There has always been one major lingering issue with the series of Pac-12 regional networks and it was present from the very beginning, carriage. The conference struggled to get subscriber numbers to a fruitful and respectable level in large part because the channels weren’t carried by DirecTV. However, the two were once very close to a deal.
In 2015, the Pac-12 Networks‘ decision makers and those from DirecTV had gotten to the “goal line” as described by former Pac-12 Networks programming manager Mark Petix. He recalled being at the end of a negotiations that would have seen the Pac-12 Networks added to DirecTV as soon as that weekend before DirecTV added one further demand.
“It felt like we were an announcement away from being on DirecTV,” said Petix in an oral history by the Athletic about the networks.
The demand from DirecTV was that as part of the deal, all twelve universities would be required to spend in the seven figures annually on AT&T (the parent company of DirecTV) telecom services and AT&T would become a “preferred” provider.
Michael Crow, president at Arizona State said, “It was a terrible deal… they were basically not interested in doing a fair deal. No one saw that deal as fair.”
Ted Robinson, a network play-by-play broadcaster added, “Sadly, that was the last gasp”.
“That was the first time we all sort of realized: “We’re not getting on DirecTV,” said Ashley Adamson, network studio host and reporter.
The deal would have netted a projected $35 million in revenue in just the first year and the Pac-12 Network would have been on DirecTV’s “Choice” tier which would have given access to another 16.4 million households. The network’s peak was around 19 million households.
