Guggenheim Baseball Management is being "forced to rework" its pending 25-year, $7B media-rights deal with Time Warner Cable, according to sources cited by Kosman & DeCambre of the N.Y. POST. The sources said that the new deal could end up seeing the company "fork over" $130M annually to MLB under its revenue-sharing agreement. That is more than 50% higher than the $85M Guggenheim "had expected to pay." The arrangement over the duration of the deal could cost the company "more than $1 billion in lost revenue," which "could hamper GBM’s ability to service the debt on the record-setting 2012 $2.15 billion purchase of the Dodgers or to maintain the team’s $216.6 million payroll." MLB "objected to the deal" because much of the $7B in rights fees to the newly formed Dodgers RSN, SportsNet LA, was "guaranteed no matter how successful -- or not -- it turned out to be." Sources said that Guggenheim "appears to be prepared to agree to the new conditions." Sources said that the Dodgers five months after announcing the media deal have "still not submitted it to MLB for approval, fearing it would be rejected" (N.Y. POST, 5/29).
