ESPN isn’t in the kind of trouble dire talk would indicate -- at least until next decade

[Commentary] It’s been a rocky year for ESPN, which shed high-priced, high-profile talent -- reportedly under orders from Disney to cut costs -- and continued to lose cable subscribers. With apologies to our colleagues in sports media -- we’re all engaging in crystal-ball journalism here based on incomplete financial glimpses of media conglomerates -- there’s just as strong an argument to be made that ESPN is better positioned than any of its competitors to handle a market transition from cable bundle to a la carte streamed television. Here are a few reasons why:

1. ESPN is the most-watched cable station in America.
2. If sports television rights are a bubble, we’re not seeing signs of a burst yet: A central premise to the argument ESPN is in big trouble is that sports rights fees, which have gone up astronomically over the last decade, are a bubble. The problem with this argument is we’re not seeing many signs of a slide in the actual value of these rights.
3. These budgets cuts really aren’t that significant, relative to ESPN’s size: ESPN has been told to trim $100 million from its 2016 budget and $250 million from the 2017 budget. But when your annual budget is in the neighborhood of $6 billion (and probably more) $100 million represents less than 2 percent of the overall pie. And ESPN is far from the only cable network looking to trim.
4. The biggest threat to ESPN is not other cable sports channels; it’s the leagues themselves: The biggest threat to ESPN, and its competitors, is a scenario develops in which sports leagues can make more money televising their games themselves than they do now selling their television rights to the highest bidder. That day could come, analysts think, but not this decade.