My two cents: Pac-12 Networks, DirecTV mess could be Scott's undoing
Pac-12 commissioner Larry Scott’s contract runs for three more school years, through June 2018, with a total compensation estimated at $3.5 million per year.
If that’s not security, what is?
But his failure to reach a deal with DirecTV last week is a blow of such significance that you wonder if the league’s chancellors and athletic directors might begin to wonder if he’s the person to take them forward. The potential profitability and distribution growth of the Pac-12 Networks is stalled.
Almost every athletic director expected more than a $21 million per-year return from Scott’s media rights deal, and more than last year’s $1 million-per-school take from the Pac-12 Networks.
People are also reading…
Most of Scott’s accomplishments were put on a tee for him (or anyone) replacing the old administration.
The $3.1 billion media rights package was, it looks now, average. The addition of Utah and Colorado didn’t turn heads (except in Denver and Salt Lake City). Moving the men’s basketball tournament to Las Vegas was a no-brainer.
Scott has taken significant heat for late start times in football and basketball. The Pac-12 Networks is bland and often unwatchable, populated with a flank of not-ready-for-prime-time analysts and on-air personalities. Its standard fare in live broadcasts is a Washington State-Arizona State basketball game and an Oregon State-Colorado football game.
The inability to become part of the DirecTV lineup stalls the league with an unimpressive 4 million subscribers within the Pac-12 footprint. And in a league with unprecedented spending at each school, nobody’s going to get rich off that.