The days of the Mountain West not being a player in college football media are about to be done and dusted as reports are saying the league is about to sign a TV rights deal for seven years and $116 million dollars. If you're doing the math along with us that means each of the soon to be twelve members of the conference will earn close o $18 million dollars a piece.
Crazy thought, right? I mean seriously, just 10 years ago this league wasn't on TV on a regular basis if at all depending on where you lived, let along allowing it's schools to rake in money that puts them closer to even footing with the big dogs of the college sports world.
Heck, just a year ago this league was struggling to figure out what it would do post Boise State and San Diego State taking off for the Big East. Now with both back in the fold and twelve teams in the league clearly there is more interest than ever from the media and that shows in what they are paying for the TV rights.
With twelve league members the Mountain West is likely headed to a championship game for football and that is helping drive some of the price, in fact the per school total could reach close to $20 million on an annual basis because of a championship game.
However, let's not kid ourselves this is all about having Boise State back in the fold.
Do you really think this property is anywhere near as valuable without it? Sure there are some decent programs like Fresno State, Nevada, Utah State, and Hawaii around and we're not saying they aren't valuable, but there is no way they bring the TV viewers that the Broncos do.
Need proof of the Broncos value? According to the report the package from ESPN will include the rights to televise all six of the Boise State home games amongst it's 22 games from the conference over the life of the deal. The report also states that the conference and the team will do a 50-50 split of revenue should a team from the conference make a BCS game.
This deal puts the league on par with the rights deal that the Big East made that starts in 2014 and that alone is amazing, considering how fast the conference, which started just 14 years ago, has grown in stature. Now the question is can the league sustain it's success – or really can Boise State sustain it's top 10 success and allow the league to stay in the argument both on and off the field in the ever increasing rat race that is college football TV rights.
