Sports are indeed expensive and push up the cost of cable packages. The NFL is about to close a deal with cable, satellite and network providers for distribution through 2021 for $6 Billion-a-year, reports Deadline Hollywood. Not all of that comes from ESPN. "Broadcast network share of the yearly fees will amount to about $3.2 billion," writes Deadline. "ESPN’s share will be about $1.9 billion per season under the league’s separate $15.2 billion deal with the cable network for 'Monday Night Football' which also lasts through 2021." And that's just the NFL. Don't forget about all the other sports, including college football, which as The Atlantic's Taylor Branch explained is also a billion dollar industry, including coverage on ESPN and its own separate channel ESPN U.

Cable executives worry that these high fees will lead to de-bundling, as younger people want cheaper à la carte packages. ESPN is the obvious target for cable execs, given it charges the highest per-household subscription fee of any cable channel. SNL Kagan estimates its monthly per-subscriber fees for the flagship channel have risen 42% to $4.69 since 2006, compared to the average cable channel fee, which rose 24% over that same period to 26 cents a month, report Schechner and Peers.

ESPN defends its prices, arguing that its valuable programming draws more cable subscribers. "ESPN is consistently ranked by cable operators as the most compelling and comprehensive driver of their businesses, offering more total value in a multiplatform world than any other basic cable network by far," a spokeswoman told the Journal. And, as of a year ago, 27 percent* of people asked in a survey by Needham & Co. analyst Laura Martin said that they would not cut the cord without ESPN's offerings online.

And ESPN presciently released data a year ago today, proving that just .1 percent of households had cut the cord. A year later, and pay TV still has a high penetration rate of 83.2%, reported AdAge's Dan Hirschhorn.

Yet, the fear still lingers. Maffei worries that as the prices go up -- thanks to ESPN -- some will opt-out of cable, or a sparser package. And it's not totally unfounded. Many new households aren't signing up for cable at all, continues Hirschhorn. "While there were 1.8 million households formed, according to Census data estimates cited by the report, only 16.9% of them signed up for pay-TV services," he writes.

This post originally said 31 percent of people would not cut the cord without ESPN online availability.

This article is from the archive of our partner The Wire.

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