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Good Thursday Morning. Bringing you an abbreviated, “snack size” version of SBP this week.

#1: After 30+ years together, MLB and ESPN are no more (for now).

🗯️ My thought bubble: This is one of those deals where there is right on both sides. MLB is 100% correct that ESPN gives it minimal coverage, even during high leverage games (i.e., Wild Card games) that are a part of ESPN’s coverage.

On the other side, ESPN paying $550 million per year for a good, but not great, product the next three years while MLB does smaller, more cost effective deals with Apple ($85 million/year), Roku ($10 million/year), and other partners is also understandable. Assuming MLB gets another partner to take on some or all of these games, it will likely not be at that same price point as what ESPN was paying. This will affect all clubs, but it will have a larger impact on the smaller market clubs that do not have the large local revenues of the bigger players. It really becomes an issue when it impacts the clubs’ abilities to put together a competitive payroll in a league with no real salary cap. As I have said before, MLB lays bare the have’s and have not’s more than any other North American sports league.

All of that being said, there may be an opportunity to reach an agreement on a smaller, slimmed down package or at a lower price point, and let’s hope for that — baseball is more fun when Baseball Tonight at 7pm EST leads into Sunday Night Baseball at 8pm.

#2: Luka’s return to Dallas does big numbers and produced one of the hardest pictures of the year

#3: The NFL report cards are here, and the Jets’ Woody Johnson being the only owner to get an F took me out

#4: Sportico grouped together professional franchises by valuation

🗯️ My thought bubble: A couple of thoughts here:

1. We’ve talked about this a number of times, but the best way to read this chart is to look at the team groupings for each league. The more nationalized leagues (NFL, MLS) have a tighter grouping, while the regional revenue-focused sports (MLB, NBA) have much more of a spread due to the local revenue differences generated by the major clubs.

2. The spreads between the global soccer clubs says all you need to know about the inherent risk — and, therefore, discount on the valuations — of owning a European soccer team.

3. From a niche sport a decade ago to an international juggernaut now, F1’s explosive growth has been incredible to see. I will be interested to follow this over the next few years to see if this growth can keep pace.

#5: The Four Nations final between the U.S. and Canada was the most watched NHL game in 30 years

Until next time, sports fans!

-Alex