Media General’s shares gained 22 percent to $13.55 in early trading.

The bid, which works out to $14.50 per share, accounts for a premium of 30% to Media General’s Friday close.

Charging that Media General deal to acquire Meredith is “value-destructive” and “ill-conceived”, Nexstar CEO Perry Sook says he is prepared to pay $14.50 for Media General, a 30% premium over Friday’s close.

Media General agreed on September 8 to acquire all of the outstanding common stock of diversified media company Meredith in a cash and stock deal valued at about $2.4 billion or about $3.1 billion, including Meredith’s net debt balance of $772 million.

A deal with Nexstar would derail Media General’s agreement to purchase Meredith (NYSE:MDP) about $2.34bn.

Nexstar, meanwhile, owns and operates 107 television stations in 58 markets, accounting for about 18% of American households.

“Based on our estimates, the combined Media General/Meredith would be required to divest approximately 37% of the acquired broadcast EBITDA, compared to only 7% in the case of a Nexstar/Media General combination”.

The deal will create the second biggest local TV station operator in the United States.

Nexstar said the proposed combination would be well positioned to deliver superior immediate and long-term shareholder value compared to the proposed combination of Media General with Meredith Corp.

After selling most of its newspaper holdings to a subsidiary of Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway a few years ago, Media General has bulked up through deals including its purchase of LIN Media last year and New Young Broadcasting in 2013.

Executives for both Meredith and Media General have said that they view Meredith’s magazine titles as a key driver of content creation for their digital properties.

To that end, Nexstar announced this morning that it was offering $4.1 billion for Media General (which includes assumption of debt).