Rocco Commisso, the veteran cable TV executive turned founder of the cable giant Mediacom and owner of Italy’s ACF Fiorentina, has died. He was 76.
Commisso’s death was announced by Mediacom and the Italian soccer team late Friday night, with the team saying that he died “after a prolonged period of medical treatment.”
A banker turned cable CFO, the executive founded Mediacom in 1995 when he was 45 years old, focusing the nascent cable provider on smaller cities and towns that were not being adequately served by other cable companies.
It was a bet that paid off, with Mediacom now the fifth largest cable company in the U.S. with over three million households and businesses served in 22 states, and making Commisso a billionaire in the process. Mediacom is wholly owned by Commisso’s family, with the executive serving as its chairman and CEO until his death.
“This is truly the land of opportunity. It gave this poor soul the opportunity to become something, somebody,” Commisso told CBS 60 Minutes correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi in a 2023 profile. “And that’s the beauty of America.”
Born in Calabria, Italy, Commisso moved to the United States at age 12, and graduated from Mount Saint Michael Academy in the Bronx in 1967. Growing up a soccer fan, it was at Columbia University where Commisso truly fell in love with the sport, playing for the Columbia Lions from 1967–1970 and serving as co-captain of the 1970 team that made Columbia’s first-ever appearance in the NCAA Playoffs. Columbia’s soccer venue is now named the Rocco B. Commisso Soccer Stadium.
He started his professional career working for Pfizer in Brooklyn, before shifting to finance after receiving his MBA from Columbia in 1975. After stints at Chase Manhattan Bank Royal Bank of Canada, where he specialized in lending to companies in the communications sector, he joined Cablevision, eventually becoming its CFO and a director. After Cablevision sold to Time Warner in a $2.2 billion deal, Commisso founded Mediacom.
“What I foresaw is the fact that sooner or later, we’re gonna get deregulated, and there’s a great opportunity to do well in the smaller markets of the U.S., the rural markets, largely because nobody wanted them,” he told 60 Minutes.
A member of the Broadcasting & Cable Hall of Fame, the Cable Center Hall of Fame and the Columbia University Athletics Hall of Fame, Commisso also received National Italian American Foundation’s Life Achievement Award, the Ellis Island Medal of Honor and the Vanguard Award for Distinguished Leadership, the cable industry’s highest honor.
He was also active in the cable business community, serving on the boards of the National Cable & Telecommunications Association and C-SPAN.
But he never gave up on soccer.
He acquired the New York Cosmos soccer team in 2017, and two years later purchased the storied Serie A team ACF Fiorentina for $170 million.
“Football was his passion, and Fiorentina became so seven years ago, when Rocco took charge of the Viola club and began to love its supporters, its colors, and the city of Florence,” the team said. “’Call me Rocco,’ he had simply said to everyone, with his extraordinary empathy.”
The pressure was on after his purchase, with Fiorentina having gone decades without a championship, and with a wealthy American owner (albeit an immigrant from Italy) providing capital. The team became a focus, with Commisso becoming its president in addition to his day job in New York running Mediacom.
“They can’t kick Rocco outta here, you know? They think they gonna criticize me and kick me out. No, that can’t happen,” Commisso told 60 Minutes. “Rocco’s a little different.”