The short e-mail arrived to VideoAge‘s editor-in-chief Dom Serafini’s inbox on June 15, 2019: “Dom, we finally bought a team in a beautiful city. I am very happy. You should call me in my office on Monday. Thanks — Rocco.”
That Rocco was Rocco Commisso, the chairman of the New York-based Mediacom and the subject of VideoAge‘s October 2017 front cover story, which profiled him as the builder of America’s fifth-largest cable-TV operator. On the day of that e-mail, Rocco had purchased the Italian football (soccer) team Fiorentina.
Rocco and Dom didn’t see eye-to-eye as far as Italian football was concerned: Rocco was a fan of Turin’s Juventus, Dom a fan of Milan. During the interview that resulted in VideoAge‘s cover story, Rocco became upset when told that Juventus didn’t play by the rules.
As a former New York Cosmos owner, Rocco had long dreamed of owning an Italian football club; with the Fiorentina purchase, that dream became reality.
On Saturday, January 17, 2026, both Mediacom and Fiorentina announced Commisso’s death without providing a cause. He was 76.
“After a prolonged period of medical treatment, our beloved president has left us, and today we all mourn his passing,” Fiorentina said. “His love for Fiorentina was the greatest gift he gave himself.”
Commisso founded Mediacom in 1995 and in 2000 he directed a successful initial public offering, paving the way for the company’s growth into the nation’s fifth largest cable television provider, offering high-speed data, video, phone, and mobile services to over three million households and businesses in 22 states.
After turning Mediacom into one of America’s biggest cable companies, Commisso purchased the Florence-based team in 2019 and became known for speaking out against Italy’s bureaucracy and its resistance to building new stadiums.
Italian-born Commisso served on the boards of the National Cable & Telecommunications Association, C-SPAN, CableLabs, Cyndx LLC, and the National Italian American Foundation.
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