SBJ Media: Less Means More For Super Bowl Ad Sales

Harry Jessell is heading into “semi-retirement.” A broadcast TV fixture, Jessell is selling most of his interest in his TVNewsCheck publication and will write an article or two a month. “Trying for quality rather than quantity,” he says. I will always have a soft spot for Harry. Back in 1993, when he was editor of Broadcast magazine, Harry hired me to write a couple of freelance pieces. We’ve remained friendly since -- to the point that when Jessell asked me to moderate a panel at an NAB event this fall, I agreed without hesitation.

REDUCTION IN SUPER BOWL AD BREAKS PAYS OFF FOR FOX

• Fox and the NFL’s decision to cut down on the number of Super Bowl ad breaks from five to four per quarter seems like a no-brainer right now. After all, Fox sold its 77th and last spot on Friday, marking the earliest sellout for Super Bowl in-game ad sales in years. But the decision, which was made over the summer, carried some risks, Fox Sports CEO & Executive Producer Eric Shanks said this afternoon. “If you have fewer A and Z spots, you have fewer A and Z to sell,” he said. “Is that scarcity of supply going to drive the price for this event that you have in your plan? In this instance, it did.”
  
  
• The network went to the market with a sliding scale -- one-off ads cost $5.6 million per 30-second spot; advertisers with two spots paid $5.5, and so on down to $5.2 million for a 30-second spot, which was the lowest rate Fox charged. Shanks said the ad sales team -- Exec VPs Seth Winter and Michael Falco and Senior VPs Mark Evans and Mike Petruzzi -- found out quickly that the market was going to be vibrant for Fox. “They all went to the market and made sure that people knew that there was something changing that created a sense of urgency for the Super Bowl and got the market going much faster,” Shanks said. “It heated up, and the guys worked to close it out just last week.”
  
  
• Seeing so much activity in the market, I told Winter that I would have been tempted to raise the ad rates, perhaps have them approach the $6 million mark. Winter’s answer convinced me that I should keep my day job. Rather than increase the number around the Super Bowl, Winter’s team convinced advertisers to buy time in other sports on the network. “The unit price already was so healthy, what we did was ask them for other considerations across the portfolio,” Winter said. “It was more beneficial to the portfolio to fill other areas up than it was to get a couple of hundred thousand on a unit price.”

SOURCES: BARSTOOL WAS CLOSE ON BOWL GAME TITLE DEAL

• Barstool Sports recently was engaged in deep discussions to title sponsor the annual college football bowl game in Mobile, Ala., multiple sources told SBJ’s Mark J. Burns. A bowl entitlement would have been a first for the brash sports and entertainment outfit. Discussions between Barstool and the bowl advanced enough that they agreed to terms before the deal fell apart because of pressure the bowl felt from both the NCAA and ESPN, sources said. Mobile was looking to fill a void left by previous title sponsor Dollar General, which exited the deal in May after a three-year run.
  
  
• As negotiations advanced, it became apparent that there were hurdles to clear, one of which came from the language in the contracts that ESPN signed to carry the game. The contract stipulates that a sports media competitor -- like, say, FS1, Bleacher Report or Barstool -- can’t buy a title sponsorship for a game that’s telecast on ESPN. Of course, Barstool and ESPN have had a contentious relationship over the past few years dating back to the John Skipper era.
  
  
• Questions also arose over how the NCAA would react to Barstool Sports as a title sponsor. The NCAA doesn’t technically have veto power over a sponsorship, but bowl games must be certified by the governing body. Barstool’s overall company emphasis on gambling content was a concern, a source said. Once the bowl backed away from Barstool, it moved forward with Charlotte-based LendingTree as title sponsor. The game will feature teams from the MAC and Sun Belt on Jan. 6.
  
  
• Over the last few months, Barstool has invested in more non-traditional marketing and sponsorship initiatives, including partnering with Matt DiBenedetto’s No. 95 car for two races in the NASCAR Cup Series. Through a relationship with New Amsterdam Vodka, Barstool and its hockey franchise Spittin’ Chiclets unveiled a pink lemonade flavor vodka dubbed Pink Whitney.

SPEED READS

• The Athletic’s Richard Deitsch has a story that’s worth a click about CBS Sports producer Gareth Hughes, who is tasked with doing the "tease" for Thursday’s Bills-Cowboys game that will feature former Bills QB Jim Kelly, who publicly has battled oral cancer. The reason I’m linking to this story: Hughes was diagnosed with bile duct cancer. Deitsch: “His hour-long flight from New York to Buffalo was the first he has taken for work in months. He had chemo the day before the Kelly shoot. ‘I thought if Jim Kelly can rally, I can rally,’ Hughes said.”
  
  
• Ratings aren’t out yet for “College GameDay” and “Big Noon Kickoff,” which were both in Columbus on Saturday. But the set-up, with ESPN and Fox set up at opposite ends of Ohio Stadium, was well-documented in media circles. The Cleveland Plain Dealer's Tim Bielik noted the “GameDay” atmosphere was “about as expected,” but many fans also turned out to watch Urban Meyer on Fox's set. The Yahoo College Football podcast had fun with a report that some Buckeye fans were boycotting “GameDay” because they deem it pro-SEC. Dan Wetzel: “Didn’t work, there was a big crowd.” A sarcastic Pat Forde: “We all know ESPN is out to get Ohio State with Joey Galloway and Kirk Herbstreit on staff!”
  
  
• Saturday marked the 35th anniversary of Doug Flutie’s famous Hail Mary pass that led to Boston College beating Miami in a regular season game at the Orange Bowl, which caused industry vet and BC alum Len DeLuca to email me: “One wonders if Miami will STOP playing on November 23 after they lost in Marlins Park yesterday to Florida International? Marlins Park is on the old Orange Bowl grounds -- it’s haunted!” In 1984, DeLuca worked as director of college athletics for CBS Sports. He recommended this NBC Sports feature on that game. 

• I saw mostly positive reviews of Rob Gronkowski’s studio performance on “Fox NFL Sunday” yesterday. SI’s Jimmy Traina: “Studio Analyst Gronk works for one reason: He’s different. There is nothing like him on any other studio show. There is also a connection NFL fans have with Gronk that they don’t have with any other studio analyst. … Let Gronk be Gronk and you have must-watch TV every week.” The Atlantic's Amanda Mull: "Gronkowski’s over-excited jock energy is a truly unsettling addition to Fox’s football commentary. I love it.” Pod Save America's Tommy Vietor: "More halftime rants from Gronk please. That was hilarious."
  
  
• I was sorry to see that Frank Biondi died of bladder cancer at the age of 74. He was a gigantic figure when I first started covering the media business, as he helped build HBO and Viacom. His sports bonafides: he relied on boxing to help build HBO, and he helped finance Tennis Channel’s 2001 launch. This L.A. Times obit by Ryan Faughnder and Meg James is a good read.

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Something on the Media beat catch your eye? Tell us about it. Reach out to either me (jourand@sportsbusinessjournal.com) or Austin Karp (akarp@sportsbusinessjournal.com) and we'll share the best of it. Also contributing to this newsletter is Thomas Leary (tleary@sportsbusinessdaily.com).