i'm happy all these bidders are here to drive up the price, but i really hope the end resolution is NBC/Versus. Going to ESPN will put us back years. Sure, we'll be in more houses, but they wont care about the NHL. We'll get one year of glory and then go back to obscurity once the NFL and NBA return.
Tru/Turner - it'll be Versus all over again. The NHL will be used again to build the brand of a fringe channel.
Versus/NBC: we've gone through the growth with them. Vs is a legitimate cable sports network now, and will grow even more with the merger. NBC treated the product well, and now will have an opportunity to pay well for it too.
I hope the NHL isnt shortsighted and sees that more important than the money is how the product will be treated. If we go back to ESPN, 5 years from now Versus will be on life support, truTV may or may not have established themselves through other sports, and there will be only 1 legitimate bidder for the next extension. If we partner with Versus to build another strong cable sports provider, we know that at least two big networks will be bidding on the next contract.