In an unprecedented deal between a national network and a college athletic conference, the SEC and CBS on Thursday announced that they have agreed to a 15-year contract extension to televise that league’s football and men’s basketball games. Financial details of the deal were not released.
Barnhart isn’t using the word “unprecedented” lightly. As he notes,
This 15-year deal is believed to be the longest in the history of college sports.
That’s longer than CBS’ March Madness deal! Needless to say, I can’t wait to see the numbers on this baby. And at least we don’t have to worry about Fox mucking up SEC broadcasts for a while.
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UPDATE: Will Collier doesn’t see this as a good development. I’m not sure I agree with his pessimism totally. Certainly some of what he bitches about would be inevitable regardless of whom the SEC cut a broadcast deal with; it’s part of the territory.
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UPDATE #2: Groo finds grounds for celebration.
Get The Picture 
I stopped after the first sentence to do a celebration dance. Stick it in your _______ Fox.
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1) Lousy kickoff times? What’s wrong with 3:30? Yeah, it’s not a night game, but they can’t all be night games. Better 3:30 than what JP gives you.
2) Terrible announcers? Ain’t nothing wrong with Uncle Verne, and Danielson, for all his giddyness, is fine. Seeing how other SEC broadcasts feature the Three Daves and Mike Patrick, I’m fine with what CBS offers.
3) A commercial every ten seconds? What, you mean like every network? And FOX would have been so, so, so much worse.
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It’s better than getting beat over the head with the next “Jumpers” promo 25 times an hour.
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Has the Hawaii game ended yet?
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I wonder which network Collier would’ve rather had the SEC ink a deal with. The only one I can think of would be ABC; Fox would’ve raised a colossal outcry from SEC fans for all the reasons already given and then some, while NBC probably would’ve relegated their SEC slate to 11:30 a.m. kickoffs so as not to interfere with Notre Dame.
At any rate, I welcome this development (and our Tiffany Network overlords). I’ll take Gary and Uncle Verne over Thom Brennaman and the Night of a Thousand Band Shots any day.
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And as if to highlight the disparity between the haves and have-nots, check out the GT “season tickets start at just $250” ad on the same page as the Barnhardt column.
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Oh, thank God! The thought of having to endure Fox announcing games is enough to jumpstart a vomit.
All hail Uncle Verne! “Lingerie on the field!”
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Indeed. Long live Uncle Verne!!!
The 3:30 start is my favorite start time anyway. I think it has something to do with leaving Sanford Stadium, in the beautiful twilight, walking back across campus with the smell of charcoal burning and the glow of highlights from earlier in the day…
Besides, CBS has easily the best theme music of all the college football broadcasts.
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“… leaving Sanford Stadium, in the beautiful twilight, walking back across campus with the smell of charcoal burning and the glow of highlights from earlier in the day…”
Ok. It just moved a little bit.
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LMAO @ Atlchris
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Wolfman you are correct about the theme music when you here that you know it’s football time.
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