1. Being the first broadcast executive to offer a NASCAR race live with flag-to-flag coverage.
In 1978, CBS’s motorsports expert, Ken Squier, approached Pilson with an idea. Squier had heard that NASCAR boss Bill France Jr. wanted his races to be broadcast live from beginning to end.
TV had never covered a race in such a way, but Pilson was receptive and took the idea to his bosses at CBS. They agreed to air the 1979 Daytona 500.
Aided by a snowstorm that hit the East Coast, ratings for that first race exceeded expectations and started a relationship between NASCAR and CBS that continued through 2000.
2. Keeping the Masters and U.S. Open tennis away from ESPN for more than two decades.
In the early 1980s, ESPN was a tiny sports outlet that traded in second-tier sports. Still, its presence on the media landscape concerned Pilson, so he made moves to keep two of CBS’s jewels, the Masters and the U.S. Open tennis tournament, away from the cable channel.
Pilson convinced both organizations to let CBS license their programming to cable channels and negotiated a deal for USA Network to carry both events.
“That was groundbreaking. No one had done that before,” Pilson said.
The properties eventually took back those rights, but they continued their relationships with USA for the next 25 years, effectively blocking ESPN from carrying them.
When ESPN finally picked up their rights in 2008 (Masters) and 2009 (U.S. Open), Pilson called ESPN President George Bodenheimer to congratulate him and said, “George, I’m the guy who made you wait 25 years before you could get those rights.”
Pilson remembers Bodenheimer laughing and saying, “I know. I would have done the same thing.”
3. Grabbing the Winter Olympics rights for Albertville and Lillehammer.
CBS had bid and failed to get the Olympics a number of times during Pilson’s career, but Pilson saw a unique opportunity with the 1992 Albertville and 1994 Lillehammer Games.
“The fact that the two Winter Games would be so close together, the fact that they were both in Europe, meant that we could … save a ton of money by building sets, designing equipment and keeping it in Europe for two years,” Pilson said. “Both Albertville and Lillehammer basically became one budget instead of two.”
Thanks to interest in Tonya Harding and Nancy Kerrigan, Lillehammer, in particular, was a huge success. CBS averaged a 27.8 rating for its coverage.
“Those ratings will never happen again in the history of television,” Pilson said.
It marked Pilson’s final success with the network. Two weeks later, CBS executives told Pilson they were removing him as president of CBS Sports.
