Sale of NBC Sports RSNs likely complicated by team ownership stakes, per report

It seemed inevitable whether Comcast opted to spin out NBCUniversal or not, but it appears as if the NBC Sports-branded regional sports networks are destined to unwind from the media company currently operating them.

As was initially reported by Matt Gelb in The Athletic on Monday, the remaining NBC Sports Regional Networks are in flux as NBCUniversal looks to continue its divestment in the regional sports network business. The news comes as Comcast announced it plans to separate NBCUniversal from its telecom business in about a year’s time.

NBC has moved to exit the regional sports network industry for some time now, shuttering or otherwise offloading a handful of its networks over the last decade and change as the headwinds of the cable business and ever-increasing rights fees for live sports have put the squeeze on such operations. Fewer and fewer traditional regional sports networks continue to exist, and many teams are looking elsewhere — to streaming, over-the-air networks, or yet-launched consolidated hubs — for the future of their local media rights revenues.

For NBC, unwinding the rest of its regional sports network operations might be a bit tedious as many of the franchises that remain tied to the networks also own stakes in their respective network. That has long been common practice in the regional sports network business, but certainly complicates a sale process, particularly when these networks are paying rights fees that are now likely seen as above market-rate.

According to a report by Austin Karp in Sports Business Journal, “team ownership” will be a “complicating factor” as NBC likely looks to sell its regional sports networks. The San Francisco Giants, Boston Celtics, and Philadelphia Flyers all have ownership stakes in the networks airing their local broadcasts.

The report added that Comcast’s spinoff of NBCUniversal will only make divestment in the regional sports networks more likely.

“Without the MVPD, they’re even less of a company priority,” an analyst told Sports Business Journal. “Maybe they get folded into Peacock somehow more quickly. … Comcast is tough. They were always a beast [in carriage talks,] even with under the same roof,” the analyst said alluding to Comcast’s hard-lined negotiations with its own regional sports networks, which shoved the channels onto more expensive tiers.

With both MLB and the NBA looking to, at some point, centralize local media in some form or fashion, teams associated with the NBC Sports Regional Networks were always likely candidates to join the aggregated effort. Now, that appears more likely once those efforts materialize. The main question as it stands is when, exactly, NBCUniversal will look to unload these networks.