Who's ready to see the $72 million bust Brock Osweiler and the Houston Texans take on either backup quarterback Matt McGloin or rookie Connor Cook and the Oakland Raiders this Saturday? Anyone? Anyone?! Unless you are a Texans or Raiders fan, you're probably going to take a hard pass on this one, which is why ESPN will reportedly lose $75 million by televising this wild card matchup.
In addition to paying the NFL a reported $1.9 billion per year for the rights to Monday Night Football, ESPN is shelling out an additional $100 million per year to air one wild card game from now until January 2022. The league then decides which game they want to give the network, and the Worldwide Leader in Sports doesn't have a say in whether they will air the contest or not.
Thanks to the snoozefest of a game between the Texans and Raiders, ESPN will recoup only $25 million of their costly investment, according to Outkick the Coverage. If the trend continues, the network will take a huge financial hit every year, culminating in a potential $600 million loss. Yikes!
Over the last couple years, ESPN has reportedly been losing subscribers on a consistent basis. However, a 621,000-person loss this past October was their largest decline in one month. The reports surrounding their potential wild card game disaster may just be another crushing financial blow for the Worldwide Leader in Sports. At some point, these losses may well catch up with the network.
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