Sinclair on hook for $1.82 billion in rights fees for Bally Sports regional sports networks

Sinclair Broadcasting knew what it was getting into when it purchased the 21 regional sports networks from Disney in 2019. But they weren't quite prepared for the pandemic that followed, which exacerbated a lot of the issues that made these networks so unpalatable to their previous owner. In late 2020, they announced that they took a $4.23 billion charge "related mostly to the regional sports networks business" and posted a $3.21 billion loss for the third quarter.