CNNSI.com's Peter King cited a source as saying that
when the NFL's three-year, $10M contract with ESPN to manage
the league's NFL.com Web site expires, "the next three-year
deal could fetch as much as" $100M. King: "That's basically
a million new dollars a year for each team in the league
starting in 2001" (CNNSI.com, 10/25).
SWEET STUFF: The WALL STREET JOURNAL's David Sweet
writes, "Confronted with threats of legal action from rival
ESPN, CBS SportsLine backed down from directing traffic from
espn.sports.com to www.sportsline.com" (See THE DAILY,
10/28). By yesterday afternoon, attempts to reach the Web
addresses like fox.sports.com resulted in the message,
"Failed to connect to server." ESPN Internet Group Senior
VP & GM Steve Zales: "Discontinuing this practice is the
least CBS SportsLine can do" (WALL STREET JOURNAL, 10/29).
....Sweet profiled Maxfootball.com, which is a "rarity on
the Internet," a Web site that "relies on original video and
audio programming," unlike "primarily text-based" ESPN.com
and SportsLine.com. Site co-Founder Mark Newman: "We feel
the broadband era is about to begin and we want to be in the
forefront of it." Sweet wrote that "problems do exist," as
home Internet connections "are often too weak to download
video, so Maxfootball.com must focus on businessmen in their
offices." Also, the site "has not secured rights to video
of replays, which would complement" commentary by talent Ted
DeLuca and Gary Horton (WALL STREET JOURNAL, 10/27).
GOING FOR SPEED: Speedvision reached an agreement with
RACER Magazine that will make RACER the provider of auto
racing news for speedvision.com (Speedvision).
