Wednesday, August 28, 2013

NASCAR's Herbst Says No TV Changes Expected In 2013

NASCAR Vice President Of Broadcasting and Production Steve Herbst has denied published reports that ESPN and Turner Sports are attempting to exit their NASCAR television contracts a year early, selling rights to 2014 Sprint Cup and Nationwide Series broadcasts to FOX and NBC.

“Despite recent reports to the contrary, nothing substantive has been presented to NASCAR regarding broadcast partners’ plans to alter our TV agreement in 2014,” said Herbst in a written statement today. “We’re very happy with our current broadcast partners and fully expect and are excited to be back with FOX, Turner and ESPN next year. These types of discussions happen regularly across the sports television landscape, very rarely resulting in changes to a media rights agreement.”

The sanctioning body recently announced a new 10-year broadcast contract with FOX and NBC that begins at Daytona in February of 2015. Sports Business Journal has reported that ESPN and Turner Sports have inquired about foregoing the final year of their respective contracts by selling the rights to FOX and NBC. While all four networks are reportedly interested in the deal, major road blocks remain concerning compensation.

2 comments:

  1. Well, so far Fox Sports 1 is a joke. Truck Qualifying and the Modified race at Bristol weren't on Fox Sports 1, they were on Fox Sports 2, which isn't even a Hi-Def channel!! The video quality makes the videos of the moon landing look like Hi-Def. It's disgusting!!! And what was on Fox Sports 1, football talk shows. NASCAR fans got screwed on this deal!! Now were locked in on a 10 year deal? Can you imagine how muck technology will change over the next ten years? Any more changes, and we'll be watching races on antenna t.v.!!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Ron, the market is working against NASCAR now, even with the absurd rights fees FOX and NBC paid. NASCAR has no standing to demand coverage of Truck qualifying et al anymore.

    I'm not convinced ESPN won't bail out of its NASCAR coverage for 2014 - it no longer makes any sense to have ESPN involved in the sport.

    ReplyDelete