(08-30-2017 10:36 AM)stever20 Wrote: the thing with Fox is it's like they aren't even trying in the first week of the year. I mean, they do have A&M/UCLA which is decent- but there are several games at least as good if not better....
And week 2 while yeah Stanford/USC is good- it'll get dwarfed by Oklahoma/Ohio St on ABC.
And Fox's real problem is from March-August- they just do not have the firepower that ESPN has. I mean ESPN has more and better baseball- to include the HR derby. They have the tennis. They have the NBA. They have the NFL draft. Heck, they have the Little League stuff- which gets good ratings. Fox has what really? Soccer? MLB(some). 3 on 3 basketball? Some Nascar. UFC(which goes up for bidding this year I think).
Ratings so far this year-
ESPN- 689k
FS1- 156k
ratings for the last 12 months
ESPN- 791k
FS1- 177k
To be sure, Fox's MLB package is better than ESPN's package since they have the All Star Game (on Fox OTA) plus much more of the postseason (including an LCS and the World Series). The Fox soccer package is also very good with FIFA and CONCACAF - we saw how the Women's World Cup drew extremely well on the Fox networks and we should expect the same when they have the Men's World Cup next year during the summer.
However, I do think ESPN is better at packaging virtually anything that is on their network (whether it's pro sports, college sports or events like the National Spelling Bee or Little League World Series) as a must-see event. It's not an accident that they're extremely good at this when they're owned by Disney (who practically invented corporate synergy). ESPN isn't just a TV network - they have the dominant sports website, the dominant sports mobile app, the dominant sports streaming service, and the dominant sports radio network. Everything (whether big or small) gets cross-promoted on virtually every media platform out there and that all drives viewership to whatever event ESPN happens to be showing that evening. That means that ESPN can essentially run a test pattern and they could draw more viewers than FS1.
I don't think that's a knock on Fox (or NBC or Turner or anyone else). It's simply that the multi-platformed monster that ESPN has built is completely unique and unprecedented in the entertainment (not just sports) business. Every media company has tried to replicate what ESPN has many times over many decades, but ESPN has simply been better at executing its strategy compared to everyone else by a wide margin. I can practice shooting 3-pointers 18 hours a day and have the perfect technique... but I'll still never be as good as Steph Curry no matter what I do. That's essentially where the other sports networks are compared to ESPN - those other networks could have the exact same content as ESPN has now, but they still wouldn't be able to replicate the broad multi-platform dominance that ESPN has created no matter how hard they try.
I seem to continue to need to remind people of this, but up until the last couple years with increased cord cutting, ESPN was generating nearly as much profit by itself as the entire rest of The Walt Disney Company (even with its theme parks, ABC, Marvel, Star Wars, Pixar, Disney Princess and other revenue) COMBINED. Just think of how many Disney properties completely permeate American culture in terms of TV, movies, theme parks and toys... and yet ESPN was dwarfing them ALL. Even with cord cutting, just one month of ESPN cable subscriber fees today is the equivalent of the domestic box office for The Avengers (which is #5 on the all-time domestic box office list). REPEAT: ESPN generates gross subscriber revenue that is the equivalent of one of the top 5 movies of all-time EVERY SINGLE MONTH... and that's before they even sell a single ad (which also carry the highest rates in the industry because it's live sports drawing hard to reach young male viewers that actually watch commercials). I continue to be amazed by how little sports fans understand just how much money ESPN generates (which is why it has pummeled so many competitors). ESPN is the single most profitable *media and entertainment* company in the world, much less the most profitable sports network.