Bidding war imminent between EA & Microsoft for exclusive MLB rights?

moondance

Member
Excerpts from a recent CNNMoney article quoting Wedbush Morgan Securities:


If you're keeping score at home, by the way, this makes four major sporting events for which EA Sports holds exclusive licenses. NASCAR, the PGA Tour and FIFA soccer are also under contract with the publisher.

So what about Major League Baseball or the NBA?

Baseball would be a tough license to secure. While it hasn't done anything with it yet, Microsoft last year purchased the rights to the "High Heat Baseball" franchise – and would likely fight to keep those relevant. (And Microsoft's about the only company in the gaming space that could engage EA in a bidding war and win.)


Other Beauts:


EA did not announce the terms of the deal, but sources told me the price tag was north of $300 million (though well below the $500 million figure some have suggested).

Assuming that's correct, at least one industry analyst feels EA might have overpaid.

"If they paid more than $200 million, then I seriously question their judgment," said Michael Pachter, an analyst with Wedbush Morgan Securities.


"It was flat out predatory licensing. [EA is] trying to put other people out of business. No matter what, the consumer has fewer choices and no matter what, they're paying more. There is no $20 option. It goes to $50 next year and stays there. I think consumers lose."


Entire article at:
http://money.cnn.com/2004/12/14/commentary/game_over/column_gaming/?cnn=yes
 
I bet the first console maker to try to get an exclusive sporting league's rights loses Madden. I can see third parties fighting for it but Sony/MS/Nintendo would be stupid to piss off EA in such a way.
 
ferricide said:
the way that they all constantly pander to EA already is sickening enough.

I agree, but from a business perspective you don't piss them off lest your next console be Dreamcast 2.
 
The way baseball is run, they'd rather get fees and royalties from as many companies as possible... unless EA is crazy enough to give them something around a billion dollars.

And that would be psychotic, considering how baseball video games don't seem to sell nearly as well as football (but oh I wish they would).
 
AstroLad said:
No matter what happens with all this, gamers win.

...

VGB get too slow for ya? Lord knows the Xbox fanboys on the IGN boards are having a field day with it. Blizzfan is probably exausted from all the fapping over Madden.

Yeah, monopolies are always a good thing. At least Midway's fighting back and fighting dirty, cutting through the pristine BS of the NFL and showing the real side of football. Heh, maybe they'll be a portion of the game where you can skip games to pimp your new EA title.
 
I bet the first console maker to try to get an exclusive sporting league's rights loses Madden. I can see third parties fighting for it but Sony/MS/Nintendo would be stupid to piss off EA in such a way.
I don't see it. EA just committed $50M+ a year on top of Madden's development, distribution, and promotion costs. They need to sell an extra couple million just to keep profits where they have been the last few years. They can't afford to throw that weight around next generation since they don't know who might come up with the killer apps and take the market. How would EA feel if they told Sony to screw after Sony bought the exclusive MLB rights only to get left out in the cold when the Sony brand continues to dominate the market. Also, EA needs as many users as possible to sell all their other titles to, telling MS or Sony that they can't have Madden is a sure fire way to get a publisher license revoked.

Madden, while a great seller, only moves about 5-7M copies per iteration. There's a next gen console installed base of over 70M. A lot of that 5-7M each year are the same people buying year to year or every other year. Thats a big installed base to build without even needing to find a counter to Madden.

The Dreamcast didn't fail because it didn't have EA, it failed because it was made by Sega and went up against the Playstation 2.

No single 3rd party decides who wins a generation. EA plays a big role. Take 2 will from this generation. The Japan 5;Capcom, Square Enix, Konami, Namco, and Sega/Sammy, each play a big role. Even Midway is regaining some of its former cache. The console with the best all around support wins.

EA will almost definately use the NFL exclusive license to get near non-existant royalties from Sony, MS, and Nintendo, but they won't try to control those companies with it like a carrot before their nose. That'd get a serious negative reaction that is as likely to hurt EA as it is to help.
 
pilonv1 said:
I bet the first console maker to try to get an exclusive sporting league's rights loses Madden. I can see third parties fighting for it but Sony/MS/Nintendo would be stupid to piss off EA in such a way.

I'm surpised by your logic. The industry isn't preschool or something. It doesn't work like that.

EA isn't going to say OH NO SCE got the an exclusive MLB license, let's not support the PS3 and kill like 30% of our profitability.

Drek, EA isn't going to get smaller royalties, but they will probably increase the price of Madden to something like 60 or 70 dollars.
 
Microsoft's phasing out sports, I doubt they're interested in the MLB license or even putting High Heat's engine to any use. They should just sell it to T2.
 
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