WASHINGTON – To watch live sports at home in 2025, between all of the apps and channels and streams games air on thanks to billion-dollar rights deals, it can feel like being in a NASA control room. 

Now Congress wants to be involved. 

On Capitol Hill Tuesday, the Senate Commerce Committee – which has jurisdiction over the telecommunications professional sports leagues use to broadcast games – interviewed representatives from the NBA, MLB and the NHL about sports’ embrace of streaming, which creates a segmented market that is pricier for consumers. 

“This is a growing problem,” Committee Chairman Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, said after the hearing. “Fans are understandably upset that it’s really hard to watch your home team, figure out what app or what network, how to watch it. It’s fractured right now. It’s expensive right now.” 

Notably, the NFL did not attend the hearing despite Cruz’s April 17 letter to commissioner Roger Goodell requesting his or a league representative’s presence. The NFL did not respond to a prior request from USA TODAY Sports for comment asking if the league intended to send a representative.

“I wish they had come,” Cruz said. “I think the issues that were discussed apply to them just like they apply to the leagues that were here.” 

The main lines of questioning during the lightly-attended meeting – nine of the 25 committee members showed up and most stayed for only brief periods – revolved around whether the leagues are not taking advantage of the anti-trust legislation afforded to them through the Sports Broadcasting Act of 1961. The leagues said that because they can operate as one entity during media-rights negotiations, they can pool resources to create a cheaper and more accessible model for fans. 

John Bergmayer, the fourth witness and the legal director of the non-profit group Public Knowledge, said fans feel like they finally broke free of the cable bundle only to watch it reform thanks to streaming platforms. 

“Streaming is no longer an afterthought, and policymakers, content creators, tech platforms, and sports leagues need to take steps to ensure that shifts in the media, technology, and sports landscapes benefit viewers, and lead to cheaper and more convenient options,” Bergmayer said during his opening statement. 

The subject of local blackouts came up early, with MLB executive vice president of media and business development Kenny Gersh saying each club has the right to distribute on cable in its market and that 29 of the 30 clubs also have a direct-to-consumer (DTC) option for streamers. But the collapse of the Regional Sports Network (RSN) market has also created an upheaval for leagues. 

“As we continue to have flux in the system, we’re going to have to continue to evaluate,” NHL senior executive vice president of media and international strategy David Proper said. 

Many of the Democratic senators, including ranking member Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Washington, Sen. Ben Ray Lujan, D-New Mexico and Sen. Ed Markey, D-Massachusetts, used their time to lambast President Donald Trump’s proposed cuts of National Public Radio and PBS. 

Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minnesota, explicitly asked NBA president of global content and media distribution Bill Koenig about the league’s valuation of the WNBA in its media rights negotiations. 

“We’re mindful of the growing popularity of the WNBA,” said Koenig, who added that the new media rights deals – valued at $76 billion – included upside provisions. For example, the revenue sharing that comes from advertising numbers stands to benefit the WNBA, he said. 

Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tennessee, used her five minutes to grill Koenig about the Daryl Morey “Hong Kong” freedom tweet from nearly six years ago and wanted to know what broadcast rights in China are worth. She also inquired about internet piracy and its impact on streaming. 

Sen. Bernie Moreno, R-Ohio, encouraged the leagues to find solutions on their own rather than compelling Congress to be involved and regulate the leagues further, while Sen. Eric Schmitt, R-Missouri, relied on his experience of trying to stream St. Louis Cardinals games as an example of the plight fans go through to watch their teams. 

“People do care about this a lot,” Schmitt said. 

Cantwell was interested in whether the leagues have specific data or metrics about fan complaints. 

“It’s certainly something we hear,” Gersch said. 

Cantwell Cantwell floated a mandate for teams to make their games free in local markets backed by advertising revenue, a more traditional model. She doesn’t want the simple act of watching a sporting event to be hijacked by a larger consumer experience like having to buy an annual subscription to a streaming service such as Prime Video or Peacock. 

“There’s just too much here where they can just think about the dollar instead of thinking about the true consumer experience,” she said. 

“In return for the very public benefits that teams and leagues receive,” Bergmayer said, demonstrating the difference from other entertainment products, “there should be an obligation to make sure that games are widely accessible.” 

Cruz said the hearing was meant to be an informational, fact-finding exercise and he was pleased to that end. 

A specific remedy, despite multiple legislative avenues, Cruz said, remains up in the air. 

“It shouldn’t be insanely complicated or insanely expensive to cheer on your hometown team,” he said. 

USA Basketball is set to make massive shifts in its structuring later this week, and among some of the most shocking moves includes the introduction of WNBA legend Sue Bird as the new managing director for the women’s national team, according to a person with knowledge of USA Basketball’s decision. The person requested anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly until USA Basketball made an announcement.

Bird, 44, is a women’s basketball legend, particularly as a member of the U.S. national team. She won five Olympic gold medals and four World Cup titles on the squad. Now, she’ll be responsible for a hefty chunk of the team’s success, taking on the ‘Grant Hill’ role for the team, making her in charge of things like player roster and coaching staff decisions for events like the Olympics and World Cup.

In previous years, a committee had been used to determine the rosters and coaches for these events. However, Bird’s expertise and respect in the basketball community seemingly has earned her the power to make those decisions on her own moving forward.

Will the men’s national team make the same shift?

The men’s national team does not need to. They’ve operated with a managing director for nearly two decades at this point, dating back to Jeff Colangelo, who took on the role from 2005 to 2021. George Hill took over the role in 2021, hence why Bird’s new position is being referred to as the ‘George Hill role.’

Much like how Hill now reports to the men’s national team day-to-day operations manager Sean Ford, Bird will now report to Briana Weiss in a similar manner.

When does the women’s national team play next?

The next big event for the women’s national team will be the FIBA World Cup in September 2026, with the first qualifying event for the tournament set to take place in November this year.

The short timeframe between now and the qualifying event makes Bird’s life much tougher as she’ll have to navigate a field of worthy candidates for the roster and coaching staff all while meandering through politics in her decisions. It’s hard to forget the drama that ensued ahead of the 2024 Paris Olympics when it was announced that Caitlin Clark had been left off the roster.

Sue Bird making moves as a podcaster as well

Coincidentally, news of Bird’s new position comes at a time when Bird also is announcing the start of a new WNBA podcast with Vox Media titled ‘Bird’s Eye View.’ The podcast is set to debut May 16 and will be available on most major podcast platforms such as Spotify, YouTube and Apple.

The show will cover WNBA news with Bird offering her expert opinions and analysis while speaking with several influential figures from around the league.

‘It’s going to be rooted in the ways in which the conversation that I can have might be different from an analyst or journalist. It’s going to be player to player, in a sense,’ Bird told The Hollywood Reporter.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Every Kentucky Derby-winning trainer has the same day-after script when it comes to bringing their horse to the Preakness. And the line is usually some non-committal variation of “they’ll tell us” if they’re physically ready to run back just two weeks later in the second jewel of the Triple Crown. 

Well, Bill Mott wasn’t kidding Sunday, the morning after Sovereignty’s victory. You could almost see the thought bubble forming around his words, telling everyone not to be too surprised if he and the management team at Godolphin, which owns the horse, decided to take a pass on Baltimore. 

“It’s good to have that option,” Mott told reporters. “I don’t think we’re dead set on it. I don’t think that’s the only thing we’re thinking about.”

And guess what? A little more than 48 hours later, a news release from Pimlico made it official: Sovereignty isn’t coming to Baltimore.

Uh-oh. Is anyone in horse racing going to listen when the best trainers in the world — and the people responsible for the health and well-being of the animal — tell you over and over again that the Triple Crown is no longer viable in its current format? 

Sorry, traditionalists. But it’s time for the Triple Crown to change. 

It doesn’t have to be anything radical. But the modern racehorse is not bred or built to run three long races in five weeks, and there isn’t a single high-level trainer in the country that would put their horse through that gauntlet unless there was a historic achievement on the line. 

Give credit to Mott, one of the best and most careful horsemen in the world, for putting his principles – and the long-term health of Sovereignty – ahead of his own ambitions and the pressure he undeniably felt to bring the show to Maryland.

Those who have resisted adding some time between the races have long argued that it cheapens the achievement if you remove part of the challenge. But what’s actually been happening over the last several years is that so few horses run in all three races it’s already being cheapened. 

And the ones that do, in general, don’t come out better for it on the other side. 

Last year, Derby winner Mystik Dan ran in all three legs and then disappeared until December. He’s 0-for-3 since then. Mage, the 2023 winner, ran in the Preakness and was never the same, retiring after two more races and several physical issues.

“I think over the years, people realize that spacing these horses out a little bit gives you the opportunity to make them last a little longer,” Mott said. “I think we’re looking at a career, you know, and you want the career to last more than five weeks.”

There could not be a more damning indictment of how the Triple Crown is now perceived. 

Sure, you can argue that breeders – especially those who care more about the price their horse will fetch in the sales ring than what happens on the racetrack – should stop what they’ve been doing for the last couple of decades and breed more soundness and stamina into their horses. But that’s just not realistic, and may not even reverse the increasing fragility of the common racehorse.

This isn’t the 1940s anymore, when it was common for Thoroughbreds to run every couple of weeks and sometimes actually run races in-between the three-week gap separating the Preakness and Belmont. This isn’t the 1980s, when one of the premier Derby preps, the Blue Grass Stakes, was actually held nine days before the run for the roses. It’s not even 2015, when American Pharoah broke the 37-year drought and proved to the racing world that it could still be done. 

And even as modern Thoroughbreds become more injury-prone and less sturdy due to inbreeding and the commercial appeal of speed pedigrees over stamina, it can still be done. 

But at what cost? 

“It’s a long season and he’s had three hard races since February and that takes a lot out of those horses,” Michael Banahan, the director of American bloodstock for Godolphin, told reporters. “It’s a quick turnaround and that’s what makes the Triple Crown so special. He’ll tell us yea or nay, and we’ll do what he tells us to do. There’s lots of great opportunities and really good races to try to compete in and see if we can pad his résumé even more.”

That last part seems significant. 

Because for the connections of a horse like Sovereignty, the Kentucky Derby was the goal, full stop. Everything they did with him in the winter and spring was designed to have him at his peak level of fitness on Saturday to run an incredibly grueling race. 

Often, the horses are so fit after the Derby that they can bounce right back two weeks later and deliver another monster performance. 

But it does grind them up, and the Preakness — for all its tradition and fanfare — is really just another big race. Yeah, running for a $2 million purse is nice. But if you just looked at the fields that the Preakness has been drawing for several years now and judged the race only on its merits, is it really even a Grade 1 quality race anymore? You can argue it’s not even as prestigious these days as winning the Travers and certainly not as lucrative as the $7 million Breeders’ Cup Classic at the end of the season.

So if running all three legs of the Triple Crown results in a tired horse that needs an extended break – at the cost of a chance to win those other big races – is it really worth trying? Sovereignty will be pointed to the Belmont, with a standard five-week break, and most likely be fresh to come back in the summer and fall with a chance to mount a Horse of the Year campaign. If that’s the calculation Mott and Godolphin are making, it’s very easy to understand why they’re taking this path.

“I think the Triple Crown is a huge challenge for any horse,” Mott said. ‘The great thing about it is not many horses are able to do it, and certainly I believe that he’s a big, strong horse and if you’re ever going to look at one and if that’s your goal and the goal of the owner and still in the best interest of the horse, it’s great. Everybody knows that American Pharoah won it and Justify won it (in 2018), but we’re going to look long-term.”

If horse racing had its act together, this wouldn’t even be a debate. There would be three weeks or a month between the Derby and Preakness, then another month to get ready for the Belmont. It would still be extremely hard to win — maybe even harder because the Preakness and Belmont would have better fields. 

And this kind of tweak at the expense of tradition wouldn’t be the end of the world. Though the spacing of the Triple Crown races has been consistent for decades, it has moved around a bit since the early days. There’s nothing sacrosanct about squeezing it into five weeks, and the powers that be should have started a real conversation about changing things when they noticed in the 2010s how few horses anymore were running in all three races. 

After that thrilling Derby on Saturday, what could possibly be better for horse racing than having a Preakness where you get Sovereignty, Journalism and Baeza back for a rematch on a different track with different conditions? Instead, Pimlico will be lucky if one of the three shows up. And if that’s the case, what’s even the point of the Preakness anymore? 

As much as most fans want to see Sovereignty try for the Triple Crown, Mott holding him out of the race might just be the moment of clarity horse racing needs to finally admit that the current format is no longer in the best interests of the sport. 

This column has been updated with new information.

Follow USA TODAY Sports columnist Dan Wolken on BlueSky.

With the NFL offseason mostly in the history books, there are only a few mysteries remaining.

The future of New Orleans Saints quarterback Derek Carr is one of them.

Carr has made headlines recently for a shoulder injury that seemingly came out of nowhere, one that threatens his availability for the 2025 NFL season. Takes have been flying from all over ever since.

Some believe the injury to be legitimate. Others have suggested Carr is faking the injury to get out of New Orleans. The quarterback later appeared at a church, where he spoke on the situation.

‘Yes, I hate I have to say this, yes, I have a shoulder injury,’ Carr said. ‘Despite what ESPN says and what some lady on a podcast might think. Okay? I have the MRI report to prove it. The team knows about it. We’ve been in constant communication. There’s nothing wrong, and we’re going to go forward with that. Is that okay?’

The situation has been far from conventional, with very few concrete answers along the way. On Tuesday, some more news came to light that paints a clearer picture.

Here is the latest on Carr and his shoulder.

Derek Carr injury update

Carr is said to be considering surgery for his shoulder. A decision on that should be coming sooner rather than later, according to NFL Network’s Jane Slater.

‘It’s my understanding that Derek Carr absolutely believes that this shoulder injury took place during the same game that he injured the wrist,’ Slater said on Tuesday.

Carr suffered the wrist injury during the Saints’ Week 14 game against the New York Giants.

Slater added that Carr has been to the Saints’ facility and the quarterback didn’t notice the injury until he began ramping up his throwing program this spring. She said that Carr was only throwing a fake football in walkthroughs with injured players and Alvin Kamara, pointing out that the Saints fell out of contention before the quarterback could push for a return.

She also reported that it sounds like Carr would prefer to avoid surgery, if possible, given he’s already had that arm operated on before. It appears that the quarterback will wait to see if he can play through the issue.

Both sides are working towards a resolution.

In the meantime, the Saints are operating with a new coaching staff led by Kellen Moore and just drafted a quarterback in the second round of the 2025 NFL Draft, taking Tyler Shough out of Louisville.

Shough figures to be the starter next season if Carr is sidelined, but Moore could have options if Carr is healthy enough to play.

All the NFL news on and off the field. Sign up for USA TODAY’s 4th and Monday newsletter. Check out the latest edition: Looking ahead to the 2025 NFL schedule release.

An intense dedication to her craft helped make former U.S. women’s national soccer team star Carli Lloyd a Hall of Famer.

But at her induction speech on Sunday, the two-time World Cup champion also acknowledged the price she paid on a personal level as she single-mindedly pursued her goals.

‘I’m sorry I wasn’t always able to give you all of me,’ Lloyd said, addressing her former teammates. ‘I wouldn’t say I have regrets, but if there’s one thing I do wish, I wish I had let more people understand me over the years. I operated like an emotionless machine. I was intense and I truly believe that the only way for me to survive in such a cut-throat environment was to be that way.’

Lloyd, who retired in 2021 after making 316 appearances for the USWNT, was one of five people inducted into the U.S. Soccer Hall of Fame in Sunday’s ceremony in Frisco, Texas.

Her credentials were impeccable. In addition to being a major part of two World Cup championship teams, she scored the winning goals in the gold-medal game in both the 2008 Olympics in Beijing and the 2012 Games in London. Lloyd was also a two-time FIFA player of the year – only the second American (along with Mia Hamm) to win the international award multiple times.

But Lloyd’s steely intensity ran counter to some of the other free spirits on those teams such as Megan Rapinoe and Alex Morgan.

She admitted that retiring as an active player – and also becoming a mother – have given her a new perspective.

‘I always knew I wanted a child, but I had no idea how this little baby could completely change me as a person,’ Lloyd said. ‘Unlike during my playing career, I have been present. I have allowed myself to be vulnerable, emotional, and fully engaged in every moment I get to spend with her.’

In the end though, Lloyd concluded that all the training, even to the extent that it cut her off from teammates and family members, was worth it.

‘As lonely and difficult as the journey was at times, I would do it all over again,’ she said. ‘There was nothing I loved more than winning, but winning comes at a cost, and I paid that price.’

Sovereignty, the Kentucky Derby winner, will not participate in the 2025 Preakness Stakes, the second leg of the Triple Crown.

According to The Courier-Journal, part of the USA TODAY Network, Preakness officials announced Sovereignty would not compete at Pimlico Race Course in Baltimore on May 17.

Sovereignty was the 8-5 favorite leading up to the confirmed field for the Preakness and was obviously expected to be a strong contender. According to The Courier-Journal, Bill Mott, Sovereignty’s trainer, did not provide a reason for the decision to withdraw from the upcoming race. However, he did confirm Sovereignty’s return for the Belmont Stakes, the final race of the Triple Crown, which will take place on June 7 at Saratoga.

When is the 2025 Preakness Stakes?

The 2025 Preakness Stakes, also known as the Middle Jewel, will be held at the Pimlico Race Course in Baltimore, Maryland on Saturday, May 17.

The Preakness is the second leg of the Triple Crown, with the Belmont Stakes being the final race.

When is the 2025 Preakness Stakes Draw?

The 2025 Preakness Stakes Post Position draw is set for Monday, May 12, at 6 p.m. ET. The post position draw determines where the horses will start from.

In fact, in the Indiana Fever’s recent preseason game against the Brazilian national team, which saw Clark return to her alma mater Iowa, ESPN averaged 1.3 million viewers throughout the broadcast.

According to Flora Kelly, ESPN’s vice president of research, only two of the 57 NBA games ESPN has televised since 2010 have matched those numbers, both of which featured Los Angeles Lakers’ star LeBron James.

Clark’s pull is undeniable at this point. During her rookie season in the WNBA last year, the league saw 22 of their regular season games average more than 1 million viewers. For perspective, there hadn’t been a WNBA game to average 1 million viewers since 2008.

The question now is whether or not those figures are sustainable.

After all, in order to draw so many viewers for the recent preseason game, ESPN needed Clark’s team to play against a national team at her alma mater. Those scenarios won’t happen during the WNBA regular season. However, it’s arguable that the numbers should only continue to increase during Clark’s career, paving the way for other stars like the Chicago Sky’s Angel Reese or Dallas Wings’ rookie Paige Bueckers to garner more followers as well.

WNBA’s viewership numbers with Clark

In 2024, the WNBA’s most watched games on ESPN, ESPN2, CBS, ABC, Ion, and NBA TV all involved the Indiana Fever, per Yahoo Sports. Twenty of the 23 WNBA games to average more than 1 million viewers last year involved Clark.

Furthermore, both the WNBA Draft and All-Star Game have demolished their previous viewership records, with the 2025 draft averaging 1.25 million viewers, second-most ever, with only Clark’s 2024 class garnering more (1.46 million). The 2024 All-Star Game averaged 3.44 million viewers. The previous record was just 1.44 million in 2003.

It’s undeniable that she is the face of the league in just her second season, and while that may upset some people including longtime fans and/or WNBA veterans, it might be best to jump on board before getting left behind, because she is doing wonders for the league’s fandom and revenue.

When does the WNBA regular season start?

The WNBA regular season begins with three games – Minnesota Lynx vs. Dallas Wings, Atlanta Dream vs. Washington Mystics and Los Angeles Sparks vs. Golden State Valkyries – on Friday, May 16.

The Fever’s season begins a day later with a nationally televised matchup against Angel Reese and the Chicago Sky at 3 p.m. ET in Indianapolis. That games follows a 1 p.m. ET game on ABC, when the defending champion New York Liberty host the Las Vegas Aces.

The Big Ten Conference had just over $928 million in total revenue and distributed about $63.2 million to each of its 12 longest-standing schools during its 2024 fiscal year, the conference’s newly released federal tax records show.

Those figures represent a 5.5% increase in total revenue and a 4.5% increase in per-school payouts compared to those for fiscal 2023 due to the beginning of new television agreements.

However, the new records, along with documents and data released by three Big Ten member schools in recent years strongly indicate that the conference’s revenue for its ongoing 2025 fiscal year will increase to somewhere between $1.2 billion and $1.4 billion, with the new TV deals taking full effect and the additions of UCLA, Southern California, Oregon and Washington increasing its membership to 18 schools. The Big Ten’s document was provided by the conference on May 6 in response to a request from USA TODAY Sports.

The Big Ten’s per-school distributions for fiscal 2025 seem likely to be around $75 million for all except Oregon and Washington, whose shares are being phased in over seven years.

All of this keeps – and, at least for now, stands to continue keeping – the Big Ten ahead of the now-16-school Southeastern Conference in terms of total revenue and per-school payouts. The SEC released tax records in February that showed $840 million in total revenue and average per-school distributions of about $52.5 million to the 14 schools other than newcomers Oklahoma and Texas.  The SEC also is on a path toward at least $1 billion in total revenue for its 2024-25 fiscal year.

For comparison, the NCAA reported $1.38 billion in total revenue for fiscal 2024 on its most recent audited financial statement.

BEST OF BEST: Our ranking of college football’s top 25 coaches

Payments to former Big Ten commissioners Kevin Warren, Jim Delany

The Big Ten’s new tax return also showed that now-former commissioner Kevin Warren received a $5.75 million bonus during the 2023 calendar year. He departed in mid-April of that year to become the Chicago Bears’ president and CEO. (IRS reporting rules require disclosure of pay data on a calendar-year basis, rather than a fiscal-year basis.)

Warren, who started with the Big Ten in September 2019, was credited with just over $6.8 million in total compensation for 2023. That included nearly $1.1 million categorized as base compensation, which works out to an annualized total of nearly $2.9 million.

The bonus was awarded by the Big Ten Council of Presidents and Chancellors “for his accomplishments over his full tenure as commissioner, including his contributions to the new TV rights deal,” a conference spokesperson said.

Warren’s time as commissioner included:

– The COVID-19 pandemic, which heavily impacted the 2020-21 school year. Warren became a center of controversy when the conference initially announced it would not play football in fall 2020 but reversed course after other conferences decided to play.

– The conference’s announcement in the summer of 2022 that it was adding UCLA and USC, starting in July 2024.

– Negotiation of seven-year TV contracts with CBS, Fox and NBC that were announced in August 2022, and widely reported at that time to be worth more than $7 billion. (The conference made agreements in August 2023 to add Oregon and Washington.)

While standing as an additional payment for his roughly 3½ years on the job, Warren’s bonus stands as one of the largest such payments in college sports since USA TODAY Sports began tracking pay of coaches and administrators in 2006, not including retention payments in which coaches became vested annually but were not due to be actually paid until the end of a fixed period or unless the coach was fired without cause.

In July 2015, then-Big Ten commissioner Jim Delany became eligible for more than $20 million in bonus payments, based on estimated present value at that time, that he began receiving in 2018. (In 2023, according to the new return, Delany was credited with a net total of nearly $3.05 million that represented the sixth year’s worth of these payments that the conference says he will be receiving over a 10-year span, ending in 2027. So far Delany has received about $18 million worth of these payments. In addition, during the 2023-24 fiscal year, Delany Advisory Inc., received $400,000 for what the new tax record described as consulting services.)

Big Ten current commissioner Tony Petitti salary

Tony Petitti’s started his role as the conference’s commissioner at the beginning of May 2023, so he was on the payroll for eight months and ended up being credited with total compensation of $2.65 million.

According to the new return, the compensation included a $500,000 bonus and pro-rated base pay that, if annualized, was about $3.2 million.

Big Ten revenue projections for 2025 and beyond

While the Big Ten started the new television agreements during a fiscal year that ended June 30, 2024, it did not immediately see the full revenue impact because CBS was still committed to broadcasting SEC games during the 2023 football season. That changed this past season, as did the Big Ten’s membership. So, the conference’s fiscal-year 2025 revenue will increase dramatically.

Iowa state board of regents budget documents from this past July show that the University of Iowa was projecting $75.2 million in “Athletic Conference” revenue for fiscal 2025.

A University of Wisconsin athletics department budget presentation to a university athletic board committee meeting three weeks ago projected “Conference” revenue of $74.7 million for fiscal 2025 and just under $82.6 million for fiscal 2026, according to the Wisconsin State Journal.

The Big Ten generally provides its longest standing members with equal amounts. When Nebraska, Maryland and Rutgers, respectively, joined the conference, their shares were scaled up to full amounts over a period of years. UCLA and Southern California, however, are scheduled to receive full shares immediately while, according to an Oregon athletics budget document for fiscal 2025, Oregon projects $54 million in “NCAA/Big Ten” revenue. (Another Oregon document from September 2023 said the Big Ten’s “media deal with Fox, NBC and CBS will pay both UO and University of Washington each an average of $32.5 million a year for the first six years and that amount should more than double when the two schools receive a full share of Big Ten media rights revenues beginning in the 7th year.” But that TV revenue will be supplemented by money from other Big Ten sources such as the College Football Playoff and Big Ten championships.)

Even using slightly lower amounts as benchmarks — $70 million to each of 16 schools and $50 million apiece to Oregon and Washington, that projects to a little more than $1.2 billion in total Big Ten distributions for fiscal 2025. And, in recent years, the conference has passed on to its schools about 95% of total revenue. That would put its total revenue for fiscal 2025 at just under $1.3 billion.