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More changes are coming to Diamond Sports’ regional sports network.
The company said in a court filing Tuesday that it and flutterFanDuel will rebrand the Bally Sports channel as the National Hockey League season begins and the National Basketball Association’s 2024-2025 season is less than a week away.
Diamond Sports said in the filing that FanDuel will become a “long-term naming rights partner” if it can emerge from bankruptcy protection. The new naming rights agreement will also give FanDuel the right to purchase up to 5% of the reorganized company and receive a performance bond for up to 5% of the equity.
The agreement is subject to court approval.
The new partnership will bring Diamond Sports one step closer to emerging from bankruptcy and will bring more exposure to FanDuel, already the No. 1 sportsbook by market share.
Diamond said in Tuesday’s court filing that while discussions with FanDuel began in February, negotiations on the final terms of the naming rights agreement did not begin until the agreements with the NBA and NHL were finalized. FanDuel representatives declined to comment beyond the filing, and specific financial terms of the agreement were not disclosed.
Diamond Sports said in court documents that it considered FanDuel “an attractive potential partner … due to the strong alignment between regional sports networks and online gaming businesses.”
This will be the third title for the regional sports network. as part of its acquisition Fox Corporation.’s assets, disney The network must be divested to gain regulatory approval. Disney sold the network, still part of Fox Sports, in 2019 to Sinclair. A naming rights agreement was later reached sign with game companies Bally Company.
Bally’s Corp. Agreement terminated as part of the Agreement precipitation An agreement was reached between Diamond Sports and Sinclair earlier this year.
Diamond, which remains an independently operating, unconsolidated subsidiary of Sinclair, claimed in the lawsuit that Sinclair’s ownership exacerbated its problems. Sinclair has not admitted wrongdoing.
Diamond Sports filed for bankruptcy protection last year. Diamond has since been in back-and-forth discussions with the NBA, NHL and Major League Baseball as the debt-laden company tries to emerge from bankruptcy.
Diamond Sports said in court documents that based on financial projections, the company hopes to emerge from bankruptcy as early as December.
Throughout the bankruptcy proceedings, teams in all three leagues have withdrawn from networks and scrambled to offer fans different local viewing options.
Earlier this month, Diamond Sports said it planned to drop all MLB teams except the Atlanta Braves for the 2025 season. Existing teams are at various stages of their contracts with Diamond Sports, but a total of 11 MLB teams will be leaving the company.
A lawyer for Diamond Sports told the court earlier this month that abandoning the teams “is not our preferred path.”
Several MLB teams, including the San Diego Padres and Arizona Diamondbacks, left regional sports networks in 2023, and MLB has been producing local games for those teams since then . On Tuesday, the league announced it would do the same for the Milwaukee Brewers, Cleveland Guards and Minnesota Twins for the 2025 season.
Some NBA teams leaving regional sports networks have turned to local radio stations to broadcast local games. The NHL’s Dallas Stars and Anaheim Ducks have entered into a top-tier streaming partnership with Victory+, a sports streamer owned by Canada’s A Parent Media Co., for local viewing.
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