic matters, and if it is about the same pain in the butt to get to both stadiums, that helps make your family free agents. From Largo, Bouie, even probably Rockville north, it's just about as easy to drive to Camden Yards as it is to the Navy Yard.  Don't forget it was Edward Bennett Williams who figured out that Camden Yards was a much better location to draw from DC than Memorial. EBW also opened the Os stores in Farragut Square. It's not just Angelos that targeted DC.

Supposedly EBW bought the O's with the intention of moving the team to DC. Baltimore with the big time assistance from the Maryland stadium authority made EBW an offer he couldn't refuse with Camden yards. He went for it because it was right at the end of 295 and as close to Washington as you could get and still in Baltimore. You're right, he then opened the O's store with the idea of making the O's Washington's team.

Offline Senatorswin

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Has anybody heard what happened in New York today with MASN?

Offline Senatorswin

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I just saw MASN argued the decision should go to an arbiter and Washington argued the MLB decision should stand. A decision is expected next month. And the beat goes on.

Offline welch

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I just saw MASN argued the decision should go to an arbiter and Washington argued the MLB decision should stand. A decision is expected next month. And the beat goes on.

The Post has an article now:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2023/03/14/masn-appeals-hearing/

Offline PowerBoater69

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The Post has an article now: https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2023/03/14/masn-appeals-hearing/
Really a terrible article. Only noting two questions from the judges, which was the point of the hearing, the Q&A. The request from the Os for the dispute to be mediated by the American Arbitration Association instead of the MLB RSDC was laid out in their appeal 13 months ago, hardly news.

Quote
The Nationals countered that MLB is impartial — and that if the court didn’t affirm MLB’s ruling, it would be a “recipe for just having this litigation continuing and continuing in never-ending fashion.”
That was not the Nationals argument, that MLB was impartial. They argued that the panel was agreed upon by the original contract and that MLB clubs were uniquely qualified to analyze disputes between member clubs.

Quote
In 2012, the Nationals challenged the rights fee payments they were set to receive for the next five seasons — around $200 million, or $40 million per year.
This is 100% wrong, the Nats and Os went to the RSDC as set in the MASN agreement, at that time there were no rights fees set for the Nats to challenge. 

Quote
But MASN sued, arguing MLB was not an impartial arbiter. The Orioles won their case in a New York court because MLB had given a loan to the Nationals and the entities had shared legal counsel.
1) The Os initially sued based on the Nats reps Proskauer having a conflict of interest, they switched to all of MLB having a conflict of interest during the appeal process. 2) It was stated explicitly during the hearing that the Os won the original case due solely to Proskauer. The loan was not a factor in the decision.

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The hearing seemed to go well for the Nats.

Questions for the Os included: 1) Whether the NY court even has the authority to force the teams to change the forum for arbitration, noting that this would be unusual. 2) What grounds would there be for a change since the only noted conflict of interest Proskauer had been removed for the second hearing. 3) Do the Os expect the court to rule that the case must go to an outside arbitor or should the case be kicked back down to a lower court with the note that the lower court has the authority to force the sides to outside arbitration. 4) The prior commissioner appeared to be partial to the Os, did their issue with MLB bias only appear when the new commissioner had a different bias. 5) The original case that forced the replacement of Proskauer was due to the appearance of a conflict of interest, not that the conflict affected the monetary decision of the original panel. 6) Did the original contract call for the RSDC to determine valuation, not arbitrate the dispute and provide a binding decision?

That last item came up again with the Nats. Kind of a left field question. Both sides clearly felt like the RSDC was an arbitration panel and while both agreed that the contract could be interpreted in that manner neither seemed eager to pursue that direction.

The first questions for the Nats weren't really questions, just agreements with their arguements, it started out nicely: 1) The MLB RSDC was created explicity for these types of disputes. 2) The arbitration forum should not be thrown out based on one representative having a conflict of interest. 3) Did the comments from Mansfred show a bias against the Os? 4) Do the terms of the contract not apply if the arbitration panel is found to be unfair? 5) If the panel does what the Nats want and enforces the ruling from the original case, doesn't that just open a secondary case to determine the value of the "offsets" and "profit-sharing"?

Here again that last question is the big one. The judges were asking the Nats whether they wanted the court to participate in the determination of the final payout amount. Great question because the Os indicated repeatedly that they will sue again to resist making payments, this time based on the actual payment owed after the higher fees get offset against lower profit sharing once the fees have been retroactively increased. It would seem to make sense that the Nats would agree to this offer, delay the final decision but determine the payoff amount. My feeling on why the Nats emphatically declined the offer, accepting the threat of a second lawsuit from the Os was because they want the injunction removed that bars them from breaking away from MASN. The original judge in this case placed an injunction against the Nats and MLB from taking any actions until after the case is settled. My guess is that the Nats value breaking away from MASN higher than timely collection of past due fees.

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The Os rep kept claiming that if the court granted their request to force a move to an outside arb panel that it would lead to a rapid end to the case. The Os would bring no further lawsuits or objections. Strangely that didn't seem to persuade anyone. After the case this quote from the Os rep to the Post really showed the Os true colors: “Once you get a neutral arbiter, we’re done — unless MLB tried to bribe one of the arbitrators. Though it’s more likely the Nationals would do it.” In other words, trust me, give us what we want and it will work out best for you, oh and by the way we consider you to be criminal low lifes.

Bottom line was that both sides agreed that this was just the first lawsuit, the dispute will continue.

Offline IanRubbish

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Diamond Sports files for bankruptcy, the MASN lawsuit could outlive the current economic structure of rights fees

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/03/14/diamond-sports-files-for-bankruptcy.html

Online imref

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The Post has an article now:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2023/03/14/masn-appeals-hearing/

this was interesting:

Quote
According to Kagan, the media research division of S&P Global Market Intelligence, MASN was in 5.6 million homes in 2018 but just 3.6 million homes in 2022. MASN has responded by cutting costs: This spring training, the network is broadcasting just four Nationals and Orioles games each, the fewest in baseball.

Offline Natsinpwc

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Thanks for that analysis PB69.

Offline PowerBoater69

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Thanks for that analysis PB69.

Thx.

The Athletic has never had very good coverage of the Nats but they are much better for the Os. Here is their article on the hearing:

https://theathletic.com/4310346/2023/03/14/orioles-nationals-masn-lawsuit

Offline Natsinpwc

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Thx.

The Athletic has never had very good coverage of the Nats but they are much better for the Os. Here is their article on the hearing:

https://theathletic.com/4310346/2023/03/14/orioles-nationals-masn-lawsuit
I don’t have a subscription but I am sure others do.

Wonder how much in legal fees each team is paying in on a yearly basis? It’s really killing both teams not having an agreement. The Nats franchise probably better able to sustain things but it’s still hurting.

Offline PowerBoater69

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I don’t have a subscription but I am sure others do.

Wonder how much in legal fees each team is paying in on a yearly basis? It’s really killing both teams not having an agreement. The Nats franchise probably better able to sustain things but it’s still hurting.

The article had a nice recap of both the hearing and the overall dispute. No huge news that were quote worthy.

The legal fees have to be in the millions, although a lot less than the $20-30 million per year in dispute.

Offline HalfSmokes

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I don’t have a subscription but I am sure others do.

Wonder how much in legal fees each team is paying in on a yearly basis? It’s really killing both teams not having an agreement. The Nats franchise probably better able to sustain things but it’s still hurting.

The nats won a ring, the Os have a great core that they are unable or willing to supplement in order to get over the hump. Personally, I hope they loose every one of the to FA with nothing to show for it.

Offline catocony

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this was interesting:

Quote
According to Kagan, the media research division of S&P Global Market Intelligence, MASN was in 5.6 million homes in 2018 but just 3.6 million homes in 2022. MASN has responded by cutting costs: This spring training, the network is broadcasting just four Nationals and Orioles games each, the fewest in baseball.

Being a major tech center and a wealthy, highly educated bunch of locals, the DC area is a leader in cord cutters.  I have a lot of friends who don't even have basic cable anymore, they stream everything.  MASN and NBCW' captive subscribers are not that captive anymore.

I pay $11.99 a month on DirecTV for the two RSNs.  I don't know what the fee is for Comcast or Cox or whatever your cable provider is, but I assume it's about the same.

Offline welch

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Thx.

The Athletic has never had very good coverage of the Nats but they are much better for the Os. Here is their article on the hearing:

https://theathletic.com/4310346/2023/03/14/orioles-nationals-masn-lawsuit

The Athletic has no writer to cover the Nats.

And thanks, again, for the analysis PB69.

Offline IanRubbish

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Makes sense that the Angelos family would rather pay lawyers than players. 

Offline Dave in Fairfax

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And they're probably farming out much of the legal work to lower-paid contract attorneys and paralegals.

Offline PowerBoater69

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I wrote up my notes for Talk Nats. Not much different than what I wrote up here, but in any case, here's the link: https://www.talknats.com/2023/03/20/ny-court-appeals-masn-vs-nationals-archive/

Offline Senatorswin

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Thank you PB for posting the hearing. After watching it the only conclusion I could come up with is the people who made the original MASN agreement and the New York Court System who haven't been able to resolve this are all buffoons. There's no excuse for this to go on for years with no resolution.

Offline Natsinpwc

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Let’s hope the Nats win and the younger Angelos seeks a settlement wanting to sell the team.

Offline IanRubbish

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2022 Census Population data is out:

-Metro Baltimore lost 9k people, 7k in Balt City, 4k in Balt County, offset by 2k increase in AA, Howard, Carroll, and Harford combined
-DC Metro was flat, District was up 3k, but PG County lost 10k

Offline IanRubbish

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Thought this was interesting, people aren't watching the NBA either. 

https://deadspin.com/nba-charles-barkley-playoffs-ratings-tnt-turner-espn-1850332429

Offline zimm_da_kid

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Why do we pay into revenue sharing if we don’t get the full profits from our market?

Offline Senatorswin

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That hearing before the 6 judges was March 14th. Are they so stupid they can't make a decision in a month? It was said the decision would come anywhere from a couple of weeks to a couple of months. This is an embarrassment for the New York court system. I also saw where if the judges tied 3-3 in their decision the process would start over again and it would take a couple more years. Those judges should be ashamed of themselves.