Interesting for sure. Personally, I think FOXSports suffered from too many platforms, to confusing of who was showing what, and their poor humor on their highlights shows made them a mess to watch.
That said, I watch a lot of FOXSCarolinas for Hurricanes games but since they are also the channel for Hornets games I have to use their alt Channel which is nothing more than a FOXSS feed when they want to put a Hornets game on, otherwise its blank. Or they use that alt channel for moving a Canes game because of " FOXSC" doing ACC games or whatever instead in some cases.
In general though, their sports announcing crews always seem pretty good, but their sports related shows, highlights and otherwise on FS1 or 2 just seem kind of lets "FOX"ify a ESPN idea.
I still think Fox Sports-1 should make itself the G5 Network of record. Cover everything--just like now, but make a real effort to cover the G5 far more competently, fairly, completely, and respectfully than the other networks. Create a loyal niche and build from there. It's not that hard---you don't need 22 hours of Johnny Manziel to be successful covering the mainstream stuff. You can make an effort to competently cover the G5 without hurting your coverage of the mainstream sports stories.
The G5 fans are a significant college educated affluent audience that is not only igored, but largely made fun of and dismissed---just like the conservative news viewers prior to the emergence of Fox News. No reason a similar formula wouldn't work for Fox Sports-1. Grab the CUSA rights---pick up some excess AAC, MW, MAC, and SB games and get rolling. Build around your Pac12/Big12 content. Once the rep is built, you can shift some content over to FS-2 and make that a viable network when bigger properties are acquired.
Fox has no coherent vision for FS1/FS2, no effective plan for drawing viewers in to watch the channels regularly, and now we see that they give up easily and don't have the persistence to keep investing the money needed to build the channels as a viable alternative to any ESPN channels.
The next question is, how long will it be until Fox throws in the towel and sells FS1 and FS2? Another year? Two years, max?
(06-30-2015 12:53 AM)Wedge Wrote: [ -> ]Fox has no coherent vision for FS1/FS2, no effective plan for drawing viewers in to watch the channels regularly, and now we see that they give up easily and don't have the persistence to keep investing the money needed to build the channels as a viable alternative to any ESPN channels.
The next question is, how long will it be until Fox throws in the towel and sells FS1 and FS2? Another year? Two years, max?
It seems FS1 had more viewers when it was known as Speed. NASCAR viewership went down on the Fox channels, but higher on ESPN.
I actually disagree. The news updates- I've never looked at those as being all that important. I think they were thinking it would set them apart from ESPN- but it never really took- like a lot of things at FS1..
As far as the live reporting for events they don't have the rights to- Outside of maybe a few interviews, I don't think it matters if the talking heads are talking in Cleveland or in Los Angeles(to just use the NBA finals as an example). And they can do the interviews via satellite.
I think this is one thing where it really looks a lot worse than it really is. I don't think the casual fan will notice much of a difference quite frankly. I've been down on FS1 for a lot- but this isn't one of those things.
Outside of watching the Ufc, I don't watch fs1 at all but Wedge is right. It's like they have no vision for it at all.
(06-30-2015 12:53 AM)Wedge Wrote: [ -> ]Fox has no coherent vision for FS1/FS2, no effective plan for drawing viewers in to watch the channels regularly, and now we see that they give up easily and don't have the persistence to keep investing the money needed to build the channels as a viable alternative to any ESPN channels.
The next question is, how long will it be until Fox throws in the towel and sells FS1 and FS2? Another year? Two years, max?
Total agreement.
I mainly have been keeping an eye on the Fox effort because they could be a big boost to the G5 down the road.
They seem to have no idea at all of what they want to do with FS2 other than take up space on the channel guide at least NBC's vision for Universal Sports is understandable even if I don't like it.
Before the last round of bowl talks they publicly said they wanted to work with anyone looking to start a bowl and to try to get existing bowls. Meetings come and go and they sign zero existing bowls and zero new bowls. CBS Sports was the only one to take a new a game.
Little Rock and Austin from what I've heard couldn't get anyone at Fox to talk to them. A few games that had hoped to move to better dates with Fox couldn't get anything firm from them.
It's like they picked a strategy for bowls and within two weeks ditched it.
If they don't get a decent piece of the Big 10, they will have one notable property east of Ames, IA, the WVU Mountaineers. No NFL, no NBA, no NHL. They will have a piece of MLB but regular season games tend to not be a significant draw.
They've locked in 7 CUSA games for FS1 (more can be added, they have an 8th but it is under the Big XII contract) but there is no obvious strategy. One Sunday game, one Thursday game, three Friday games in two different time slots, two Saturday games under the contract in different time slots.
I think the thing that when you look back at things that really blindsided Fox with regards to sports is not having a chance to bid on the NBA. I think they were counting on that. I think now the Big Ten is so crucial to them that ESPN knows if they can shut them out there, Fox is in deep trouble with regards to sports.
FOX still owns the rights for Big East basketball. It's not an elite property, but to dismiss it as "not relevant" would be a little misleading.
(06-30-2015 09:04 AM)oliveandblue Wrote: [ -> ]FOX still owns the rights for Big East basketball. It's not an elite property, but to dismiss it as "not relevant" would be a little misleading.
The problem is college basketball regular season isn't all that meaningful. In the scope of TV sports, it's really not relevant at all.
Even with the scope of what fox has right now- I'd put NASCAR, UFC, Big 12 fb, Pac 12 fb, MLB, World Cup, US Open, and even MLS ahead of Big East basketball.
(06-30-2015 09:04 AM)oliveandblue Wrote: [ -> ]FOX still owns the rights for Big East basketball. It's not an elite property, but to dismiss it as "not relevant" would be a little misleading.
When the New Mexico Bowl with Arizona and Nevada draws a larger TV audience on ESPN vs a head-to-head match-up of the #1 college basketball team being upset on CBS (Indiana-Butler) and Utah State vs. Toledo Tater Bowl also draws a larger audience that day, it is hard to say regular season college hoops is terribly relevant.
They do a nice job with NASCAR but the college FB coverage is clearly not getting through. Most people don't' even know where FS1 is on the lineup. Half the time they have some crappy UFC reality show or a car auction on it seems.
Essentially they overpaid the Big 12 to help compensate for the terrible exposure the conference gets with games n FS1 while they grow the channel. In the process ESPN decided to promote its' brands (specifically SEC) which ultimately hurts the PAC and Big 12.
I do like Joel Klatt??sp He calls a good game IMO.
For a network with "no vision" they must be doing something right, they passed ESPN2 on viewers this past month due to the Women's World Cup and US Open. Just takes time to build a network up and FOX has a pretty decent lineup of sports properties to build around while more will be acquired in the future. FOX knew this wasn't going to be a quick process.
(06-30-2015 10:38 AM)MissouriStateBears Wrote: [ -> ]For a network with "no vision" they must be doing something right, they passed ESPN2 on viewers this past month due to the Women's World Cup and US Open. Just takes time to build a network up and FOX has a pretty decent lineup of sports properties to build around while more will be acquired in the future. FOX knew this wasn't going to be a quick process.
2-3 weeks due to the world cup/us open doesn't make a channel. They may have more viewers for a 2-3 week period, but that's not passing ESPN2 by any stretch.
The problem that Fox has with FS1 is the current group of properties isn't enough to make any sort of long term dent.. No NBA, NHL, NFL, and not enough of college football by any means. And way too much UFC which turns casual fans off quite a bit.
And while it's easy to say Fox knew this wasn't going to be a quick process, I don't think they expected to get totally shut out of the NBA at all.
(06-30-2015 10:52 AM)stever20 Wrote: [ -> ] (06-30-2015 10:38 AM)MissouriStateBears Wrote: [ -> ]For a network with "no vision" they must be doing something right, they passed ESPN2 on viewers this past month due to the Women's World Cup and US Open. Just takes time to build a network up and FOX has a pretty decent lineup of sports properties to build around while more will be acquired in the future. FOX knew this wasn't going to be a quick process.
2-3 weeks due to the world cup/us open doesn't make a channel. They may have more viewers for a 2-3 week period, but that's not passing ESPN2 by any stretch.
The problem that Fox has with FS1 is the current group of properties isn't enough to make any sort of long term dent.. No NBA, NHL, NFL, and not enough of college football by any means. And way too much UFC which turns casual fans off quite a bit.
And while it's easy to say Fox knew this wasn't going to be a quick process, I don't think they expected to get totally shut out of the NBA at all.
SportsCenter covers UFC fights. It isn't some WWE crap.
(06-30-2015 11:48 AM)MissouriStateBears Wrote: [ -> ] (06-30-2015 10:52 AM)stever20 Wrote: [ -> ] (06-30-2015 10:38 AM)MissouriStateBears Wrote: [ -> ]For a network with "no vision" they must be doing something right, they passed ESPN2 on viewers this past month due to the Women's World Cup and US Open. Just takes time to build a network up and FOX has a pretty decent lineup of sports properties to build around while more will be acquired in the future. FOX knew this wasn't going to be a quick process.
2-3 weeks due to the world cup/us open doesn't make a channel. They may have more viewers for a 2-3 week period, but that's not passing ESPN2 by any stretch.
The problem that Fox has with FS1 is the current group of properties isn't enough to make any sort of long term dent.. No NBA, NHL, NFL, and not enough of college football by any means. And way too much UFC which turns casual fans off quite a bit.
And while it's easy to say Fox knew this wasn't going to be a quick process, I don't think they expected to get totally shut out of the NBA at all.
SportsCenter covers UFC fights. It isn't some WWE crap.
They cover it some. FS1 to a lot of folks is the UFC channel. They cover it at least 10 times more than ESPN does. And that turns a lot of mainstream sports fans totally off.
(06-30-2015 01:02 PM)MissouriStateBears Wrote: [ -> ]http://awfulannouncing.com/2015/is-espn-...-line.html
ESPN letting higher-priced "stars" go when they want more money is nothing new there. They offered guys like Eisen and Patrick small salary increases when negotiating new contracts and then let them go rather than give them huge raises.
(06-30-2015 12:53 AM)Wedge Wrote: [ -> ]Fox has no coherent vision for FS1/FS2, no effective plan for drawing viewers in to watch the channels regularly, and now we see that they give up easily and don't have the persistence to keep investing the money needed to build the channels as a viable alternative to any ESPN channels.
I thought FS1/FS2 college football content and quality was good, but I really struggle to understand how a major broadcast network failed to understand its target demographic as badly as Fox did with FS1/FS2. Doesn't every network try to maximize carryover viewership by clustering like programming, probably best exemplified by NBC's "Must See TV" Thursday night lineup? Did Fox actually buy PAC12 content because they thought that the typical Stanford fan would stick around after the game to watch Nascar and UFC? Nothing like a four hour Nascar lead in to your 10 PM PAC game seeing as how widely popular Nascar is in among college educated left coasters. It is simply mysterious to me what collection of assumptions they were operating under which made this seem like a good programming arrangement.