Roberts says in a recent government filing he structured the offer this way at the direction of the NFL owners, who said they would not have had to share the equity interest with the players' union as they would rights fees.
Comcast has not disclosed the size of the equity stake the NFL owners were seeking, company spokeswoman Sena Fitzmaurice said yesterday. The package of eight games, based on other contracts, was estimated to be worth about $400 million a year.
An NFL official confirmed yesterday that the league discussed a stake in the sports network, which was later renamed Versus, but said the players' union would ultimately benefit from an equity stake through dividend payments, or a sale of the asset.
How to carve up the multibillion-dollar NFL revenue pie between the football players and NFL owners has been a flashpoint for years in the league. Almost 60 percent of the revenue goes to the players and 40 percent to the owners.
"An equity stake is shared with the players," Frank Hawkins, senior vice president for business affairs with the NFL, said yesterday. "It's just not shared currently."
At the time of the negotiations with the NFL, Roberts was desperate to make a deal for rights to regular-season NFL games to combat the cable-killer Sunday Ticket, a product from rival satellite provider DirecTV. The Sunday Ticket broadcasts more than 200 out-of-market NFL games each season and was draining die-hard pigskin fans from Comcast.
But the NFL owners rejected Roberts' offer in early 2006 and instead used the eight NFL games for its start-up NFL Network, believing the league could profit more handsomely with its own media property.
