Former Fighter Pilot Richard Clark Will Negotiate Next College Football Playoff TV Deals Despite No Media Rights Experience

Air Force Academy superintendent Lt. Gen. Richard Clark was hired to be the College Football Playoff's new executive director this week.

Clark played linebacker for Air Force from 1992-95. He was a four-year letterman in football and as a senior helped lead the Falcons to a 12-1 finish and No. 8 ranking in the AP poll.

Since then, Clark has put together a 38-year military career. As a command pilot, he has more than 4,000 combined hours of flight time and has spent more than 400 flight hours in combat including the Gulf War, War in Afghanistan and Iraq War. He’s earned awards including the Distinguished Flying Cross, Legion of Merit and Bronze Star Medal.

“Among the many aircraft that he has piloted in his career, he piloted the B-1 bomber, and given some of the issues in college football, you may never know when that might come in handy,” Mississippi State President Mark Keenum, the chairman of the Board of Managers who decided on Clark's hiring, told reporters on Monday.

Clark will be replacing the retiring Bill Hancock and will take the lead on several key issues that the College Football Playoff faces as it moves to an expanded format next year.

The largest task for Clark will be securing new TV packages when the CFP expands from four to 12 teams next season.

The expanded playoff will span from mid-December to mid-January and is expected to be worth at least $1 billion in annual broadcasting rights fees. It is expected be one of the most valuable and most-watched sports television packages starting next year.

The CFP's current exclusive deal with ESPN reportedly pays an average of $470 million a year through 2026. The expanded playoff, however, could fetch as much as $2.2 billion per year — more than double the current payout, according to Front Office Sports.

The CFP's current contract with ESPN expires after the 2025 playoff and so too will any postseason agreement between the FBS conferences. While ESPN owns a portion of the playoff games in 2024 and 2025, the others are up for bid. Multiple networks have made presentations to the FBS commissioners this fall, including ESPN, FOX, NBC, Amazon and Turner.

Clark told reporters on Monday that he does not have any experience negotiating media rights deals. However, Hancock will be staying on much of 2024 in an advisory role to help with the transition.

“Some of those decisions are decisions that I will be working very closely with all the stakeholders who are involved in that growth, which is one of the skills I think I’ve developed over the years as a person who collaborates and really helps to pull a team together to move forward with big decisions like this,” Clark told reporters on Monday.