A version of this article first appeared in the CNBC Sport newsletter with Alex Sherman, which brings you the biggest news and exclusive interviews from the worlds of sports business and media. Sign up to receive future editions, straight to your inbox. Comcast’s spinoff of most of NBCUniversal’s cable portfolio has a new name – Versant. This week, I had a chance to speak to the new company’s Chief Executive Officer, Mark Lazarus. “Laz,” as he’s known colloquially, replaced Dick Ebersol as chairman of NBC Sports in 2011. Before that, he was president of Turner Sports. More recently, he’s been chairman of NBCUniversal Media Group, overseeing the company’s TV and streaming platforms. Now Laz will have a chance at running a publicly traded company that consists of cable networks including USA, CNBC, Golf Channel and MSNBC, among others. The company plans to begin trading separately from Comcast before the end of the year. Versant will have its own sports strategy, including bidding on live sports to add to its current portfolio. Lazarus told me in an exclusive interview he’s already held talks with both the National Women’s Soccer League and Major League Baseball about potentially acquiring live game rights. The NWSL has a package of games it’s currently shopping and could add a fifth media partner to its existing roster of CBS, ESPN, Amazon Prime Video and Scripps Sports (ION). For baseball, it’s unlikely Versant has the financial firepower to compete for the Sunday Night package recently vacated for next season by ESPN, but MLB controls the rights to many games through its out-of-market streaming service, MLB.TV , and its pay-TV add-on service Extra Innings. MLB hived off some of these games to Roku for $10 million per year last year. MLB also has national deals with Apple TV+, Turner Sports and Fox. Local deals are primarily spread out among regional sports networks, although Amazon owns the exclusive rights to some New York Yankees games. “We’re looking for sports deals that drive distribution, diversify ad sales and have a value,” said Lazarus. Getting a small package of games for USA Network could help boost Versant’s future distribution conversations with pay-TV providers. For MLB, carving out a chunk of games for USA Network can help improve the league’s reach. Lazarus said he’ll examine all sorts of live rights as they come available, provided they can boost distribution revenue as pay-TV carriage renewals arise. “We have a pretty good sports portfolio,” Lazarus said. “We’re not going to be in the NFL business. We’re not going to be in the Big Ten business, because that stuff’s all spoken for. But we’ll be with the next-level stuff.” USA already airs English Premier League games in the U.S. in addition to NASCAR, certain golf events (including two majors – the U.S. Open and the British Open) and WWE’s “Smackdown.” USA will also get WNBA games as part of NBCUniversal’s new deal with the NBA, beginning next season. Lazarus shared with me that the WNBA commitment is actually greater than the initial agreement with the league. USA Network will have Wednesday night doubleheaders beginning next season. The Olympics will continue to air on all of the cable networks that have long been part of NBCUniversal’s broader deal – including CNBC (hello curling!). Golf Channel already airs many live tournaments, including The Ryder Cup, and “golf will be an important vertical for us, and we’ll continue to invest in the golf industry,” Lazarus said. Sixty-five percent of Versant’s programming is live, either through news or sports, Lazarus told me. Versant will be cut loose from NBCUniversal and will have to showcase the value of its content on its own, no longer able to link itself to NBC’s broadcast network, which owns the rights to the NBA, the NFL’s “Sunday Night Football” and many other leagues. But that won’t happen overnight: Versant will have about a two-year grace period, as nearly every major TV distribution deal is locked down until 2027, with the bulk coming up for renewal in 2028. With annual revenue of roughly $7 billion, Versant won’t be able to compete for the top sports rights against behemoths like Disney, Netflix and Amazon. But the company’s sports strategy is very important to the future of the company, given its importance with distributors. Lazarus recently announced three significant sports executive hires: Matt Hong as President of Sports, Jeff Behnke as Executive Producer and Senior Vice President of Sports Production, and Roy Cho as President of Distribution and Partnerships. One sport Lazarus said he won’t be bidding on is F1. Those rights are currently in market , but Lazarus told me he doesn’t think the racing league will move the needle on distribution deals, noting ratings are about one-third of NASCAR’s. One more detail Lazarus shared with me is post spinoff, Versant will have a negotiated promotional deal with NBCUniversal where programming is marketed between the two companies’ networks and digital properties. There will be no money exchanged in the deal, but the marketing value will be equal. This goes beyond sports, but given there are far more eyeballs on NBC than on the cable networks, this works to Versant’s advantage. On the record With Jason Wright , the managing partner and head of investments at Ariel Project Level … This week’s “On The Record” is with Jason Wright , the managing partner and head of investments at Ariel Project Level, a venture of Ariel Investments. Washington Commanders fans are certainly familiar with Wright – he was president of the team from 2020 until January of this year. Now, Wright’s interests lie in investing in women’s sports. He told CNBC’s Brian Sullivan this week that part of the problem with the way women’s sports have been run in the past is they “haven’t had the intellectual and relational capital to run them as EBITDA-positive businesses, the way that has happened in men’s sports over 30 years.” Wright said a more sophisticated approach to running women’s sports teams, including dynamic pricing on ticketing and market segmentation, should help the entire industry with future profitability. Watch the entire interview here. Or listen to it here and follow the CNBC Sport podcast if you prefer the audio version. Watch the entire interview here. Or listen to it here and follow the CNBC Sport podcast if you prefer the audio version. CNBC Sport highlight reel The best of CNBC Sport from the past week: CNBC’s Michael Ozanian is out with his latest team valuations – this one dedicated to global soccer. Real Madrid took the top spot in his global rankings with a value of $6.7 billion. Manchester United was second at $6 billion. I got a chance to speak with Paraag Marathe , the chairman of Leeds United and president of 49ers Enterprises – a treat for me as a big Niners fan. Leeds got promoted to the Premier League for the 2025-26 season, which begins August 16. Leeds will get hundreds of millions more in revenue from TV and sponsorship deals with the promotion, but Marathe told me the added money will simply be reinvested in the club to ensure it stays in the Premier League and isn’t quickly relegated back to the Championship League. It’s Mother’s Day this Sunday – shout out to the moms reading this – and CNBC Sport has a story this week on maternal health from Contessa Brewer . Former professional soccer player Morad Fareed has created a community platform for new and expectant mothers to improve their health. The idea involves setting up a competition of three football clubs in Brazil and their associated fanbases of mothers against three in the United States. Intrigued? Read more here. Former LPGA superstar Michelle Wie West spoke with CNBC’s Jessica Golden this week about her investment in Togethxr, the company behind the popular “Everyone Watches Women’s Sports” slogan. Togethxr aims to increase investment in and media coverage of women’s sports, among other goals. You can watch that interview here . Saudi Arabia continues to invest in international sports. The Public Investment Fund, the country’s sovereign wealth fund, announced on Wednesday that it will become the title partner of five events that will take place on the Ladies European Tour. Comcast is pushing its mobile service hard to investors these days, so it should be no surprise the new Philadelphia 76ers and Philadelphia Flyers stadium will be called Xfinity Mobile Arena. CNBC’s Lillian Rizzo has the story. NBA superstar Russell Westbrook is trying to simplify funeral planning with artificial intelligence. That is a real sentence, not MadLibs. CNBC’s Samantha Subin explains . The big number: $4.53 billion That was ESPN’s total revenue for Disney’s fiscal second quarter – up 8% from a year ago and surpassing Wall Street expectations. Operating income of $669 million also topped analyst estimates, which averaged $654 million for the overall sports segment. (Star India, which is also counted in the division, has negligible impact on revenue and operating income.) As I noted last week, sports TV ratings continue to soar across the board. Disney CEO Bob Iger said during his company’s earnings conference call that ESPN’s second-quarter primetime audience, aged 18-49, was up 32%, making it ESPN’s “most watched Q2 in primetime ever.” He cited the NFL, college football and the NCAA women’s basketball tournament as the driving forces. Iger also confirmed ESPN will reveal the name of its long-awaited “flagship” streaming service next week along with pricing details. ESPN has a media day planned for Tuesday – the day of Disney’s upfront presentation to advertisers. Some fodder for next week’s newsletter, which will be all about those media upfronts in New York. Quote of the week “I’d also like to check to see if Mr. Curry is in fact a space alien.” — Sen. Ted Cruz , R-Texas, who chaired this week’s Senate hearing on the state of sports broadcasting – an event we profiled in last week’s newsletter. The event primarily focused on ensuring sports stay available and affordable to consumers as the media ecosystem shifts from traditional pay-TV to streaming, but Cruz threw in a comment late in the session about if the NBA could do something to lower Steph Curry ‘s shooting percentage after the Golden State Warriors defeated his state’s Houston Rockets in the first round. Curry then proceeded to strain his hamstring the next day in Game 1 of his second-round series against the Minnesota Timberwolves. Is there a Ted Cruz curse?? Speaking of Curry, I’ve got an important announcement: CNBC Sport will premier its longform production on the business aspirations of Curry on June 4. The official name of the special is “Curry Inc: The Business of Stephen Curry”. It will debut live on CNBC as a primetime special at 9 p.m. ET. Around the league One interesting tidbit I picked up watching the Senate hearing – NBA’s President of Global Content and Media Distribution Bill Koenig mentioned the league is working on partnering with food delivery apps to allow consumers to click on a game link within the delivery app to make finding games easier for consumers. CNBC’s future parent company and ESPN’s streaming service aren’t the only ones with new names coming – the Utah Hockey Club will become the Utah Mammoth starting next season. Yahoo Sports and Boardroom, the media business co-founded by Kevin Durant and Rich Kleiman , have announced a new content partnership . Eli Manning has some company bidding for a minority stake in the Giants. Former New York Giants defensive end Michael Strahan and billionaire Marc Lasry have teamed up to buy a small piece of the team, Sportico reported.
Mark Lazarus at the NBCUniversal Upfront presentation from Radio City Music Hall in New York City on Monday, May 13, 2024.
Charles Sykes | NBCUniversal | Getty Images
A version of this article first appeared in the CNBC Sport newsletter with Alex Sherman, which brings you the biggest news and exclusive interviews from the worlds of sports business and media. Sign up to receive future editions, straight to your inbox.
Comcast’s spinoff of most of NBCUniversal’s cable portfolio has a new name – Versant. This week, I had a chance to speak to the new company’s Chief Executive Officer, Mark Lazarus. “Laz,” as he’s known colloquially, replaced Dick Ebersol as chairman of NBC Sports in 2011. Before that, he was president of Turner Sports. More recently, he’s been chairman of NBCUniversal Media Group, overseeing the company’s TV and streaming platforms.
Now Laz will have a chance at running a publicly traded company that consists of cable networks including USA, CNBC, Golf Channel and MSNBC, among others. The company plans to begin trading separately from Comcast before the end of the year.
Versant will have its own sports strategy, including bidding on live sports to add to its current portfolio. Lazarus told me in an exclusive interview he’s already held talks with both the National Women’s Soccer League and Major League Baseball about potentially acquiring live game rights. The NWSL has a package of games it’s currently shopping and could add a fifth media partner to its existing roster of CBS, ESPN, Amazon Prime Video and Scripps Sports (ION).
For baseball, it’s unlikely Versant has the financial firepower to compete for the Sunday Night package recently vacated for next season by ESPN, but MLB controls the rights to many games through its out-of-market streaming service, MLB.TV, and its pay-TV add-on service Extra Innings. MLB hived off some of these games to Roku for $10 million per year last year. MLB also has national deals with Apple TV+, Turner Sports and Fox. Local deals are primarily spread out among regional sports networks, although Amazon owns the exclusive rights to some New York Yankees games.
“We’re looking for sports deals that drive distribution, diversify ad sales and have a value,” said Lazarus.
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Subscribe here to get access today.
Getting a small package of games for USA Network could help boost Versant’s future distribution conversations with pay-TV providers. For MLB, carving out a chunk of games for USA Network can help improve the league’s reach. Lazarus said he’ll examine all sorts of live rights as they come available, provided they can boost distribution revenue as pay-TV carriage renewals arise.
“We have a pretty good sports portfolio,” Lazarus said. “We’re not going to be in the NFL business. We’re not going to be in the Big Ten business, because that stuff’s all spoken for. But we’ll be with the next-level stuff.”
USA already airs English Premier League games in the U.S. in addition to NASCAR, certain golf events (including two majors – the U.S. Open and the British Open) and WWE’s “Smackdown.”
USA will also get WNBA games as part of NBCUniversal’s new deal with the NBA, beginning next season. Lazarus shared with me that the WNBA commitment is actually greater than the initial agreement with the league. USA Network will have Wednesday night doubleheaders beginning next season.
The Olympics will continue to air on all of the cable networks that have long been part of NBCUniversal’s broader deal – including CNBC (hello curling!). Golf Channel already airs many live tournaments, including The Ryder Cup, and “golf will be an important vertical for us, and we’ll continue to invest in the golf industry,” Lazarus said.
Sixty-five percent of Versant’s programming is live, either through news or sports, Lazarus told me. Versant will be cut loose from NBCUniversal and will have to showcase the value of its content on its own, no longer able to link itself to NBC’s broadcast network, which owns the rights to the NBA, the NFL’s “Sunday Night Football” and many other leagues.
But that won’t happen overnight: Versant will have about a two-year grace period, as nearly every major TV distribution deal is locked down until 2027, with the bulk coming up for renewal in 2028.
With annual revenue of roughly $7 billion, Versant won’t be able to compete for the top sports rights against behemoths like Disney, Netflix and Amazon. But the company’s sports strategy is very important to the future of the company, given its importance with distributors. Lazarus recently announced three significant sports executive hires: Matt Hong as President of Sports, Jeff Behnke as Executive Producer and Senior Vice President of Sports Production, and Roy Cho as President of Distribution and Partnerships.
One sport Lazarus said he won’t be bidding on is F1. Those rights are currently in market, but Lazarus told me he doesn’t think the racing league will move the needle on distribution deals, noting ratings are about one-third of NASCAR’s.
One more detail Lazarus shared with me is post spinoff, Versant will have a negotiated promotional deal with NBCUniversal where programming is marketed between the two companies’ networks and digital properties. There will be no money exchanged in the deal, but the marketing value will be equal. This goes beyond sports, but given there are far more eyeballs on NBC than on the cable networks, this works to Versant’s advantage.
On the record
With Jason Wright, the managing partner and head of investments at Ariel Project Level …
