Fresno State Athletics is leaving Learfield Sports, among the nation's leading third-party rights holders, to keep those rights in-house.
As reported by local ABC affiliate KFSN, the athletic department is calling its new media rights entity "Bulldog Sports Enterprises." Chris Pachecho, a former football player under Jim Sweeney, owns a radio station and other local businesses and will serve as president of BSE.
"We're betting on ourselves and there's no other person I'd rather than Chris and his team," Fresno State athletic director Garrett Klassy said, as reported by KFSN.
The deal is for five years and is being managed in-house, with 80% of the profits staying with Fresno State and 20% going to Bulldog Sports Enterprises and its staff.
"We have a unique situation, not too many providers have access to a radio station or a bunch of sign companies, so those two things are critical components to what we do," Pacheco said.
Klassy oversaw a similar media-rights change when he was the deputy athletics director at the University of Nebraska, which has since returned to a third-party media-rights holder. The Huskers went from Learfield/IMG to an in-house arrangement, then signed on with JMI Sports in March 2022.
Related: Nebraska Back to Third-Party Media Rights With $215M Deal
"One of the things I really underestimated when we made this move at Nebraska is how much local businesses like writing checks back to the university and not to a third party that's located in some other area," Klassy said, as reported by KFSN.
Klassy added that now is the time for a change at Fresno State because of the increased exposure teams will be getting with their July 1 move to the reconfigured Pac-12 Conference.
