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9/16/2020 10:49 am  #1


A10 Media Coverage

Two ramifications of the current pandemic:  First, that live sports on television are among the very few things which advertisers can rely upon.  And second, most businesses are being forced to tighten their belts.  

This makes for some precarious possibilities regarding the coverage of A10 basketball.  Here is a recap of how things stand today:

NBC Sports Network televises many nationally televised conference games.  Practically all are on weekends. 
CBS Sports Network also televises many games including some good weeknight matchups. 
ESPN has a limited Friday night package of strong games.
ESPN+ has extensive coverage of I believe all non-televised conference games.  These games are streamed rather than televised.
Stadium has a handful of games which they syndicate to local markets.  GW games that end up on NBCSW or MASN, for example, are often produced by Stadium.

So, is the glass half full or half empty?  Sports network need live sports programming, and this is more true with ESPN+ than any of these other deals.  ESPN+ is subscription based so it must have enough offerings that make it worthwhile for its customers to spend money each month.  It has been creative with its programming, offering shows hosted by Peyton Manning, Mike Greenberg (a sports gambling/human interest show) and others which will either never be shown over regular ESPN or will be months after it first airs on +.  It has invested heavily on the UFC.  As it develops more original programming and acquires live sports to show, it presumably may becomes less reliant on A10 basketball to draw in customers.  Plus, it's strategy of bundling + with Disney and Hulu means that ESPN gets its cut from many who may never actually watch ESPN+.  My guess is that the ESPN Friday night package is contractually tied in with +, so if the A10 games ever migrated away from + (or were dropped by +), the Friday night games would go away as well.

As for the other outlets, these are essentially fringe networks to begin with.  One thing about the A10 is that our schools often geographically overlap or are close in proximity with other schools from major conferences (GW-Georgetown, Dayton-Xavier, St Joes/La Salle-Nova/Temple, URI-Providence/Boston College, Fordham-St. John's, etc.).  This matters because a network that feels its serving these markets already could be prone to drop the A10 from its lineup.  For example, CBS Sports Network televises a number of Big East games. 

So, why now with this post?  Like I said, it has to do with belt tightening.  Networks that may once have said that it's worth producing these games even if they don't make a lot of money on them may start to feel that it's no longer worth the expense.  What's likely to happen is that many sports production people are going to lose their jobs (and their benefits) but then will be asked to work games as freelancers.  This is terrible sounding to be sure but may very well be one of the harsh realities of today.  Those who say no will be replaced with less talented, less experienced freelancers, resulting in a drop in broadcast quality.  Will this happen with NFL Sunday Night football?  Probably not.  With A10 basketball?  A distinct possibility.

And yet, we would all gladly accept a drop in quality as long as we could still access these games on television.  I honestly don't know what will become of the NBC Sports Network, the CBS Sports Network, or Stadium?  Each has deep pockets behind them (Stadium is owned by Sinclair Broadcasting who recently purchased many of Fox's former regional sports networks).  But with each day of the pandemic, almost everyone's pockets become a bit smaller.
   

 

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