• by Wayne Friedman , Staff Writer, May 9, 2025

Versant is thinking balls and strikes -- especially as it looks to add more programming.

The newly announced Comcast Corp. spinoff group for most of its cable networks will look to sports programming, more “live” content as a goal.

Right now, 65% of Versant’s programming is live -- coming from sports and news content.

Speaking with CNBC Sport, CEO of Versant Mark Lazarus -- a longtime NBCUniversal TV executive -- has talked up sports deals, especially for one key cable TV network in its group: USA Network.

Lazarus has already had discussions with the National Women’s Soccer League and Major League Baseball about acquiring live game rights.

For a long time, USA Network has been a general interest entertainment network. But in recent years it has added much more sports: English Premier League NASCAR, golf events ( the U.S. Open and the British Open) and WWE’s “Smackdown.”

As part of NBCUniversal's deal with the NBA (for NBC Television Network, and Peacock), USA will also get WNBA games.

Now, Lazarus has said new sports deals won’t include those bigger sports franchises -- the NFL, the NBA, or even Big Ten College Conference, for example. Still there is plenty of other content to consider, especially Major League Baseball which has tons of content given the 162-game schedule for all teams.

This is to amp up Versant perhaps brand-appeal as a collection of cable networks -- including USA, Golf Channel, MSNBC and CNBC -- a media company with “live” programming focus.

Although cable networks -- as part of the legacy pay TV ecosystem -- continue to be hammered by cord-cutting, all this makes sense. Live content is the one area that still gives life to legacy TV, especially for hard-press TV marketing brands looking for real-time engagement with their messaging.

And did we forget to mention the Olympics? When the event, held every other year, comes on the schedule -- winter or summer games -- virtually all NBCU cable networks get some part of Olympics content (as well as Peacock). And that can encompass networks including CNBC, MSNBC Golf Channel, and E!. and others.

Mostly this coverage on these channels has been in non-core daytime/weekday times (especially MSNBC and CNBC). Still, all this could be a good sign of things to come for any fringe and upcoming sport -- even for news networks.

Hmmm.... Have some pickleball to go with your political content?