The Big 12 has agreed to a new media rights extension with ESPN and Fox that is worth $2.28 billion over six years, Sports Illustrated’s Ross Dellenger confirms.
The deal, which starts in 2025, is added onto the current contract between the parties and is expected to bring the conference $380 million a year when it begins, an increase of $160 million from the current deal, per John Ourand of Sports Business Journal.
According to Ourand, the negotiating window for this contract wasn’t supposed to open until February of 2024, but new Big 12 commissioner Brett Yormark convinced the networks to open the exclusive negotiating window earlier. Yormark, who is only a few months into his tenure as commissioner, successfully secured the extension as the conference is dealing with uncertainty.
As Oklahoma and Texas are prepared to leave the Big 12 for the SEC, this new extension gives the conference some stability within the media moving forward. Additionally, per Ourand, this contract will be up in 2031, which is before the SEC’s or ACC’s media deals are up in ’34 and ’36, respectively.
The Big 12 will add four teams to the conference, making it 14 teams overall beginning next season, but the conference is expected to utilize a divisionless schedule to protect rivalries for the next two years.
This contract is expected to have a clause that, when the Big 12 reverts back to 12 teams when Texas and Oklahoma leave for the SEC in 2025, allows any new members of the conference to receive a pro-rata share of the money, per Dellenger.
With the Big 12’s media contract wrapped up, that leaves the Pac-12 as the next conference that has to secure a long-term media deal.
