Longtime sports broadcaster spoke at length on the new deal during weekly Coast to Coast segment on The SportsCage<\/p>\n
REGINA — You can count Sportsnet\u2019s Arash Madani as one of the big fans of the brand new CFL broadcast deal.<\/p>\n
Madani joined The SportsCage for his weekly Coast to Coast segment this past Thursday and offered his thoughts on the massive six-year $500 million deal with TSN and DAZN that was announced earlier in the day.<\/p>\n
As has been widely reported, the deal — which includes adding YouTube as a \u2018premier platform partner\u2019 — boosts TSN\u2019s broadcast revenue from $50 million per season to approximately $83 million per season in the largest television rights deal in CFL history.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt’s the day that the league is now fully with the grown-ups,\u201d Madani said. \u201cIt’s got its own streaming service deal, just like everybody else. It’s got an international deal that’s going to be going places. It’s not just our little secret anymore, where you have to do CFL Plus to get on some kind of streaming thing if you’re looking for the Grey Cup somewhere\u2026 This is a big day. This is a really big day.\u201d<\/p>\n
Of course, it wouldn\u2019t be the CFL if there wasn\u2019t some sort of controversy, and the fact that DAZN will be carrying 20 games exclusively has rankled some fans who don\u2019t want to have to add another channel to be able to watch Saturday night contests.<\/p>\n
Madani pointed to the fact that people have been paying for games through cable for 20 years at this point and that the deal shows how the world of broadcasting has changed dramatically since games were regularly available over public broadcasters.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe world today has just become multiple streaming services,\u201d Madani said, pointing out that NHL Monday night games are now only available on Amazon Prime and unavailable on cable. \u201c Look at the NFL south of the border. If you want to watch the NFL, there are exclusive streaming games on Peacock, exclusive games on Netflix, exclusive games on Amazon Prime. We are spoiled up here because we get a lot of those things. So this is the cost of doing business in 2026.\u201d<\/p>\n
There\u2019s the added bonus of DAZN being an international network, which will help spread the game much farther than North American borders. That\u2019s just the cherry on top of what Madani feels is an utterly incredible deal — and one that commissioner Stewart Johnson should be proud of.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis alone has just justified his presence in the seat,\u201d Madani said matter-of-factly. \u201cFive hundred million bucks over six years [is incredible]… If we were having this conversation a year ago, I would have been like, \u2018this all seems far-fetched\u2019, but they pulled it off. It’s a pretty remarkable achievement. \u201c<\/p>\n
In the end, Madani said he thinks opposition to the deal simply comes down a fear of change.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeople have said we need new revenue streams for the league,\u201d Madani said. \u201cWell, it’s gone from effectively for two decades having one broadcaster to now having multiple broadcasters. And at a time where our industry is shrinking, where budgets are shrinking, they just went from under $50 million a year in broadcast revenue to $83 million a year in broadcast revenue. I don’t know a place that gets 60% more revenue than before anymore. To me, that’s a coup.\u201d<\/p>\n