ST. LOUIS — Diamond ÁñÁ«ÊÓƵ Group said Monday that it has reached a deal with Comcast to resume carrying its sports networks, a move that will strengthen Diamond’s efforts to emerge from bankruptcy in the coming weeks and restore many fans’ access to its games effective Thursday.
Diamond — the parent company of Cardinals and Blues regional telecaster Bally ÁñÁ«ÊÓƵ Midwest — has been in bankruptcy proceedings since March 2023, a product of years of declining cable viewership. The company has been pushing forward a plan to emerge from bankruptcy and continue airing professional sports, but that plan hit a major obstacle this spring when contract renewal talks with Comcast broke down.
The distributor abruptly dropped Diamond’s games from its packages, leaving viewers across a swath of the Midwest without access to Cardinals games. It mainly affected fans in central Illinois and the Memphis area. Comcast’s Xfinity is not available in the St. Louis market.
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The change drew the ire of loyal Cardinals fans. It also raised doubts among MLB, the NHL and the NBA that Diamond could successfully emerge from bankruptcy.
Diamond’s financial health and survival is of keen interest to the leagues. Professional teams depend on Diamond to air their games — and to pay them for the right to do so. Should Diamond fail, teams might be left without a means of reaching their fans and without the substantial broadcast-rights fees Diamond pays, which sometimes represent teams’ largest source of annual revenues.
Diamond, meanwhile, depends on distributors such as Comcast to pay it for the broadcasts it produces.
After Diamond broke up with Comcast — one of the company’s top three distributors by revenue — attorneys for the leagues cast doubt on Diamond’s ability to emerge from bankruptcy.
Diamond was scheduled to spend Monday and Tuesday in Houston bankruptcy court, in a set of key hearings when the company would try to gain its creditors’ and the judge’s approval to formally emerge from bankruptcy. But last week, Diamond’s attorneys postponed the hearings this week, telling the bankruptcy judge that the company had made “substantial progress†with Comcast.
The company has not yet rescheduled them.
Diamond also is working on agreements with the NHL and NBA, which would be key for the company’s bankruptcy plan.
The company is under pressure to emerge from bankruptcy before the basketball and hockey seasons begin in October. The leagues have made clear that the uncertainty of airing games through a bankrupt broadcaster represents a hardship for the teams and that they would protest if the case stretched into yet another season.
The deal restores access for fans but only on Comcast’s Ultimate TV package. Fans who previously viewed the games on Comcast’s base level package will have to upgrade in order to access the games.
The creation of a tiered subscriber system was an issue in negotiations between Comcast and Diamond.
Diamond CEO David Preschlack called the deal a “critical step†in the company’s restructuring effort.
“We are mindful that time is of the essence with basketball and hockey seasons fast approaching,†he said in a statement. “And once agreements with our team and league partners are complete, we intend to move expeditiously to present a plan of reorganization to the court.â€
View life in St. Louis through the Post-Dispatch photographers' lenses. Edited by Jenna Jones.
