Updated throughout the day with quick takes from staff.
As we round out the second month of the NFL lockout, Thursday marks the longest work stoppage in the sport's history. There have been legal milestones along the way, but no tangible end is in sight. And don't think your precious alma mater's Labor Day weekend kickoff festivities will console you. Oh, no: The tribulations of the pro game are fully prepared to sully college football as well. Disney, the round-eared parent of ESPN, is already talking up the jacked-up ad rates they'll be able to charge for advertising slots in college games, a slope as slippery as Chip & Dale themselves! Tee-hee!
"We will see some extremely, extremely improved pricing for ESPN’s college football games. CPMs will be up, rates will be up," Iger said. "They’ll probably expand their format so that they’ll add more inventory in order to take advantage of that. So the significant increases we’ll see not just in college football but in other ESPN programming will offset, at least somewhat, the impact of a [lockout]."
And what are the networks going to want, once they get more expensive ad buys? More ads. And once this new high bar for commercialized airtime is set, it's hard to imagine it dipping down again. Remember Rule 325e? How willingly do you imagine the NCAA would further go about shortening games for the benefit of Allstate, et al.?
The real winners here, of course, are stadium vendors in high-profile venues, who would have everything to gain from games stretching to eight hours in length to accommodate the extra blocks of commercials. How's that West Virginia beer sales deal looking about now?
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I don't know about other conferences and Schools
But Notre Dame has control over the length of TV timeouts and commercial breaks. There’s nothing they could do about it should the NCAA change the rues, but as of now, they have contractual control over the length of games.
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by Londonjoe on May 12, 2011 10:14 AM EDT reply actions
Prepare to wait until next year for football
…with the positioning of the players/owners not considering negotiations, it will be until next year before we see football. The fastest way back to games is a new cba, but now that it is in the courts system, it’s unlikely it will be settled soon. Nothing ever gets done quickly in the court system.
by theuglytruth on May 12, 2011 1:24 PM EDT reply actions
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