Diamond Sports Group, the regional sports network bane of millions, is still on death’s doorstep but continues to slither. In contrasting reports this week we’re told that the company is both near its breaking point while also securing another lifeline.
First up, death, via Steven Church at Yahoo!Finance —
The company, owned by Sinclair Inc., has yet to hash out a deal with Comcast Corp. to broadcast games on the cable company’s system. If a deal fails to materialize, that would be a fatal blow to Diamond, representatives of Major League Baseball and the National Basketball Association told US Bankruptcy Judge Christopher M. Lopez. Their concerns about Diamond’s future were echoed by the National Hockey League.
“Diamond, from our view, doesn’t appear to have a viable business plan,” Vincent Indelicato, a lawyer who represents the NBA, said during a status conference on Diamond’s Chapter 11 case.
However, over at Sportico, Anthony Crupi reports on new life —
“We recently reached an agreement in principle with a third party on rebranding the RSNs and we are working diligently to turn that agreement in principle into a document agreement,” Diamond’s counsel said, before noting that a copy of the contract will be filed with the court shortly after it’s been papered.
This, on top of Amazon’s recent entry into the fray with their $115M lifeline back in January.
And who might this third party rebrand be? Why none other than FanDuel.
While Diamond did not disclose the identity of its new business partner, Bloomberg this week reported that FanDuel was stepping in to replace Bally’s.
Yes. At a time when professional sports is having a renaissance of gambling scandals, the most sensible thing to do is have your regional sports networks rebrand under the identity of a betting parlor.
The saga continues. July 29th is the next scheduled hearing.