Right now, ESPN is focused on renewing its deal with the NBA. But when you are the Worldwide Leader in Sports, a year does not go by when you don’t have some decisions to make regarding your play-by-play rights. With the announcement last year that the College Football Playoff will eventually expand to 12 teams, there are people at the network already thinking about 2026.
That is the year the current contract between ESPN and the CFP ends. The network has indicated that it would be willing to be flexible in the next rights deal. Michael Nathanson of the research firm MoffetNathanson told Richard Deitsch that the network may have no choice.
“I think ESPN always likes having the year-end anything, and especially college football between the SEC Network and ACC Network and their deep ties,” he said. “The problem is it’s so expensive.”
Currently, ESPN pays around $470 million per year for the TV contract to air the College Football Playoff. That number is expected to go way up in the next negotiation, as the event would expand from three games to eleven.
“It’s such an expensive package that something would have to be thrown overboard. You can’t have everything. Clearly, they want the NBA because they’ll get NBA games for ESPN+. But do they get UFC (which is up in 2025) on top of that?”
Conferences like the Big Ten and the Pac-12, which do not have close ties with the network, have questioned whether ESPN’s relationship with the SEC benefits the conference when it comes time to select the four-team field for the College Football Playoff each year. That same argument has been used by other networks that want a piece of college football’s championship tournament as well.
No one from the College Football Playoff has said how many media partners the event may take on or when negotiations would begin.
They pay over 100 million a game to air the current playoff I understand it is for all inclusive coverage on all platforms and international distribution. That is a ton of money for just 3 games a year I know they place massive emphasis on those games with the negative casts but the added costs might not overcome the massive price the pay for just 3 games a year