Warner Bros. Discovery has struck a multiyear "sub-licensing" agreement with ESPN to secure some early-round games in the new expanded College Football Playoff series. WBD's TNT will get two
first-round games starting this season and an additional two quarterfinal games in 2026 and 2028, which can be added to WBD's streaming Max platform.
A potentially eye-opening move by legacy TV network groups and legacy pay TV distributors revolves around issues for their seemingly much maligned smaller cable TV networks.
The current era has taken on a kind of "jig is up" quality that seems to preclude linear from ever reversing its losses in viewership and revenue.
"We have proposed creative ways to make Disney's direct-to-consumer services available to their Spectrum TV subscribers," Disney said. This could include ties to ESPN+, analysts speculate -- but not
necessarily for Disney+ and/or Hulu.
Amid tense negotiations and the blackout of networks/stations, Charter and Disney are each aggressively pushing alternatives for video consumers left in the lurch as the new fall TV season is about to
start.
ESPN has been said among analysts to be the glue that holds the traditional pay TV bundle together. With its departure, cord-cutting could dramatically accelerate.