White Sox chairman Jerry Reinsdorf is looking to launch his own regional sports network.
Charles Rex Arbogast/AP
The market for regional sports networks isn’t what it was 10 years ago, when the Dodgers were only a year into a 25-year, $8.35 billion deal with then-Time Warner Cable to launch SportsNet LA. It’s not even what it was five years ago, when the Cubs launched Marquee Sports Network.
But that won’t stop White Sox and Bulls chairman Jerry Reinsdorf from entering the fray with his own RSN, and according to noted sports business consultant Marc Ganis, it shouldn’t.
“It may be the best option available,” Ganis, the co-founder and CEO of Chicago-based Sportscorp Ltd., said Wednesday. “Sometimes you just have to take the best option available, even if it’s not ideal.”
That option, as the Sun-Times reported Monday, is leaving NBC Sports Chicago when the network’s contract with the Sox, Bulls and Blackhawks expires in October and turning multiplatform sports network Stadium into an RSN. Reinsdorf helped launch Stadium in 2017 and bought majority control last May.
Ganis said Reinsdorf’s anticipated RSN would have the makings of a successful one.
“Having three teams provides critical mass,” Ganis said. “So it could be quite successful, especially if one or more of the teams start winning. One-team RSNs are very challenging. The Cubs are doing OK with it, but it’s still very challenging.”
It also would need wide cable and satellite distribution, which is no guarantee as providers dig in their heels to suppress the rising cost of carrying live sports. Ganis said that’s why airing games on broadcast television would be important for selling the network. It’s quite a pivot after the Sox, Bulls and Hawks followed the Cubs in leaving longtime broadcast home WGN for supposed greener pastures.
“They have to get all three teams on a meaningful number of games on broadcast television,” he said. “What’s happened now with cord-cutting is the broad exposure that you get with over-the-air television is far more valuable than it was before. If they’re gonna try to sell streaming packages a la carte, you have to be able to show your product to the potential buyers.”