November Madness: CBS Pays $6 Billion

Television showed once again Thursday that there might be no limit to how high sports rights fees can go.

CBS has agreed to pay $6 billion over 11 years for exclusive rights to the NCAA basketball tournament and championship events in other sports, beginning in 2003 and extending through 2013.

CBS, basically, will be paying about $550 million per year for three weeks of programming. By comparison, the network pays $500 million a year for its NFL package.

But the NCAA deal also includes digital and home videos, Internet rights, radio rights, marketing, corporate sponsorships, merchandising and other peripheral aspects. CBS President and Chief Executive Leslie Moonves said, “This is the first sports deal to extend into the world of new media.”

However, CBS will not bring in a cable partner or change its format in presenting the tournament, said Sean McManus, CBS Sports president.

NCAA executive director Cedric Dempsey said much of the money from the deal will go to benefit member schools and student athletes, and that the 6% that currently goes to administrative costs will decrease.

CBS, as part of its current eight-year contract, is paying $216 million a year for the NCAA tournament, meaning the new deal is an increase of about 150%.

This comes one week after the $400-million-a-year deal NASCAR made with Fox and its cable networks and NBC and TBS. In 1985, NASCAR was getting only $3 million a year for TV rights to 28 races.

The other major bidders for the NCAA tournament were ABC and ESPN as one entity and Fox and its cable networks as another. Had one of those bidders won, most of the early-round games would be shown on cable.

Industry sources said Fox’s bid was $1 billion less than CBS offered. It was uncertain how much the Disney entry of ABC-ESPN offered. It is believed ABC-ESPN was CBS’ main competition.

That CBS would go so high is surprising in that the championship game this year had its lowest rating ever, a 17.2, and the overall average for all tournament games was a 6.8, also the lowest in CBS’ tenure.

“When you have multiple entities interested in a particular property, it tends to drive the price up,” said Jim Spence, the No. 2 man behind Roone Arledge at ABC Sports for years who now runs a consulting agency. “Clearly, that’s happened here.”

NEW GM, NEW NAME

Todd Merkow, 34, vice president and general manager at Fox Sports Net in Arizona, will soon be named the new vice president and general manager at Fox Sports Net in Los Angeles. The graduate of Santa Monica High has a strong background in the business side of television and production. He replaces Kitty Cohen, who resigned Sept. 9.

Fox Sports, hoping to simplify things, has dropped the regional designations for the regional cable networks. All of them will now be known as Fox Sports Net. In Los Angeles, it will be Fox Sports Net and Fox Sports Net 2. That’s fine, but it will be more confusing to DirecTV subscribers who get all 22 of the Fox regional networks. The feeling here is, the name Prime Ticket should have been retained, no matter who owns it. Everybody knew what Prime Ticket was.

PAR-3 FOR THE COURSE

Thanksgiving is traditionally a day of football, but this year there will also be a healthy serving of golf.

Side dishes include a taped match-play event at 10 a.m. on ESPN and the final rounds of the last two Skins Games on ESPN2 at 2 p.m. This year’s Skins Game will be on ABC the next weekend.

Also, the Golf Channel has a half-hour special on its national Drive, Chip and Putt Junior Skill Competition at 10 a.m.

The main course will be on Fox at 1 p.m. It is the second Sun Microsystems Par-3, an 18-hole event taped this week at the Four Seasons Resort’s Aviara course in Carlsbad. Michael Weisman, co-creator of the event and executive producer of the telecast, said, “The only problem we had with the telecast was when our host, Joe Buck, got near a water hazard. Ever since he did that bass fishing tournament, when he gets near water he has to stop and drop a line.”

GOLF’S GREATEST MOMENTS

The Golf Channel is commemorating the end of the 1900s by naming golf’s greatest moments, as selected by viewers. Thirty-six moments were nominated, and the top 18 will be presented on two special editions of “Viewers’ Forum” Sunday and Monday at 5 p.m.

A panel of experts will analyze the choices on

Nov. 28. The top moments include Arnold Palmer winning the 1964 Masters, Jack Nicklaus winning the 1986 Masters and Bobby Jones’ Grand Slam in 1930.

BOXING BEAT

The Lennox Lewis-Evander Holyfield rematch Saturday got 850,000 buys, a decrease from the 1.2 million for their first fight in March. The replay will be on HBO Saturday at 6:30 p.m. as part of a 2 1/2-hour show that includes live coverage of the Michael Grant-Andrew Golota fight in Atlantic City, N.J. . . . Channel 9 offers live boxing Saturday at 8 p.m. The main event from the Hard Rock Casino Hotel in Las Vegas has teenage phenom Diego Morales against Juan Manuel Marquez in a junior-bantamweight bout.

SHORT WAVES

Michael Jordan is interviewed by old friend Pat O’Brien on tonight’s edition of “Access Hollywood” on Channel 4 at 7:30. Jordan announces he is making an IMAX film, “Michael Jordan to the Max.” He also tells O’Brien he doesn’t see himself as the athlete of the century. “I would rather see Muhammad Ali be No. 1,” he says. . . . Attention, Harvard-Yale fans: DirecTV offers exclusive coverage of Saturday’s game at 9:30 a.m., with Randy Rosenbloom and former Harvard All-American Dan Jiggetts announcing. This is definitely a step up for Rosenbloom, whose last assignment was a pay-per-view wrestling event.

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What Los Angeles Is Watching

A sampling of L.A. Nielsen ratings for Nov. 13-14.

SATURDAY

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Over-the-air Channel Rating Share College football: Washington at UCLA 7 5.1 14 College football: USC at Washington State 7 4.9 10 College football: Notre Dame at Pittsburgh 2 2.2 6 Auto racing: NASCAR Busch Grand National 300 4 1.9 5 Golf: Franklin Templeton Shark Shootout 2 1.5 5 College football: Stanford at Arizona State 9 0.8 2

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Cable Network Rating Share College football: Miami at Virginia Tech ESPN 1.4 3 College football: Illinois at Ohio State ESPN2 1.1 4 College football: West Virginia at Boston College ESPN 1.0 4 College football: Stanford at Arizona State FSN 0.8 2 Golf: LPGA Tour Championship ESPN 0.6 2 Soccer: MLS playoffs, Columbus at D.C. United ESPN2 0.6 2 Horse racing: Hollywood Park Today FSN2 0.4 1 Pro basketball: Boston at Chicago WGN 0.4 1

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SUNDAY

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Over-the-air Channel Rating Share Pro football: Carolina at St. Louis 11 11.7 33 Pro football: Green Bay at Dallas 11 8.6 21 Pro football: San Diego at Oakland 2 5.4 13 Figure skating: Skate America 7 3.4 7 Auto racing: NASCAR Winston Cup Pennzoil 400 4 2.2 6 Golf: Franklin Templeton Shark Shootout 2 2.2 4 Triathlon: Ironman World Championship 4 1.6 4 Golf: LPGA Tour Championship 7 1.3 4

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Cable Network Rating Share

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Pro football: Denver at Seattle ESPN 6.7 11 Pro basketball: Atlanta at Lakers FSN 1.5 2 Drag racing: NHRA Auto Club Finals at Pomona ESPN2 1.2 2 Horse racing: Hollywood Park Today FSN2 0.6 1 Boxing: John John Molina vs. Manuel Gamica FSN 0.5 1 Tennis: Lindsay Davenport vs. Martina Hingis ESPN 0.4 1

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WEEKDAY RATINGS: MONDAY--Pro football, New York Jets at New England, Channel 7, 12.5/19; pro basketball, Lakers at Phoenix, Channel 9, 4.3/7.

Note: Each rating point represents 51,350 L.A. households. Cable ratings reflect the entire market, even though cable is in only 63% of L.A. households.