Ratings are dead. At least, that’s what Mark Cuban says. The billionaire entrepreneur and former owner of the Dallas Mavericks made that case during a recent appearance on Front Office Sports Portfolio Players.
What We Know: According to Cuban, streaming platforms are aggressively buying into live sports — not for eyeballs, but for subscribers. Amazon Prime Video holds exclusive NFL Thursday Night Football rights and NBA games worth $1.8 billion annually. Netflix has secured Christmas Day NFL games and WWE programming. Meanwhile, Peacock owns key NFL playoff and MLB packages, and Apple TV+ holds exclusive MLS games. ESPN also has a massive arrangement with the NHL. Together, these deals touch all four major American sports leagues. For streamers, according to Cuban, live sports are a subscription engine — not a ratings play.
What They Said: Mark Cuban on ratings figures for sports on streaming platforms “It’s not about ratings anymore. Ratings are irrelevant. It’s now subscriptions and churn. Do you create new subscriptions? Because that’s the money. Yes, they sell ads, and yes, they want to sell more, but that’s not the primary source of revenue.”
Mark Cuban on the precarious position of linear television “Any league that makes their money from TV, whether streaming or linear, understands that linear TV is dying. It’s becoming completely dependent on sports. When you [linear TV] have 60-70% of your revenue coming from basically one industry, we would give you s**t on Shark Tank. So, that has to be a concern.”
Mark Cuban expands on why streaming platforms don’t pay attention to ratings “The idea of the ratings are up, the ratings are down. Meaningless numbers. That helps advertising sales on the margin, but it’s all about subscription revenue. That is what pays the bills. When Netflix reports their earnings, they talk about ad revenue, but how many subscribers do you have locally or globally? When you know NBC Peacock reports, how many subscribers do you have? Disney? How many subscribers do you have? They don’t look at the average ratings anymore at all.”
What Remains Unclear: However, whether streaming’s subscription model can sustain these enormous rights fees long-term remains uncertain. Cuban acknowledged that risk directly. The returns on billion-dollar sports deals must eventually materialize — otherwise, the entire structure wobbles. Furthermore, it remains unclear whether event-driven sports strategies, like Netflix’s Christmas Day approach, can meaningfully move subscriber needles beyond initial bursts of growth.
What It Means: Cuban isn’t wrong in his assessment of what matters most to streaming platforms. The goal is to drive more people to the streaming platform instead of how many people actually view it. That’s another reason why Netflix is making the investment it is in podcasting for example. Can content drive subscription over content driving viewership. It’s not one and the same. However it is interesting to see streaming platforms continue to release viewership data from large events. If it doesn’t truly matter, than why release it in the first place. Sports on every level should be cautious however of trusting in fees streaming platforms pay for their content. If the streamer doesn’t see subscription gains, then the league may be on the mend because of the failure of network TV.
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John Mamola is Barrett Media’s sports editor and daily sports columnist. He brings over two decades of experience (Chicago, Tampa/St Petersburg) in the broadcast industry with expertise in brand management, sales, promotions, producing, imaging, hosting, talent coaching, talent development, web development, social media strategy and design, video production, creative writing, partnership building, communication/networking with a long track record of growth and success. He is a five-time recognized top 20 program director in a major market via Barrett Medi’s Top 20 series and has been honored internally multiple times as station/brand of the year (Tampa, FL) and employee of the month (Tampa, FL) by iHeartMedia. Connect with John by email at John@BarrettMedia.com.
