ESPN college football broadcast camera on display before the All State Sugar Bowl playoff game between the Texas Longhorns and the Washington Huskies on Monday, January 1, 2024 at Caesars Superdome in New Orleans, Louisiana.
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In an attempt to strengthen its sports offer, Warner Bros. Discovery has signed a five-year sublicense agreement with disney ESPN will broadcast the first-round and quarterfinal games of the College Football Playoffs.
Warner Bros. Discovery's TNT will carry two first-round games this year and next and will add two additional quarterfinal games starting in 2026. Disney also has the option to sublicense one semifinal game to Warner Bros. Discovery starting in 2026. third year of reaching an agreement if he wishes, according to people familiar with the matter.
Disney will maintain exclusivity on the championship game during the terms of the contract, which runs through 2031, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the details are private. Disney is paying about $1.3 billion a year for the rights to the entire College Football Playoff.
The new 12-team College Football Playoff slate debuts in December, replacing a four-team tournament that began in 2014. Under the new format, the top four teams earn byes while teams ranked 5th through 12th play top-flight games. round. in the stadium of the highest ranked team.
ESPN will produce the games and will primarily use ESPN talent for the broadcasts, which will be branded as TNT, people familiar said. As part of the sublicensing deal, Warner Bros. Discovery is paying ESPN an average of “hundreds of millions” per year for games over five years, though less in years one and two, when it only has two games per year. said the people.
Warner Bros. Discovery has exclusive rights to sublicense the games during the term of the agreement.
“It is exciting to add TNT Sports, another highly respected broadcaster, to the College Football Playoff family,” Bill Hancock, executive director of the College Football Playoff, said in a statement. “Sports fans across the country are intimately familiar with their work on a wide variety of sports properties over the past two decades, and we look forward to seeing what new and innovative ideas they bring to the promotion and delivery of these games.”
The first round of this year's CFP will take place on December 20 and 21.
Does the CFP come in and the NBA leave?
Warner Bros. Discovery plans to add the games to its Max sports tier. The company is increasing its live sports offerings while in the midst of a difficult negotiation with the National Basketball Association for a package of live games.
TNT has been a partner of the NBA for almost 40 years, but is at risk of losing games Comcastowned by NBCUniversal and Amazon if Warner Bros. Discovery decides to waive its equivalent rights or, potentially, if the league chooses to ignore those rights.
College football is one of the most popular programming on television. Michigan's semifinal victory over Alabama last year drew an average audience of 27.2 million viewers, the most-watched non-NFL sporting event since 2018.
Even if Warner Bros. Discovery loses the NBA, it will now have both the CFP and the NBA through mid-2025, plus multiple weeks of games for the March Madness tournament for NCAA men's basketball, men's and women's soccer, NASCAR, Major League Baseball. and the National Hockey League. That should help the company in its upcoming carriage renewal deals for TNT and its other cable networks.
ESPN's sublicense to Warner Bros. Discovery also keeps all CFP games on Venu Sports, the new sports streaming service developed by Disney, Fox and Warner Bros. Discovery and expected to launch in the fall.
Disclosure: Comcast owns CNBC's parent company, NBCUniversal.
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