What are the Dallas Cowboys worth? Ohlmeyer Communications found America`s Team is being marked down.
Ohlmeyer is the syndicator of over-the-air television rights to ESPN`s 12-game National Football League schedule. Part of the cable network`s deal with the NFL was that a station from each of the competing teams` market be allowed to broadcast its games.
Ohlmeyer is ESPN`s broker. In Dallas, Channel 5 submitted the winning bid. Based on market size, Ohlmeyer established minimum bids in each NFL city. In Chicago, it was $250,000; in San Diego, $100,000.
In Dallas, it was $175,000, but none of the area stations bid the first time around.
”They (Ohlmeyer) said everybody would be eligible to bid again under new rules, which were `Bid what you think it`s worth,”` Russ Thornton, Channel 5 program director, said.
Thornton wouldn`t confirm Channel 5`s eventual winning bid, but a source familiar with the bidding thought it was between $80,000 and $90,000. Channel 5 will pay that for the Cowboys-Miami Dolphins regular-season game and 65 percent of that for the Cowboys-Los Angeles Raiders pre-season game.
Dallas Channels 4, 8 and 21 also submitted bids.
”In the case of Dallas, we negotiated a little bit longer because the economic situation there is not quite what it was in other places,” said Bill Liss, senior vice president at Ohlmeyer. He said Ohlmeyer was”delighted”
with bids nationwide and ”pleased” with bids from Dallas` Channel 5.
”We structured our bidding so we wouldn`t lose money. We don`t know we`re going to make any. You lose network income. It`s not just what you can sell on the game, you`re also throwing some away. It gets to be an iffy deal, especially in a soft market,” Thornton said.
In Chicago, it`s a Bears market. Channel 7, the ABC affiliate, reportedly paid $500,000 for the rights to carry one regular-season game–with the Vikings. Under the formula devised for the bidding, the station also paid 65 percent of that for one exhibition game.
Dallas` Channel 5 has aired selected Cowboys preseason games since the mid-1970s and carries the Tom Landry Show and Dallas Cowboys Weekly.
”We think it`s not only good programming, but there`s so much interest in the Cowboys, you can`t lose,” Thornton said.
But there are major risks. Both ESPN telecasts are Cowboys home games. The Nov 22 game with Miami probably will be a sellout, but the Aug. 30 preseason game with the Raiders is a longshot. If that game doesn`t sell out 72 hours before kickoff, it will be blacked out in the Dallas and Channel 5 will not have to pay.
If the games are sellouts and not blackouts, Channel 5 and ESPN will carry the broadcasts. That kind of competition and duplication won`t make it an easy sale to advertisers.
There are seven NFL cities with ESPN-televised pre-and regular-season games–Dallas, San Diego, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, Denver, Chicago and Miami. Los Angeles is the only city where an over-the-air outlet has not been selected.
Channel 5`s Cowboys connection starts Aug. 9 when it televises the annual Blue-White intrasquad game from the team`s Thousand Oaks, Calif., training camp. The station will carry the Aug. 15 pre-season game at San Diego and the Sept. 5 pre-season game with Houston at Texas Stadium, if blackout requirements are met.
