Courtesy USA Today

(March 19, 2010) Leagues and the networks that pay to cover them are business partners. They both want the biggest possible TV ratings because, in different ways, they both sell those same viewer eyeballs.

But in today's increasingly complicated media landscape, leagues and their networks might not always have the same goals, and such differences rarely air publicly.

But they bubbled up with Fox Sports President Ed Goren and MLB executive vice president Tim Brosnan at this week's IMG World Congress of Sports in Los Angeles in a hint of how networks aren't thrilled about leagues starting channels and expanding online video efforts.

Said Goren, as reported by Sports Business Daily: "You're going to water down the value of your major television deal. At some point, (networks are) going to say, 'Enough! We're not going to pay you what we pay you. Find other ways to get that revenue.' "

The NFL's Red Zone channels, which switch viewers between live games when teams are in scoring position, might be great for fans. But, Goren says, they could cut into Fox's ratings. "At some point there will be enough people watching a Red Zone as a game being aired in that market," he said.

Brosnan suggested the MLB Network is a year-round "infomercial" for baseball that might spur interest in Fox's baseball coverage. Said Goren, "(Whether) it's great for Fox, I'm not so sure."

Goren, who recently bought six HD TVs, also said he was not sold on 3-D — "as soon as I buy the 3-D sets with glasses, I'm convinced they'll release 3-D without glasses" — and figures rights to the 2014 and 2016 Olympics, unless ESPN makes a whopping bid, will go down. NBC's Vancouver live-taped prime-time coverage, he says, "Helped the Olympics. (NBC) just paid too much."

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