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Nothing about that article sounds good. MLBTV is already notorious with their punitive blackouts and now Sinclair may squeeze the cable providers. I guess I may have to go old school and see if I can get KMOX six hours away or just listen on Sirius XM.
A number of people that I respect have gone to Sinclair, but I know very litte about them. Don’t know much about them but the key will be whether they keep a firm line between sports and politics. ESPN hasn’t done that and are paying a price.
Prices may go up. Apparently Fox didn’t see much future in the sports network or they would not have dumped it. So the challenge will be to keep viewership and too much increase in price will defeat that purpose.
It seems that MLB is getting such a huge price for broadcast rights that it will be hard for any network to make much money off the broadcasts.
Is suspect that some will turn away because Sinclair is somewhat conservative. But politics will never determine what sports broadcasts I watch.
While this story is about FOX Sports Detroit, one may surmise that the freelancers who make up most of the production crew for all of the other Sinclair regional sports networks (including FOX Sports Midwest) are being handled similarly.
Sinclair signs a partner for a new digital venture.
What do you think this means for those of us who live in areas where we get FSM but because we are in a region that multiple teams have “rights” to we only see one teams game (and unfortunately for me that is the Royals and not the Cardinals even though I pay extra for my RSN)?
I don’t figure they will be but I can still hold out hope. It is very frustrating that I can watch everything else on FSM (Channel 671) except anything related to the Cardinals. Any program that deals with the Cardinals gets blacked out regardless if there is anything Royals related on FSM (671-5). Even during all of this COVID-19 nonsense when they were showing repeats of the All-Time Cardinal games I was blocked from watching them. The rules are archaic and nobody (MLB, FSM, DirecTV/DISH) want to take ownership and always blame each other. It is a slap in the face to fans.
I will step down from my soapbox now! Thanks for the welcome and listening (reading). 🙂
Ideally, MLB would have removed all blackouts as a thank-you to fans who had to put up with all their BS this year and who could not go to see games in person this season even if they wanted to. However, MLB is not going to do that because it would show they could.
In their defense, individual teams’ broadcast contracts likely complicate matters significantly. And we all know that when money is involved, there isn’t going to be any givebacks. Fans will be asked to just pay more.
The fun continues… YouTube TV had already dropped the RSNs on October 1.
The problems with cable followed us as cord-cutters. Hulu+ Live TV has announced they cannot come to agreement with Sinclair and will stop carrying 22 regional sports networks, including @FSMidwest, effective tomorrow. https://t.co/VePjhkittp
— Brian Walton (@B_Walton) October 22, 2020
I've received many questions about alternatives to get your FOX/Sinclair regional sports networks now that they are off YouTube TV and Hulu + Live TV. The remaining choices aren't that appealing, but here they are. (free) https://t.co/5JD0m022Lv pic.twitter.com/0D3o0wdFfZ
— Brian Walton (@B_Walton) October 23, 2020
You would have to think that eventually MLB will have no choice but to end the blackout policy. Once there are no more exclusive deals it will need to adapt or be left way in the dust.
All this makes me more thankful that I live where the big majority of Cards games are able to streamed, as of now.
Yes, this current problem affects those viewers in market. Those outside of Cardinals territory still have MLB.TV to watch games.
Remember that there are highly lucrative multi-decade contracts between teams and RSNs that almost certainly assume blackouts. To remove them all would be huge renegotiation efforts and a lot of money would be given up, which is why the problem (for viewers) persists after so long.
One would have to think that at some point, ratings are going to go down across the board for the simple fact that is getting harder and harder for fans to find the games to watch. I wonder what that “puke point” is…
This whole issue is the only reason I have stayed with my local cable provider. I actually have cable, Netflix, Amazon Prime, Hulu, and HBO. Is my TV and internet bill way too high? Yes it is but my wife and I decided to have that as a splurge item since she has certain shows she can’t do without and I don’t want to miss the Cardinal games.
The blackout rules are crazy. A guy I work with, who happens to be a Cub fan unfortunately, watches all of the Cub games on MLBTV with no problem but of course I can’t do that with Cardinal games here in NW Arkansas even though I am six hours from St. Louis. (sigh)
If DirectTV and cable are the only options left for in market viewing of the games, I can’t imagine that ratings won’t take a big hit before long. I know that I personally would have to be pushed a lot to go the route of DirecTV given all of their problems and uncertainty. Where I live, there are no cable options.
That is a good point 25. If the FSM ratings tank due to fans not having the option to watch would that motivate the team to step up and get more involved with the negotiations or blackout rules?
I suspect any change in direction on blackout rules would have to start from MLB and work down, not the other way around. Back when Selig was commissioner, he vowed to fix it, but it never happened.
On the ratings, it brings up a good question. Is the money an RSN commits to pay a team affected by ratings? My suspicion is that the team gets its money either way, but the RSN takes a hit on ad rates. The primary pressure would seem to be on Sinclair.
This is both really interesting and pretty scary at the same time. We know the streaming providers are balking at the prices to carry Regional Sports Networks. One of the ideas reportedly being looked at by Sinclair (and others) to get and hold more viewers, which in turn increases the value of the RSNs, is to integrate live betting into the game telecasts. Their market research shows that more people watch games and stay watching them when they have their own money riding on the outcome.
https://www.sportico.com/business/media/2020/yes-network-sports-betting-1234615803/
Sinclair is taking a bath on the FOX Sports Nets.
The KC situation suggests the team was willing to take less in rights fees in return for a share of network ownership.
At the time of the last deal between the Cardinals and FS Midwest, the team reportedly had a 30% stake in FSM. I haven’t heard that it has changed.
Sinclair has written down $4.23B against the 21 FOX Sports Regional Nets they paid $9.6B for just last year. Subscribers down, carriers dropped networks. Very interesting note that they renegotiated the FS KC contract to give the team an ownership stake. https://t.co/IJX123BIJm pic.twitter.com/lBD1fV1HZh
— Brian Walton (@B_Walton) November 5, 2020
You wonder if the end game will be teams running their own TV gig and selling “tickets” for everything. It doesn’t sound feasible now when the outside money flows in, but as more cords get cut and streaming replaces cable and satellite, it seems likely that more and more specialized and targeted entertainment options will invade even sports. Want to watch the Cards broadcasts? Gonna cost you a PPV fee every game.
Just when I thought it couldn't get any weirder. About those FOX Sports Nets we can no longer see? Sinclair is talking with betting companies about selling naming rights, per Sportico. "Coming up next, your #stlcards game on 'DraftKings Sports Midwest'!" https://t.co/glva1yBBjo pic.twitter.com/eounL1XBOc
— Brian Walton (@B_Walton) November 17, 2020
I have been bouncing from one streaming source to the next chasing fsmw with the package of other channels I want. It appears I am out of choices now without being right back up to satellite prices so I’ve given up now. This is bound to hurt the teams if nobody is willing to pay the price for rsn programming.
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