Coronavirus Knocks Out Live Sports: How Quickly Can Industry Rebound?

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The media industry was expecting March Madness. What it got was absolute chaos. Just a week ago, two of the top executives in TV sports were talking up the NCAA’s annual men’s basketball tournament…

contests. Consider that AT&T’s Turner Sports and Walt Disney’s ESPN agreed to pay around $24 billion to secure contracts with the NBA over the course of a nine-year deal. And Comcast’s NBC-Universal struck a 10-year deal with thethat’s said to cost around $2 billion.

And then of course there are the Olympics. NBCUniversal, which has U.S. rights to the sports extravaganza, said earlier this month that it sold more than 90% of its ad inventory for the Tokyo Games, a haul valued at more than $1.25 billion. The company’s parent, Comcast, agreed to pay $4.38 billion for the U.S. media rights to four Olympics from 2014 to 2020, and $7.75 billion for broadcast rights to the Olympic Games between 2021 and 2032.

The media companies are traversing unmapped terrain. Both ESPN and Fox Sports called their situation “unprecedented,” and indicated they would work with the sports leagues to find a new path. ESPN’s Burke Magnus, the executive who oversees programming acquisitions and scheduling, said in a recent statement that the sports-media giant would likely tap a mix of “SportsCenter,” talk shows, documentaries, and, potentially, previously-scheduled original programming.

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Perfect opportunity for disruption. There’s a better way for sports to exist in the 21st century.

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