Maryland's about to make a lot of money and play a lot of games on Fox Sports.
The Big Ten is nearing an agreement to sell half its annual media rights package to Fox, the Sports Business Journal's John Ourand and Michael Smith reported on Tuesday afternoon. The reporters say the agreement could be worth up to $250 million over six years depending on if the Big Ten also sells Fox the other half of its media rights, or what it gets out of ESPN, CBS or whomever.
That suggests the Big Ten could collect $1.5 billion on a deal centered around its TV rights over six years. The current Big Ten deal with ESPN is for $1 billion over 10 years, plus a basketball-only deal worth $72 million (comparatively small potatoes) for six years.
Two years ago, Big Ten schools were expecting to pull in about $45 million annually from the conference once the league negotiated a new TV deal. These terms suggest they'll get about $18 million per year just from half their outside TV and media rights, not even accounting for revenues from the Big Ten Network, postseason appearance payouts, ticket sales and merchandising. The numbers could get huge:
In FY 2015, B1G schools got $21 million w/ TV + BTN. Let’s say FOX deal is exactly half: That’s ~$35 million per, not even counting BTN.
— Kevin Trahan (@k_trahan) April 19, 2016
Add in NCAA payouts ($4.4 million and rising), bowl games ($4.7 million), ticket sales, etc., and you’re looking at well over $50 million.
— Kevin Trahan (@k_trahan) April 19, 2016
Maryland won't get to join in all the fun immediately, as the Terps don't get full Big Ten financial shares until 2020-21. But the Big Ten is going to be absolutely swimming in money, and that's good news for Maryland's athletic department. (It doesn't matter as much for Maryland's players, who will get exactly zero liquid cash out of this deal.)
Just on the first half of the Big Ten's media rights, Fox will broadcast about 25 football games and 50 basketball games per season starting in 2017, SBJ reported. So you'll be seeing a lot less of Maryland on ESPN and CBS.