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CBS SPORTS PLANS TO KEEP EARLY NCAA GAMES; SPORTSLINE BOOST

          CBS Sports is "going out of its way to quash reports
     that it plans to sell some NCAA Men's College Basketball
     Tournament games to a cable network," according to John
     Dempsey of DAILY VARIETY.  CBS Sports President Sean McManus
     outlined three main reasons why the net won't sell off the
     early round games to cable outlets: 1) Protecting local
     affils; 2) Continuing the NCAA's relationship with DirecTV
     to carry the early-round games; 3) CBS affils could shortly
     offer HDTV signals which would allow four spinoff channels
     and it "would be relatively easy for the CBS stations to
     employ those extra channels as outlets for the concurrent
     NCAA games" (DAILY VARIETY, 11/22).  In Dallas, Barry Horn
     noted McManus' mentioning that early round games were
     available on DBS and wrote, "Sounds like a perfect sales
     pitch for DirecTV" (DALLAS MORNING NEWS, 11/20).
          CBS' LONG COATTAILS: In Miami, John Dorschner reported
     that SportsLine got a "healthy boost in its stock price
     thanks" to part-owner CBS' $6B NCAA TV rights deal.  With
     news of the deal on Friday, SportsLine was up $6.25, or
     15.72%, to close at $46.  The CBS deal might allow
     SportsLine to "provide live radio broadcasts of all college
     tournament basketball games via the Internet -- a move that
     could greatly increase the number of visitors to the site." 
     Raymond James & Associates analyst Phil Leigh: "We believe
     SportsLine.com users will ultimately have point-and-click
     access to the entire 64-team tournament."  Leigh thought the
     deal would allow SportsLine to create NCAA Web sites and
     sell merchandise (MIAMI HERALD, 11/20).  CNBC's Bill
     Griffeth asked SportsLine CEO Michael Levy if he was
     "expecting some kind of revenue streams specifically from
     this deal."  Levy: "We certainly expect a lot of traffic to
     our site, because this is the most concentrated promotion we
     get on CBS."  Griffeth: "But there are no hard dollars
     coming from this?  You're just saying it'll probably be more
     from the advertising -- that you can charge more for more
     eyeballs as a result of the promotion.  Is that what you're
     saying?"  Levy: "Yeah. ... We see tremendous growth ahead in
     ad sales around this tournament" ("Market Wrap," 11/19).
          AD SALES FOR 2000: In the SPORTSBUSINESS JOURNAL,
     Langdon Brockinton reports that media buyers say that some
     30-second TV spots for the 2000 NCAA men's basketball finals
     are "going for more than $700,000 each."  But "generally
     speaking," an advertiser cannot buy time on the tournament
     "alone," as it must have a presence on the regular-season
     schedule.  One media buyer said an advertiser must spend $6M
     on CBS' NCAA coverage to get a 30-second spot on the Finals,
     as well as one unit in each of the Final Four semifinal
     telecasts.  CBS has "already sold close to" 90% of its ad
     inventory for its '99-2000 NCAA men's basketball season
     (SPORTSBUSINESS JOURNAL, 11/22).  AD AGE's Frankel &
     Friedman report that CBS received "only modest" 8-10% price
     increases for its 2000 men's tournament, with 30-second
     spots for the Final in the $600,000 range (AD AGE, 11/22).

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