Wow! From media to sports betting, ESPN is in even deeper now.

I'm shocked. This is only inches from being as bad as if the NFL or MLB started their own book.

Penn in the Ivy League?!

(08-08-2023 04:43 PM)bullet Wrote:  Penn in the Ivy League?!

PENN Entertainment. They used to work with Barstool.

"PENN agreed to pay $1.5 billion to ESPN as a part of this deal, the Action Network's Darren Rovell reported. In addition, ESPN will be granted roughly $500 million in warrants over the next 10 years."

ESPN is just licensing the name "ESPN" to PENN, who is a large and established gaming company though one with little consumer level brand recognition, for $1.5B and then $500M in warrants. Guess this is one way to raise a big chunk of the money Disney has to pay Comcast for Hulu. I bet a huge part of that $1.5B was due upfront and has a short payback window.

It makes sense though, not that pretty much anyone in the public will care or differentiate that "ESPN Bet" isn't actually owned or operated by ESPN.

This answer a huge question for me though. Disney is going to spin-off ESPN, a la Discovery/Max/Warner or whatever that company is called. Companies the size of Disney don't typically license out their core brands for things that aren't joint ventures - and especially freaking DISNEY doesn't do this since they are the kings of using their own IP. This is simply Disney extracting every single last possible cent in value from ESPN, before loading it up with debt and either selling it to private equity or doing a spinoff/IPO. And I'm leaning towards IPO right now, because this would be incredibly easy to hype up to the average retail investor to purchase shares in, so probably don't need to have private equity buy it first to polish it before IPO and Disney itself will do the stripping.

This does not make me feel great about our deal with ESPN/ABC though. If we go to 9 or 10 conference games, or add more schools, we 100% need to have another media partner and a game on Thursday or Friday. Honestly, I'd be down for 100% of Vanderbilt's home games to be Friday night games. It's not like there's a surge of alumni onto campus on Saturdays that makes it difficult for us to host like for Bama or Texas or Florida, and might actually help convince some Nashville people to buy more season tickets. Lots of exposure for us to sell to recruits.

From D1.ticker:

ESPN is partnering with PENN Entertainment to launch ESPN BET, a branded sportsbook for U.S. fans. PENN Entertainment will rebrand its current sportsbook and relaunch as ESPN BET, effective this fall, in the 16 states where PENN Entertainment is licensed. The rebrand includes the mobile app, website, and mobile website. ESPN Chairman Jimmy Pitaro: “Our primary focus is always to serve sports fans and we know they want both betting content and the ability to place bets with less friction from within our products. The strategy here is simple: to give fans what they’ve been requesting and expecting from ESPN. PENN Entertainment is the perfect partner to build an unmatched user experience for sports betting with ESPN BET.”

https://espnpressroom.com/us/press-relea...rtainment/

Under the terms of the agreement, PENN has agreed to make $1.5B in cash payments to ESPN paid over the initial ten-year term and grant ESPN approximately $500M of warrants to purchase approximately 31.8M PENN common shares that will vest ratably over 10 years. Should ESPN Bet meet certain U.S. OSB market share performance thresholds, ESPN could receive bonus warrants to purchase up to an additional approximately 6.4M PENN common shares. Additionally, PENN has sold 100% of the Barstool Sports common stock to Barstool Founder David Portnoy “in exchange for certain non-compete and other restrictive covenants. PENN also has the right to receive 50% of the gross proceeds received by David Portnoy in any subsequent sale or other monetization event of Barstool.”

https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/2...ts-Betting

Amazing. Disney doesn't have casinos on their cruises and they are one of the biggest supporters of preventing the expansion of casinos in Florida, most recently leading the charge to prevent the Seminole Tribe from having a sportsbook............ well well well.....how the mouse is a hypocrite......we now have ESPN BET

(08-08-2023 04:59 PM)BeepBeepJeep Wrote:  "PENN agreed to pay $1.5 billion to ESPN as a part of this deal, the Action Network's Darren Rovell reported. In addition, ESPN will be granted roughly $500 million in warrants over the next 10 years."

ESPN is just licensing the name "ESPN" to PENN, who is a large and established gaming company though one with little consumer level brand recognition, for $1.5B and then $500M in warrants. Guess this is one way to raise a big chunk of the money Disney has to pay Comcast for Hulu. I bet a huge part of that $1.5B was due upfront and has a short payback window.

It makes sense though, not that pretty much anyone in the public will care or differentiate that "ESPN Bet" isn't actually owned or operated by ESPN.

This answer a huge question for me though. Disney is going to spin-off ESPN, a la Discovery/Max/Warner or whatever that company is called. Companies the size of Disney don't typically license out their core brands for things that aren't joint ventures - and especially freaking DISNEY doesn't do this since they are the kings of using their own IP. This is simply Disney extracting every single last possible cent in value from ESPN, before loading it up with debt and either selling it to private equity or doing a spinoff/IPO. And I'm leaning towards IPO right now, because this would be incredibly easy to hype up to the average retail investor to purchase shares in, so probably don't need to have private equity buy it first to polish it before IPO and Disney itself will do the stripping.

This does not make me feel great about our deal with ESPN/ABC though. If we go to 9 or 10 conference games, or add more schools, we 100% need to have another media partner and a game on Thursday or Friday. Honestly, I'd be down for 100% of Vanderbilt's home games to be Friday night games. It's not like there's a surge of alumni onto campus on Saturdays that makes it difficult for us to host like for Bama or Texas or Florida, and might actually help convince some Nashville people to buy more season tickets. Lots of exposure for us to sell to recruits.

This gambling conversation has been going on for a while, it's hardly a new or surprising development. Maybe ESPN gets spun off, maybe they become their own separate company, maybe not. Either way, we in the SEC will be fine.

(08-08-2023 05:09 PM)bryanw1995 Wrote:  

(08-08-2023 04:59 PM)BeepBeepJeep Wrote:  "PENN agreed to pay $1.5 billion to ESPN as a part of this deal, the Action Network's Darren Rovell reported. In addition, ESPN will be granted roughly $500 million in warrants over the next 10 years."

ESPN is just licensing the name "ESPN" to PENN, who is a large and established gaming company though one with little consumer level brand recognition, for $1.5B and then $500M in warrants. Guess this is one way to raise a big chunk of the money Disney has to pay Comcast for Hulu. I bet a huge part of that $1.5B was due upfront and has a short payback window.

It makes sense though, not that pretty much anyone in the public will care or differentiate that "ESPN Bet" isn't actually owned or operated by ESPN.

This answer a huge question for me though. Disney is going to spin-off ESPN, a la Discovery/Max/Warner or whatever that company is called. Companies the size of Disney don't typically license out their core brands for things that aren't joint ventures - and especially freaking DISNEY doesn't do this since they are the kings of using their own IP. This is simply Disney extracting every single last possible cent in value from ESPN, before loading it up with debt and either selling it to private equity or doing a spinoff/IPO. And I'm leaning towards IPO right now, because this would be incredibly easy to hype up to the average retail investor to purchase shares in, so probably don't need to have private equity buy it first to polish it before IPO and Disney itself will do the stripping.

This does not make me feel great about our deal with ESPN/ABC though. If we go to 9 or 10 conference games, or add more schools, we 100% need to have another media partner and a game on Thursday or Friday. Honestly, I'd be down for 100% of Vanderbilt's home games to be Friday night games. It's not like there's a surge of alumni onto campus on Saturdays that makes it difficult for us to host like for Bama or Texas or Florida, and might actually help convince some Nashville people to buy more season tickets. Lots of exposure for us to sell to recruits.

This gambling conversation has been going on for a while, it's hardly a new or surprising development. Maybe ESPN gets spun off, maybe they become their own separate company, maybe not. Either way, we in the SEC will be fine.

Yeah, the SEC will be fine in general, but Disney licensing the ESPN name is a huge and surprising development. That's not how Disney usually operates.

Yeah, a TV network that has financial ties with college teams that they air wants to get into the sports gambling world. What is wrong with that.

Meanwhile, the all time hits leader in MLB isn't in the HOF because he bet on his own team.

Another interesting comment to me today was that many younger fans (bettors) don't even care which team wins anymore. They follow specific players because of fantasy sports.