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The NFL-Skydance Billion-Dollar Question

Everyone in the sports-media industrial complex has been trying to game out the NFL’s strategy for exercising its change-of-control option in its CBS/Paramount deal. But the current idea gaining traction will throw everyone for a loop—especially the NHL and MLB.

NFL
In this current configuration, the NFL would waive any opt-out provision and extend the current broadcast deals, which expire in 2033, for another year or two. Photo: Mario Hommes/DeFodi Images/Getty Images
John Ourand
July 7, 2025

One of the simmering subplots in Skydance and RedBird’s tortured, endless, and inevitably litigation-stoking pursuit of Paramount Global, Shari Redstone’s mismanaged heirloom, has been the fate of CBS’s annual $2.1 billion NFL deal. Indeed, that yearly payment represents a quarter of the total valuation of the proposed merger, which finally seems on the glide path to closing after Trump extracted his $16 million blood sacrifice last week. And yet, it’s unequivocally underpriced in a world where Disney is spending hundreds of millions more per season on the NBA.