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Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the ACC

ESPN locked down its deal with the ACC, ensuring the league will avoid Pac-12 overreach problems and keep Clemson and Florida State in the fold. But the price ESPN paid proves its sports rights market is not a bonanza for everyone.

Jim Phillips
ESPN had until the end of this week to elongate the agreement, and decided to move forward after weeks of talks with the conference commissioner, Jim Phillips. ESPN had all the leverage, of course. Photo: George Walker/Icon Sportswire/Getty Images
John Ourand
January 31, 2025

I forget: Was it Keynes or Friedman or Hayek who offered the economic truism that not all sports leagues experience the platform shift to streaming equally? After all, the interest of Amazon Prime and Peacock helped the NBA run up an 11-year $76 billion deal. Meanwhile, the NFL is licking its chops to exercise an out from the $110 billion worth of rights-fees deals the league signed about four years ago, presumably hoping that current partners like Prime, Netflix, and YouTube TV create an unforeseen market for its games. And then there’s the Pac-12. A couple of years ago, the historic league’s member presidents overestimated their economic value, passed on a linear TV deal from ESPN, and, in the end, were unable to find any deal at all, at least not at the level they wanted. Eventually, 10 of its 12 members left for other conferences.