Notre Dame Football Wants a Big Raise in Next Rights Deal; Could Games Disappear From Peacock?
The Notre Dame football team might be unofficially known as the Golden Domers, but the only color the school seems to see right now is green. Front Office Sports reports that Notre Dame wants to triple the amount of money it gets in its next broadcasting agreement, which could put its relationship with NBCUniversal in jeopardy.
The Notre Dame football team has been independent since its inception, as anti-Catholic bias prevented it from joining the country’s large athletic conferences in the early 20th century. In 1991, the team agreed to an exclusive broadcasting deal with NBC, which airs the team’s games on national television every week. As part of the arrangement, Fighting Irish games also appear on NBCU’s streaming platform Peacock.
The contract between the school and NBCU currently pays out around $22 million per season, according to FOS. But the gargantuan broadcasting pact recently signed between the Big Ten and CBS, NBC and Fox will pay schools like Michigan and Ohio State closer to $90 million per season, which is why Notre Dame wants to triple the number it gets in its next deal; Notre Dame’s current agreement with NBC expires after the 2024 season.
There are some who believe that Notre Dame won’t get the amount it is seeking unless it joins one of the country’s top athletic conferences. The Irish currently plays half of its games each season against teams from the ACC, but that conference’s media rights deals won’t get Notre Dame to its desired revenue. Former Fox Sports executive Patrick Crakes says that if Notre Dame truly wants to get triple the amount it’s currently receiving, it may need to sacrifice its independent status.
“My big-picture thought is that Notre Dame will need a conference to support a three-time bump long term,” Crakes said. “I think either the Big Ten or SEC would do. Also, don’t rule out a third new conference in several years. A lot of assumptions are falling apart as pay-TV-bundle economics go flat.”
As Crakes points out, less than half of the United States currently has a pay-TV subscription according to one survey. Sports rights deals just keep zooming up in value, while cable subscriber revenues are down, and it might be hard for networks and providers to justify paying out so much money to secure the rights for just one team, no matter how big that team’s brand is.
If Notre Dame does try to stay independent and shop its rights around to the highest bidder, it could mean the team’s games will disappear from NBC and Peacock after the 2024 season. If the school gets a better offer from Fox or another outlet like ESPN, it will take that offer, and NBC will have to be content with the new package of Big Ten games (including Peacock exclusives) it won in its deal with that conference.
It’s highly unlikely that a streaming service becomes the exclusive home of Notre Dame football after 2024. Although streamers like Peacock and Paramount+ have carried plenty of college football games in the past, the economics of streaming make paying $80-$90 million per season for one school’s streaming rights difficult for everyone in the industry, save perhaps Netflix, which is just now starting to dip its pinky toe into the world of sports streaming.
For now, it’s a wait-and-see game as Notre Dame and NBCU near the end of their deal following the 2024 season. An extension between the two could be announced before then, but if it isn’t, Notre Dame football will hit the open market looking for a big pay bump.
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