Sinclair warns of 112 channels being dropped by DISH next Monday (8/16)

DISH and Sinclair Reach New Multi-Year Carriage Agreement​

November 15, 2021
- Agreement maintains carriage of local Sinclair channels on DISH TV, and Tennis Channel on DISH TV and SLING TV
- Multi-year agreement ensures DISH customers long-term access to channels

ENGLEWOOD, Colo. and HUNT VALLEY, Md., Nov. 15, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- DISH Network Corporation and Sinclair Broadcast Group today announced they have reached a new, multi-year carriage agreement, ensuring Sinclair's owned 144 local stations, across 86 markets nationwide, will remain on DISH TV, and the Tennis Channel will remain available on DISH TV and SLING TV.
"We are pleased to have reached a multi-year agreement with Sinclair after months of negotiations," said Brian Neylon, group president, DISH TV. "Sinclair has been a good long-term partner to work with. Both sides have been committed to keeping our customers top of mind and not putting them in the middle of our negotiations. After several contract extensions, we have arrived at a fair agreement that benefits all parties, especially our customers."
William Bell, Sinclair's Head of Distribution & Network Relations commented, "Our agreement with DISH reflects the continued importance that distributors place on local and national broadcast content. We look forward to continuing to provide DISH viewers with the high-quality and highly-desired entertainment, and timely local news that they depend on every day."
For a full list of Sinclair-owned local channels, click here.
 
So is this a massive blink by Sinclair on the RSNs? I feel for the people who thought the tea leaves read the RSNs were coming back.
 
So is this a massive blink by Sinclair on the RSNs? I feel for the people who thought the tea leaves read the RSNs were coming back.
Sinclair could not win no matter what, they need money, so the locals are not going anywhere, if they give a better deal for the RSNs to Dish, then other providers will want the same deal, if they make it a pay channel like HBO, then the vast majority will not subscribe and other providers will try and do the same.

Dish has also proved that you do not need the RSNs, their loss in subscribers is the same level of other providers, DirecTV has had a bigger loss in subs and they have the RSNs.

Also, Hulu Live and You Tube TV do not have them either and they both, roughly, have combined the same number of subs that Dish has and still growing, no one subscribing to those services seem to care about the RSNs.
 
Sinclair could not win no matter what, they need money, so the locals are not going anywhere, if they give a better deal for the RSNs to Dish, then other providers will want the same deal, if they make it a pay channel like HBO, then the vast majority will not subscribe and other providers will try and do the same.
Sinclair's issue is they might not have streaming rights for the programming they assumed they had.
Dish has also proved that you do not need the RSNs, their loss in subscribers is the same level of other providers, DirecTV has had a bigger loss in subs and they have the RSNs.

Also, Hulu Live and You Tube TV do not have them either and they both, roughly, have combined the same number of subs that Dish has and still growing, no one subscribing to those services seem to care about the RSNs.
The biggest risk a content provider can take is dare subscribers to live without their content. Because, it turns out, many subs can. Especially those that never watched it, who don't even notice it is missing.
 
Sinclair's issue is they might not have streaming rights for the programming they assumed they had.
I am not talking about streaming, just about making it a regular pay channel which Charlie has been quoted before wanting to do.

Also have to give Dish credit, they could of carried the RSNs and charged a non optional sports fee as other providers do, glad they did not do that.

As far as streaming goes, looks like they are out of luck, MLB, NBA and NHL ( which just signed a streaming deal with Disney) do not want to give up the rights without a massive payout, probably something Sinclair cannot afford.
 
Sinclair has an MOU with BallySports for the RSNs. They have already announced a standalone app which will cost something around $20 a month. We'll see how that goes.

 
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Sinclair has an MOU with BallySports for the RSNs. They have already announced a standalone app which will cost something around $20 a month. We'll see how that goes.

Old story, it has come out since then that Sinclair does not have the rights to sell it as a stand alone streaming service.


 
Now a Tegna deal has to be solved. In my area Beaumont/Pt. Arthur, Tx we had the Sinclair channels( CBS Cw and Fox) dispute blocked, so we got those back. Tegna has our ABC and NBC station still blocked but we had them on ota. So none of the regular satellite locals were available from DISH. So we went with Houston locals and only lost the CBS station from Houston. Luckily he still had guide information for his local CBS station ota. But Charlie said he doesn't think a deal with Tegna will ever be worked out and he could afford to lose their stations.
 
The business press says Sinclair had taken on a pile of high yield debt thinking the various distributors for locals would pay more. Did not work out.
The regional sports is a different issue and has some other income options
 
Now a Tegna deal has to be solved. In my area Beaumont/Pt. Arthur, Tx we had the Sinclair channels( CBS Cw and Fox) dispute blocked, so we got those back. Tegna has our ABC and NBC station still blocked but we had them on ota. So none of the regular satellite locals were available from DISH. So we went with Houston locals and only lost the CBS station from Houston. Luckily he still had guide information for his local CBS station ota. But Charlie said he doesn't think a deal with Tegna will ever be worked out and he could afford to lose their stations.
I wasn't aware of any take downs during the Sinclair negotiations because Sinclair kept offering extensions while they were fixing their ransomware problems.
 
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The business press says Sinclair had taken on a pile of high yield debt thinking the various distributors for locals would pay more. Did not work out.
The regional sports is a different issue and has some other income options
Right now, they have RSNs on fewer screens, they have no streaming option both in the sense they have no streaming service to sub to and their streaming rights are in doubt. They planned on winning out on gambling, but the owners of the content begged to differ. Sinclair is in trouble. They went all-in with a pair of aces while a possible straight flush needing just a K of diamonds was on the table.
 
Now a Tegna deal has to be solved. In my area Beaumont/Pt. Arthur, Tx we had the Sinclair channels( CBS Cw and Fox) dispute blocked, so we got those back. Tegna has our ABC and NBC station still blocked but we had them on ota. So none of the regular satellite locals were available from DISH. So we went with Houston locals and only lost the CBS station from Houston. Luckily he still had guide information for his local CBS station ota. But Charlie said he doesn't think a deal with Tegna will ever be worked out and he could afford to lose their stations.
Charlie can afford it but I'm tired of paying extra for Peacock. After this months discount expires it's going to be time to move on, no reason to pay Dish a $5 increase when I've lost a channel I watch. Will miss Hopper3 which I've had since release but why pay more for less, YTTV is $65 & has more channels than Flex.
 
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Looking over their financials, long term debt for Sinclair is at $12 billion, cash on hand is only $1 billion, not a good ratio to have, especially when operating profits are only in the millions ( 3rd quarter was 19 million in net revenue).

 
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Dish and the fact they aren't carrying the RSN's is mentioned. We knew this earlier, but analysts are noticing it as well:

Kannan Venkateshwar, Barclays managing director of U.S. media, cable and telecom equity research, warned that all the distributors view the market differently. Dish Network, for example, seems to be involved in never-ending fights with distributors and has dropped several sports networks, including the Bally Sports-branded RSNs.

“Dish’s margins have actually gone up … since it started getting into these disputes,” Venkateshwar said. “It may lose subs, which looks bad in the headlines, but its cash flow actually goes up.”
 
Look at this...$446 million in revenue from advertising and a whopping $1,053 million from carriage and retrans fees. TV is no longer ad supported, it is all pay TV.

• Total advertising revenues of $446 million decreased 11% versus $500 million in the prior year period, due to the absence of political revenues, as 2021 is a non-political year. Core advertising revenues, which excludes political revenues, in the third quarter of $434 million were up 11% versus $391 million in the third quarter of 2020, due to a recovery from depressed levels in the same period a year ago caused by the pandemic.

• Distribution revenues of $1,053 million increased versus $1,003 million in the same period a year ago, due primarily to a significant decrease of distributor rebates tied to minimum game guarantees that were in the prior period's results. The gains were partially offset by dropped carriage of the Company's RSNs and subscriber churn.
I see the future that none of the carriers will be carrying Locals. So the only way to get them will be OTA. If they are offered by a carrier, they will be sold in a separate package under separate contracts and will be sold at whatever the market demands are. The Local packs will have to pay for themselves or else they will not be offered. For the people that want or need them, they will have to pay and pay.
 
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