Take Two held their Q4 2004 earnings conference call yesterday and, after getting ahold of the transcript of the event, I found a couple of choice nuggets to share regarding the company's response to the EA/NFL deal that has dominated our news this week. The first, was a blanket statement by Take Two president Paul Eibeler regarding the company's overall disappointment with the decision by the NFL and NFLPA:

　　"On a separate note we are extremely disappointed by the decision made by the NFL and NFL PA to grant an exclusive license for NFL based video games. We feel these actions do a tremendous disservice to the consumer."

　　However, while not exactly poo-pooing the significance of the news, Take Two made it clear that the NFL game was an important, but not vital, portion of their bottom line business:

　　"The licensed NFL game we distributed for Sega was not a material contributor to our profitability to date and was expected to be a small contributor in our '05 guidance."

　　When asked if the budget price of ESPN NFL 2K5 contributed to the NFL/NFLPA's decision to go exclusive with EA, Take Two CFO Karl Winters had this to say:

　　"If you look at the past history, you know, some of these Sega products for the majority of the past two seasons were at value pricing so I really don't believe that. This was a strategic approach to getting more competition particularly in the football market."

　　While not committing to the status of an NBA license for next year's basketball title, Take Two said they continue to enjoy a good relationship with the basketball league. When questioned about whether Take Two might pursue an exclusive license of their own (such as for the NBA), Take Two CFO Karl Winters was non-committal:

　　"When we look at diversification and the opportunity in sports, we are looking at every aspect of the marketplace. With this news on the NFL, we have to rethink our strategy and rethink our proposals to the leagues as well as the leagues are, you know, rethinking or repositioning their strategy. I can tell you that in prior conversations with the various leagues, they did like the competition in the marketplace, they liked the fact that it forced innovation, that there was a tremendous amount of discussion or a buzz about the games with the fan base."

　　Obviously, these aren't responses that do much in the way of answering the questions on sports gamers' minds. Most of those answers, it seems, will require more time.