NHL And NBC Sports Announce 10 Year Deal

Added on Apr 20, 2011 by J Merrill in

NHL

A landmark deal between the National Hockey League and NBC Sports Group is going to put hockey in homes for ten years, through the 2020-21 season. NBC will have television and media rights for the NHL, and Versus will be its cable outlet. They will both feature games of the week through out the season. NBC and Versus will telecast 100 exclusive regular-season games, nearly double this just-completed regular season total.

It wasn’t to long ago when hockey was barley getting any attention, and now they will be featured on network and cable television. A huge plus for U.S. Fans: This deal marks the first-ever national distribution of all Stanley Cup Playoffs games, including, for the first time, exclusive coverage starting with the League conference semifinals.

NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman was quick to point out how well they have worked with them in the past. Bettman announced “NBC Sports and Comcast have been fantastic partners. They have provided incredible coverage of our sport and have teamed with us to deliver the best TV viewer-ship figures in three decades. It is a credit to our players, our great game and our outstanding fans that Brian Roberts, Steve Burke, Dick Ebersol and their teams would make a commitment of this scale. We also know the best is yet to come.”

Everyone assumed a deal would be reached between NBC and the NHL, but industry analysts were surprised by the length and size of the deal. For the rights, NBC will fork over about $200 million a year for the length of the contract. Bettman continued “This is the most significant U.S. media rights partnership in the League’s history. NBC Universal / Comcast is one of the most important, connected and ‘wired’ media companies in the U.S., and as the potential of the NBC Sports Group is realized, the importance of our relationship will become more apparent to hockey fans and our business partners.”

Dick Ebersol, chairman of NBC Sports Group, was just as excited about the deal as Bettman. Ebersol said he is most excited about the playoffs being exclusively on Versus. Ebersol also announced that Versus is no more than 3 months away from a name change that will have NBC in its name. Ebersol went on to say that the playoffs are like another season that vibrates for 2 months. He said “I like the rabid fan base in each and every city during the playoffs. That doesn’t exist in every city in other sports, that deep level of rabidness. That’s not to say you won’t see it in some cities. It’s that in the NHL it is rabid in every city (and arena).”

NBC was also very happy about the one-off games like the winter classics, and are hoping to do more of them in the future. Those are always fun to see, and I am still waiting to find out the teams who could be involved with the next 30 for 30 episodes that debuted this year.