Author Topic: WP: Nats MASN deal renegotations will have a huge impact  (Read 204303 times)

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Offline CALSGR8

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 :-[  Sorry.  I thought i was in the Caps thread.  Titles get small on a Smartphone!

I had wondered why I didnt see it!


Offline comish4lif

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An update from Bos in today's chat - he thinks the Nats will get paid.

Quote
Q: Bos, Earlier this (baseball) offseason, the Post printed a story about the Nats and MASN renegotiating the TV rights deal. What's the latest on the that?

A: That's probably going to be a deep dark secret and a tough negotiation. And maybe rougher than tough. Talked to an exec with deep knowledge of it a couple of months ago about it and he'd told Ted, "Don't worry, there is no way you are NOT going to get it." Meaning there is no way the rights don't get reworked __and at something in the Texas/Houston range of $50-$60M (guesstimate) which is far above the current $28M.  I'll had to check with Selig again but I think he's the tie-breaking vote __iow, the only vote that counts and nhe'll be fair, especially since the Nats took such a shafting on the original deal. 

Offline MarquisDeSade

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An update from Bos in today's chat - he thinks the Nats will get paid.


So, an additional $22-32M?  I doubt that's ever going to go to payroll.

Offline Kevrock

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So, an additional $22-32M?  I doubt that's ever going to go to payroll.

Since the contract issue is so public, they could raise payroll by that amount and still be operating at the same crazy profit level they are operating on now... all while getting props for finally spending.

Offline PebbleBall

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Since the contract issue is so public, they could raise payroll by that amount and still be operating at the same crazy profit level they are operating on now... all while getting props for finally spending.

They will spend more because they've rigidly spent ~30% of revenue on payroll, and that won't change.  The bump will be good for fans in that sense but it won't do anything to change their philosophy. 


Offline The Chief

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So what exactly is going to be a "deep dark secret"?  The terms of the new deal?

Offline Kevrock

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Yeah, I don't even understand what Boz is trying to say. It reads like a crappy WNFF post.

Offline welch

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I don't care about the payroll as long as the team is good. Put another way, I want the Lerner's to spend enough, as they did with Zimmerman, to keep the good players they develop.

(That was the Yankees' edge, more than over-paying for free-agents like Giambi: they paid enough to keep Bernie Williams, Posada, Jeter, Martinez, Rivera, O'Neill.)

Offline HalfSmokes

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I don't care about the payroll as long as the team is good. Put another way, I want the Lerner's to spend enough, as they did with Zimmerman, to keep the good players they develop.

(That was the Yankees' edge, more than over-paying for free-agents like Giambi: they paid enough to keep Bernie Williams, Posada, Jeter, Martinez, Rivera, O'Neill.)

they also paid enough to get cc sabathia teix, arod, damon... all of whom were instrumental in their 09 run (even Burnett chipped in 3 war)

Offline welch

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they also paid enough to get cc sabathia teix, arod, damon... all of whom were instrumental in their 09 run (even Burnett chipped in 3 war)

...and note the difference: Bernie / Jeter won about five World Series-es in six years. CC and Arod won '09. I've been a Nats fan since '52 or '53. I'm greedy. Ernie Banks used to say, "Hey, let's play two". I say, "Hey, let's win three championships in a row".

Offline HalfSmokes

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even just keeping their own this year is going to cost them about $60 million. Throw in guys that they've resigned after trading for (ie the Gio category) and you're well north of $100 million. A team may have a run or two in it at a low payroll, but sustaining it be it through resigning the players who got you there, resigning the chips you added (which you need to do if you depleted the farm system to add them), signing free agents to supplement... can get very expensive

Offline welch

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even just keeping their own this year is going to cost them about $60 million. Throw in guys that they've resigned after trading for (ie the Gio category) and you're well north of $100 million. A team may have a run or two in it at a low payroll, but sustaining it be it through resigning the players who got you there, resigning the chips you added (which you need to do if you depleted the farm system to add them), signing free agents to supplement... can get very expensive

Let it be done. Just win.


Offline Ray D

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I'll had to check with Selig again but I think he's the tie-breaking vote __iow, the only vote that counts

What does that mean, "the only vote that counts"?  His vote counts only if there is otherwise a tie.  Where does it say there will be  a tie?


Offline HalfSmokes

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Lerner- we want more
Angelos- no

That's a tie

Offline Ray D

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Lerner- we want more
Angelos- no

That's a tie

Oh. I thought it was a vote among the owners.

Offline HalfSmokes

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I may be reading box wrong and he may be wrong- I thought it would be an independent arbiter

Offline PebbleBall

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Quote
While discussing the Nationals’ ascension from afterthought to possible playoff contender, Major League Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig touched on another issue of central importance to the Nationals.

The negotiations between the Nationals and Orioles owner Peter Angelos over the Nationals’ share of the revenue produced by MASN remain ongoing, Selig said.

“It’s a matter that is under discussion, under review by appropriate parties,” Selig said Monday in a phone conversation. “Nothing’s been determined by that discussion. I do understand the importance of television. It’s under very serious discussion.”

MLB has involved itself in the discussions “at the appropriate committee level,” Selig said.


Otherwise, the commissioner remained mum on the high-stakes talks, lining up with the other parties involved. Even high-ranking officials in the Nationals front office are not aware of where the negotiations stand at this point. But “it’s going to have a huge effect on us,” one said.

The Nationals are trying to increase their cut of the revenues produced by MASN, the regional sports network they own roughly 13 percent of compared to Angelos’s 87 percent share. Their contract entered a once-every-five-year “reset” period, allowing the Nationals to argue for a greater share of the profits, in line with what their rights fee could demand on an open market.

The Nationals earned $29 million from their television rights fees last year, and they are hoping to double or even triple that figure. To maximize their take, the Nationals hired a high-powered media consultant to argue for what constitutes fair-market value fees. The impact would directly affect their on-field product, allowing payroll to increase.

The money generated by television rights deals has skyrocketed across the sport, becoming centrally important to the financial health of franchises. The Rangers agreed to a $3 billion, 20-year deal with Fox in 2010. The Angels entered into an agreement that enabled them to sign Albert Pujols.

The Nationals, under the new collective bargaining agreement, will cease receiving funds in revenue sharing, making their television money all the more important.


http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/nationals-journal/post/bud-selig-nationals-orioles-negotiations-over-masn-under-very-serious-discussion/2012/04/04/gIQAxKpMvS_blog.html

Offline Kevrock

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Quote
The Nationals, under the new collective bargaining agreement, will cease receiving funds in revenue sharing, making their television money all the more important.

I don't think we should be operated like a small market team, and I don't think we're in a small market. That said, I don't see how we're exempt from the revenue sharing based on our market size if we're forced into a television deal with MASN that hasn't been paying us market value.

If Selig/MLB freaks us on this renegotiation/reset my head will explode.

I wonder if/when Angelos sells the Orioles if there would finally be a way to buy out of this thing and open up the bidding.

Offline MarquisDeSade

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If Selig/MLB freaks us on this renegotiation/reset my head will explode.

I know all the armchair arbitrators will disagree, but I definitely see MLB freaking the Nats again.

Offline PebbleBall

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I know all the armchair arbitrators will disagree, but I definitely see MLB freaking the Nats again.

The question is whether or not MLB will have any influence if it goes to arbitration.

Offline HalfSmokes

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I know all the armchair arbitrators will disagree, but I definitely see MLB freaking the Nats again.

do we even know it's selig's decision?

Offline MarquisDeSade

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Nobody gives a rat's ass.

Offline R-Zim#11

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Quote
“It’s a matter that is under discussion, under review by appropriate parties,” Selig said Monday in a phone conversation. “Nothing’s been determined by that discussion. I do understand the importance of television. It’s under very serious discussion.”

I am really curious how Selig spoke so clearly with Angelos **** in his mouth! Practice makes perfect? :lol:

Offline MarquisDeSade

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Interesting read from Deadspin today that echoes what I've said before here on the boards regarding TV money:

http://deadspin.com/5899105/joey-vottos-new-contract-is-like-a-mortgage+backed-security

Some highlights:

We're now learning that that cable providers are tired of RSNs' bullcrap and perfectly willing to yank telecasts. Non-fans—against their will—subsidize telecasts for fans. Consider the MSG-Time Warner standoff in winter (and what's going on in San Diego now) According to reports (because none of this is transparent), Madison Square Garden wanted Time Warner customers to pay a 53 percent increase on its $4.65-a-month fee. That's $7.11 a month—or $85.32 a year, from every Time Warner subscriber in New York—for the Knicks, Rangers, Islanders and Devils. Time Warner naturally balked, and might have held out longer if not for Jeremy Lin. In San Diego, Fox Sports San Diego is reportedly seeking a 400 percent fee increase from Time Warner Cable. Time Warner wisely has said no.

[SNIP]

But the cable-riches scheme needs those unfettered giant fee increases, just like Wall Street relied on ever-increasing housing prices. Once the blips start, the whole scheme's doomed to collapse. And then this apparently good story, of the homegrown Votto getting a deserved payday from a beloved, old small-market franchise, will become the darker and more familiar one, of middle America making a financial promise it couldn't afford.

I really hope the FCC gets involved puts an end to this "bending the cable consumer over the barrel" nonsense. 

Offline HalfSmokes

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Just think - here we get to pay MASN and Comcast sports (then again, isn't espn the most expensive network for carriers)