The most interesting part to me is that the article mentions ESPN will have to charge nearly $40 to ala carte subscribers just to cover their rights fees. No more forced subsidy, either ESPN finds enough ACC subscribers willing to pay that fee, or ESPN starts losing money and ESPN has to renegotiate to a lower payout to the ACC and cuts back just like they are with on air talent. Just using ACC as an example but it could be NBA or anything else.

Sports bubble is popping and either the fans will pay much much more or ESPN or the conferences/players will get less. I doubt many will pay $40 for just ESPN heading into a recession.

America Sports Network may benefit

Meh. That's just wishful thinking. Football fans in the UK pay > $50/month just to have Premier League and Champions League games. $35/month for all of the ESPN channels is more sports for less money.

(07-27-2015 10:53 PM)Wedge Wrote:  Meh. That's just wishful thinking. Football fans in the UK pay > $50/month just to have Premier League and Champions League games. $35/month for all of the ESPN channels is more sports for less money.

We are paying more than $50 for Disney and ESPN. So many people dropped Suddenlink which they keep raising our bill to even afford to have ESPN. There will be a time that cable will say enough is enough and drop ESPN and the evil mouse.

(07-27-2015 10:53 PM)Wedge Wrote:  Meh. That's just wishful thinking. Football fans in the UK pay > $50/month just to have Premier League and Champions League games. $35/month for all of the ESPN channels is more sports for less money.

You won't find me paying that much to a bunch of SEC lovers.

If all B1G games were only on the BTN, then I'd consider paying that kind of change in the football season to get all the B1G games.

(07-27-2015 10:27 PM)Miami (Oh) Yeah ! Wrote:  The most interesting part to me is that the article mentions ESPN will have to charge nearly $40 to ala carte subscribers just to cover their rights fees.

I don't know why this is a surprise. We have been saying this for 3 years on the many, many, threads you personally have started on this subject, and you disagreed every time.

Dang, 40, 50, 70 dollars????? Sorry, but Americans are not going to pay that a month. ESPN is going to lose money, and a lot of it.

(07-27-2015 10:20 PM)MplsBison Wrote:  

(07-27-2015 10:10 PM)arkstfan Wrote:  

(07-27-2015 05:16 PM)MplsBison Wrote:  

(07-27-2015 03:04 PM)goofus Wrote:  

(07-27-2015 12:58 PM)MplsBison Wrote:  So you'd pay the same $50/mo just for ESPN, except where let's say the screen goes blank and the audio cuts out when commercials are playing, as someone who pays $50/mo for a full cable package (including the same ESPN feed, with the commercials)?

Maybe you can just pay someone to sit there, then when commercials come on he can put a cardboard box over the screen and mute the sound.

thats not what I wrote and I am pretty sure you are aware what I meant. I do not pay for long delays caused by commercials. I pay $8.99 a month for netflix because I believe that is reasonable.

As for ESPN, if it charged $8.99 a month and it broadcast games without delays due to commercials or for any kind of commercial reasons, I would pay for that.

If they try to charge $50, probably not. If there is a game I really want to watch, I will go to a bar instead.

There never will be such a thing as a telecast of a game that does not interrupt the normal game timeline in order to show commercials.

That's just a fact of life.

Unless the game is soccer.

There you go, there's the answer that goofus so badly desires.

Convince the NFL, NBA and NCAA to adopt running clocks for each half. No timeouts, period, for anything.

That's the thing. Before games were regularly telecast on TV, football took breaks after each score and each change of possession. Baseball between innings and pitching changes. Basketball took breaks in the action on fouls, out-of-bounds, and timeouts. TV didn't invent the breaks it just increased how long they were.

NASCAR, Formula 1, and cycling don't pull over to the side of the course for commercial breaks.

The breaks are going to happen, only thing potentially up for discussion is how long those breaks are.

(07-28-2015 08:38 AM)arkstfan Wrote:  The breaks are going to happen, only thing potentially up for discussion is how long those breaks are.

Yup. For example if you watch NBA summer league basketball, there are no timeouts (other than the in between quarter breaks), half time is only 8 minutes, and there were far fewer fouls than a regular game. And the games STILL filled the entire 2 hour TV window (games were 40 minutes like college).

(07-28-2015 08:16 AM)Nebraskafan Wrote:  Dang, 40, 50, 70 dollars????? Sorry, but Americans are not going to pay that a month. ESPN is going to lose money, and a lot of it.

I seriously doubt that ESPN is going to have a big hit.

MLB.TV had 2.2 million subscribers at $115 a year in 2011. That sounds tiny but consider what a limited product it is. In Little Rock the most popular team is the Cardinals followed a decent way back by the Rangers. A $115 subscription gets you 0 Cardinals games, 0 Rangers games, 0 Royals games, and 0 Astros games.

If you live in Chicago MLB.TV gets you 0 Cubs and 0 White Sox games.

You get 0 playoff games. If you live Atlanta and your favorite team is the Pirates, you get blacked out of Pirates games every time they play Atlanta.

That's 2.2 million people (four years ago!) buying because they are either baseball crazy or their favorite team is in another market.

That works out to $20 a month for no local teams, no All-Star game, no playoffs and ONLY MLB games.

(07-28-2015 08:54 AM)arkstfan Wrote:  That's 2.2 million people (four years ago!) buying because they are either baseball crazy or their favorite team is in another market.

That works out to $20 a month for no local teams, no All-Star game, no playoffs and ONLY MLB games.

WWE Netwok is $10 per month, and you don't get their TV shows. You do get their PPV's, but none of their 4 TV shows. And consider they were charging $50 per show for a 3 hour show once a month, and making a killing doing so, you can see how it can work. I mean Boxing matches still go for $50-$60 a pop. UFC Events nearly the same. And these are one time events that last only a few hours, none near as popular as say Monday Night Football.

A one time event isn't the same as paying the same dollar figure on a monthly basis that could be on ending.

People will pay to watch their favorite sports, but when there favorite sports are not on, there will be people who drop it until their favorte sport season starts again and the cycle continues. That's just the reality of what life will be like.

There are people that already do that with basic cable.

(07-28-2015 09:22 AM)Nebraskafan Wrote:  A one time event isn't the same as paying the same dollar figure on a monthly basis that could be on ending.

You realize the events I described were all recurring monthly events, not one time events, right? WWE has 12-13 PPV's per year. UFCS has -77. There are Boxing PPV's every month. Plus there are off brand PPV's of each of the those sports (other wrestling promotions such as ROH and TNA, other MMA promotions such as Strikeforce, second tier boxing cards, etc). None of these are near as popular as just MNF, for example, and people pay $40-$60 per month for these events, monthly, that last only a few hours, many who buy every one of them for that particular sport. We have not even gotten into existing ala carte channels, such as HBO (30 million subscribers), Showtime, Starz, etc, who charge about half of what ESPN would charge, who's customers likely don't watch as often as they would ESPN.

I have long said I don't think ala carte would be happen because once the true cost becomes apparent, the status quo in some form would likely remain. But if it happens, the cost is very real. We already saw it with Disney, which was once an ala carte channel, and cost the same as HBO did at the time, and now goes wholesale for $1.00 per month. ESPN charges five times that. I don't know that they would charge quite five times the amount Disney does ala carter, but double (Which would be about $35 per month if Disney goes for HBO's $17.00 per month) is MORE than within the low end range.

A boxing match people pay for is something people will pay once for, but not every month besides hardcore boxing fans.

Just like causal basketball fans like me will not pay to watch college basketball, but I will find an online stream for free.

If people know of a way out of paying for something they know they can watch for free, they will take the free route. Hence why so many people share login information for HBO or whatever it is called since I don't watch those channels.

(07-28-2015 09:55 AM)Nebraskafan Wrote:  A boxing match people pay for is something people will pay once for, but not every month besides hardcore boxing fans.

Just like causal basketball fans like me will not pay to watch college basketball, but I will find an online stream for free.

If people know of a way out of paying for something they know they can watch for free, they will take the free route. Hence why so many people share login information for HBO or whatever it is called since I don't watch those channels.

Let me go back to a favorite analogy.

You are an athletic director and you can sell 75,000 seats at $50 a pop or you can sell 55,000 seats at $75 a pop, which would you rather do?

Hint 55,000 at $75 produces more revenue and you should end up with lower security costs, lower parking management costs, and a smaller water bill from the toilets being flushed fewer times. You make less on sales of official beverage of the team but that's not big money and you offset part of that with fewer people employed to sell, clean up after the game takes less time.

ESPN is at around 94 million subscribers at roughly $6 per month. $564 million a month. At $40 a month $14.1 million subscribers gives you the same base revenue.

If 80% of ESPN subscribers balk at $40 a month, ESPN is laughing all the way to the bank.

(07-27-2015 10:15 PM)Okielite Wrote:  You can already get ESPN in a streaming package through sling TV

Exactly. And its $20/month, not the $50 that people are talking about here. ESPN, ESPN2, and since SlingTV pays the ESPN3 fee, ESPN3 (critical for a Kent State fan), among others. And TNT as well, so in Beijing in March, Sling TV and a VPN is the best way to follow the NCAA Tourney.

Its Sports package for an extra $5 does not include BTN, nor NBCSN, but if you have a device that can pick up SlingTV and cannot pick up HOB Now, you can add HBO as well ... I think that Sling TV basic plus HBO adds up to $35.

(07-28-2015 10:03 AM)arkstfan Wrote:  Let me go back to a favorite analogy.

You are an athletic director and you can sell 75,000 seats at $50 a pop or you can sell 55,000 seats at $75 a pop, which would you rather do?

Its a close call, since there's a benefit to the school from the exposure from those extra 25,000 fans, so you have to offset the extra money against the lower exposure.

If you can sell 75,000 a $50 a pop ($3.75m) or 45,000 at $75 a pop ($3.375m), you clearly prefer the $45. AND if you can sell 75,000 at $50 a pop ($3.75m) or 50,000 at $75 a pop ($3.75m), you also clearly prefer the $50.

Quote: ESPN is at around 94 million subscribers at roughly $6 per month. $564 million a month. At $40 a month $14.1 million subscribers gives you the same base revenue.

If 80% of ESPN subscribers balk at $40 a month, ESPN is laughing all the way to the bank.

But, of course, a substantial share of that 94m would not pay that $6 as a separate payment ... they are getting basic cable, they need the Cartoon Network to keep the kids happy, they don't give a damn about sports. Its much fewer than 94m than watch ESPN more than once or twice a year. It would not be surprising if half of ESPN's would balk at an unbundled $6/month. 80% balking at $40/month seems a certainty ... the question is whether its 90% that balks at that price or 95%.

And given that you can already get ESPN online for $20/month, with other channels included, its hard to see how ESPN gets 5% of current basic cable subscribers to pay $40/month just for ESPN. The $40 ESPN package would have to include some premium features over and above the live ESPN stream, and over and above what is available from WatchESPN.

(07-28-2015 09:55 AM)Nebraskafan Wrote:  A boxing match people pay for is something people will pay once for, but not every month besides hardcore boxing fans.

You can say that, but it just doesn't jive in reality. There are a few boxing matches that some people will only pay for once (Mayweather vs. Pacquiao), but by and large it is the same people who order fights and PPV's over and over. This isn't even debateable as WWE, UFC, Goldenboy promotions, etc will all tell you the same thing. They have spent gobs of money doing research on this. It is mostly the same people who buy their product, with "big" matches and events drawing more casual fans. The numbers are in the tens of millions, but they are there. Meanwhile you have 30 million people who pay $15-$20 every month for HBO (another 140 million worldwide). By and large, even people who subscribe to HBO, watch it far less often than the average ESPN viewer watches ESPN. If people are willing to pay $20 per month for something they watch less than once per week, people who watch ESPN much more often will be willing to pay 50% more to get ESPN. Especially if that is the only way to get it (legally).

It has already been shown above that people pay $20 for MLB games that do not include home teams. 3 Million of people pay $300 per year, nearly $75 per month, for NFL Sunday ticket, which does not include local teams' games, prime time games, national TV games, or playoff games. Same with the NBA League Pass, which is $200 per year, and does not include home team games, playoff games, or national TV games on TNT, ESPN, ABC, or NBA TV.

I think you are vastly underestimated what people will pay for what they like, especially when that is the only option. Even though ESPN is the main target here, they are not the ones who will suffer.

(07-28-2015 10:04 AM)BruceMcF Wrote:  

(07-27-2015 10:15 PM)Okielite Wrote:  You can already get ESPN in a streaming package through sling TV

Exactly. And its $20/month, not the $50 that people are talking about here. ESPN, ESPN2, and since SlingTV pays the ESPN3 fee, ESPN3 (critical for a Kent State fan), among others. And TNT as well, so in Beijing in March, Sling TV and a VPN is the best way to follow the NCAA Tourney.

You are comparing apples to oranges. You can get ESPN on basic cable and it costs far less. But everyone who has Sling is getting it, meaning they are paying a wholesale rate, for everyone just like cable, in the neighborhood of $5-$6 per month. Cable has a lot of built in costs and margins, that Sling doesn't because they don't maintain the infrastructure, so they can profit even if charging less.
What we are talking is as an ala carte channel, or retail if you like, where no one is paying wholesale to get every subscriber the channel. The two are not remotely comparable.

(07-28-2015 10:04 AM)BruceMcF Wrote:  And given that you can already get ESPN online for $20/month, with other channels included, its hard to see how ESPN gets 5% of current basic cable subscribers to pay $40/month just for ESPN. The $40 ESPN package would have to include some premium features over and above the live ESPN stream, and over and above what is available from WatchESPN.

You can't get ESPN online for $20 ala carte. You are getting it on basic cable, just like you could at time warner or AT&T. You can get basic Direct TV for $19.99 which includes ESPN. This is not the same as we are discussing.

(07-28-2015 10:03 AM)arkstfan Wrote:  Let me go back to a favorite analogy.


ESPN is at around 94 million subscribers at roughly $6 per month. $564 million a month. At $40 a month $14.1 million subscribers gives you the same base revenue.

If 80% of ESPN subscribers balk at $40 a month, ESPN is laughing all the way to the bank.

There is one flaw in this argument. You assume they make no money on advertising and sponsorships. With 94 million subscribers, you have 6 times as many potential sets of eyes to see a a particular ad, which makes the larger events more profitable. Also for ESPN, there is no additional cost for extra subscribers (for cable companies this analogy makes more sense). Finally one additional problem in this scenario is each lost subscriber is a bigger deal than it is now, since each subscriber is worth more money. You could see issues where slower months (summer months) show subscribers leaving and coming back in the fall, whereas the status quo is a much more steady income stream.

So while ESPN could certainly survive and thrive, I don't see them being better off than they are now either.

(07-28-2015 10:10 AM)adcorbett Wrote:  

(07-28-2015 09:55 AM)Nebraskafan Wrote:  A boxing match people pay for is something people will pay once for, but not every month besides hardcore boxing fans.

You can say that, but it just doesn't jive in reality. There are a few boxing matches that some people will only pay for once (Mayweather vs. Pacquiao), but by and large it is the same people who order fights and PPV's over and over. This isn't even debateable as WWE, UFC, Goldenboy promotions, etc will all tell you the same thing. They have spent gobs of money doing research on this. It is mostly the same people who buy their product, with "big" matches and events drawing more casual fans. The numbers are in the tens of millions, but they are there. Meanwhile you have 30 million people who pay $15-$20 every month for HBO (another 140 million worldwide). By and large, even people who subscribe to HBO, watch it far less often than the average ESPN viewer watches ESPN. If people are willing to pay $20 per month for something they watch less than once per week, people who watch ESPN much more often will be willing to pay 50% more to get ESPN. Especially if that is the only way to get it (legally).

It has already been shown above that people pay $20 for MLB games that do not include home teams. 3 Million of people pay $300 per year, nearly $75 per month, for NFL Sunday ticket, which does not include local teams' games, prime time games, national TV games, or playoff games. Same with the NBA League Pass, which is $200 per year, and does not include home team games, playoff games, or national TV games on TNT, ESPN, ABC, or NBA TV.

I think you are vastly underestimated what people will pay for what they like, especially when that is the only option. Even though ESPN is the main target here, they are not the ones who will suffer.

The ones that keep paying are the hardcore fans, unless they have excells income vs expenses and do no care.

Non-Hardcore fans aren't going to pay unless they need to.

It's just like other things in life. Do you pay for life lock if you have a lot of money and your identity you want to protect or would the price not be worth it for you since you have limited funds to work with each month.

I LOVE football, but if I have the option of easily cutting ESPN out of my monthly expense for half of the year, I will do it. And I know other people that will do it.

Also, as I mentioned, I LOVE football, but if I can find thee games for free I'm not even going to pay to watch ESPN.

If the only way that I can watch BTN was in a package that included other channels, then I would pay for football season only. I don't watch other sports that much.