SEC Football is falling behind on the revenue front, and a new offer from ESPN won’t save it. Steve Berkowitz of USA TODAY reported Wednesday that the league was $88 million behind the Big Ten in revenue for FY 2024, the first year the new TV contracts went into place. That gap is only going to widen.
Remember, the SEC inked a 10-year $3 billion deal with ESPN/ABC to carry its marquee games, while the Big Ten has a seven-year $7 billion deal across three networks. Now, though, ESPN is coming to the table with an offer to help the SEC somewhat lessen that gap: It won’t work.
According to a report from The Athletic, ESPN is offering the SEC $50-80 million more to go to a nine-game league schedule like the Big Ten has. Sure, that would reduce the number of games the network carries in a year from 128 to 120, but it’s basically eliminating 16 meaningless non-conference games for eight better conference games.
The increased advertising revenue for the marquee games would make up for the loss in total games. However, this is a bad deal for the SEC, and the league should demand more money before coming to the table. Greg Sankey’s teams won’t get close to the Big Ten in revenue with this move.
Consider for a second what a nine-game schedule means. Every other year, a team is mandated to play five road games. If there’s a home and home marquee non-conference game, they may have to play six road games. Altogether, you could estimate that teams would lose a home game every two years.
According to notable statistician T.J. Altimore, the football stadium revenue per home game for SEC teams in 2023 ranged from $1.5 million to $7.8 million. Eight teams, or half the league, brought in more than $5 million per home game in revenue. Even if this ESPN offer is accepted at the top end, it’s right at $5 million extra per team to split.
Okay, so losing a home game every other year may average out to a loss less than that $5 million gained. Then there are the other avenues for money that narrow with a nine-game schedule, though, most notably, having an easier path to the College Football Playoff.
Last year, with the Indiana Hoosiers and SMU Mustangs getting in, the committee showed it’s not going to value strength of schedule, so that extra tough conference game isn’t going to help anybody. It’s just another potential loss for money teams and could result in SEC Football programs cannibalizing themselves.
Remember, conferences make $4 million for every team they have reach the first round of the CFP, $8 million for every team they have reach the quarterfinals, $14 million for every team they have reach the semifinals and $20 million for every team they have reach the national championship game. There’s an incentive to have more teams.
Why would you want to risk losing that?
Along with the tougher schedules come narrower pathways to bowl games as well. Many lower-level SEC Football teams reach bowl games by beating up on their three bad non-conference opponents and beating three worst teams in the league they play. Even with an extra league game, they will rarely get to four easy teams.
As a result, they would have to drop playing Power Five non-conference teams or miss out on a bowl, and if more SEC teams miss out on bowl games, that is again less revenue. Every non-CFP bowl game involving an SEC team has a payout of at least $1.3 million, and some of them are as high as over $8 million.
Adding all of these things together, teams would likely make less money with a nine-game SEC Football slate if ESPN only increased its offer $50-80 million. The only way they could avoid it would be is if every team ditched all Power Five non-conference games, so say goodbye to Florida-Florida State, South Carolina-Clemson, Georgia-Georgia Tech and Kentucky-Louisville.
None of these outcomes are good in the moment. Sankey has to walk away from ESPN’s offer until at least $150 million more is on the table, and he should come with a demand for $300 million more. Although a nine-game schedule would be great for SEC Football fans, it can’t come without way more stipulations.
