I have no evidence to support this, but my assumption would be that if ESPN were offered separately they would need to charge substantially more to break even.

I have no evidence to support this, but my assumption would be that if ESPN were offered separately they would need to charge substantially more to break even. My thesis for this is that most people aren’t sports fans, but they pay for sports whether they want to or not due to all the bundling. In a way, non-fans are subsidizing the content for fans. My sneaky suspicion is that unbundling sports would be a cataclysmic event for the sports television industry. I would pay $15/month for ESPN but I wouldn’t pay $25. What do you think?