• by Wayne Friedman , Staff Writer, 7 hours ago

If you think there is continued disruption at the big TV-network based companies -- in terms of the potential new ownership drama around Warner Bros. Discovery -- the next phase in the legacy TV upheaval is on the way.

Analysts say it is highly likely the current TV station ownership cap -- which prevents one company from owning stations, accounting for more than 39% of U.S. TV households -- is likely to be struck down. So much so that the biggest potential deal currently -- Nexstar Media Group, with a proposed $6.2 billion to buy Tegna -- is highly likely to get approved.

Nexstar Media Group is the biggest owner of TV stations.

Curry Baker, media analyst of Guggenheim Securities, says: “We continue to believe Nexstar is on-track to close the Tegna transaction, despite political noise, with both the DOJ and FCC processes progressing.”

With the prospect in change coming, expect many others to jump on this bandwagon.

Would Sinclair Inc. -- the second-biggest owner of TV stations -- look to find a way to play catch-up? Sinclair has been able to offload some of its most difficult troubling businesses --- and debt -- including Diamond Sports Group.

It is no longer responsible for a massive $9 billion in debt attached to DSG, now called Main Street Sports Group and/or FanDuel Sports Network.

So can bigger deals of say 100 each for Nexstar or Sinclair? For its part, could we see Sinclair, E.W Scripps, and Gray Media merged.

Midsized TV stations owning groups would be perhaps even harder pressed to make deals.

No doubt many would like to expand their linear TV businesses, including a move to start national TV platforms/networks -- as Nexstar has done, with buying a controlling ownership of The CW or starting on a cable TV news platform, NewsNation.

More importantly, those big groups Nexstar and Sinclair, could then command higher carriage fees from cable, satellite and streaming distributors.

Those two groups could also put pressure on their existing networks' affiliations (ABC, CBS, NBC, and Fox) financial partnership agreements.

In turn, those big media companies owning linear TV networks/stations (Walt Disney, Paramount, NBCUniversal, Fox Corp/) could just buy up more stations as a defensive move.

For years there was much discussion of the current disruption to the TV ecosystem. Going forward, better words would be convulsion -- and perhaps chaos.