NWSL announces 4-year, $240 million TV deal

Calling it the “beginning of our future,” NWSL commissioner Jessica Berman revealed the league’s new four-year media deal on Thursday.

The NWSL announced it had agreed to a new deal with CBS Sports, ESPN, Prime Video and Scripps Sports for the next four years, worth a reported $60 million per year.

“These partnerships fundamentally change the game for our league and the players who take the pitch each week,” Berman said. “On behalf of the NWSL, our owners and players, I want to commend CBS Sports, ESPN, Amazon Prime Video and Scripps for investing in our league and affirmatively declaring to the marketplace that this league is exciting, valuable, and important.

“We have taken great care to ensure our games are discoverable by increasing our reach in order to expose new audiences to everything that makes our league special, without compromising the economic value of our product. This is the beginning of our future.”

Beginning next season, 118 games will be broadcast.

Each Friday night, matches will be available on Prime Video.

Saturday night, there will be a doubleheader on ION, which aired WNBA games this season.

There will also be games aired on CBS Sports Network and Paramount+, and there will also be games aired on ESPN, ESPN2 and ABC.

There will be a minimum of 21 games for CBS, 20 for ESPN/ABC, 27 for Prime Video and 50 for Scripps Sports/ION.

The key for all fans is that, according to the league, “all matches, regardless of where they appear, will have consistent and up-leveled production quality due to increased and uniform investment across all platforms.”

ION will air the NWSL draft in January.

Also next season, with the arrival of Bay FC and Utah Royals FC, the number of playoff teams will increase from six to eight.