http://awfulannouncing.com/2016/fs1-morn...ormat.html

"...and what about FS1’s history-making week which gave the network its highest-ratings and beat ESPN for the first time in all dayparts?

We had the highest single day in FS1 history. Then you have the announcement we had the highest week in FS1 history. We have internal goals that we set, that are on backs of napkins for Jamie and myself. We’re starting to have to create new ones. …My goal originally was to create habit-forming programming. We didn’t have that when we got here. There were some really quality shows. But there wasn’t a full slate of programming. We do know what the sports fans want. They want people, and talent, who are incisive and entertaining. Now we’re two puzzle pieces away from having that lineup that we desire in the daypart."

But remember people FS1 has no shot going against ESPN and conferences like the Big East/Big 10 are dumb for not having all of their content on ESPN.

But then they ruin it with UFC and NASCAR.

to me, the problem with the Big East in particular was putting EVERYTHING on FS1 and nothing on ESPN. Big Ten didn't put everything on FS1. Of the top 10 basketball conferences, the Big East and the CAA are the only 2 that aren't on ESPN at least some.

And lets see what they do now that the baseball is off the network. Does Undisputed and the Herd continue to get the better numbers? Or was it a Cubs fueled thing and that's gone now.

Also just looking at Wednesday night shows big problems for FS1 still....

MLB game ended and the post game show on FS1.
1120-midnight- post game show drew only 186k viewers.
midnight-1230- Katie Nolan drew only 60k viewers
1230-1- Fox Sports Live drew only 47k viewers

the postgame show on FS1 from Game 6 of the LCS drew 3.371 million viewers

So folks aren't turning to FS1 at all.

(10-28-2016 09:27 AM)TheBasketBallOpinion Wrote:  http://awfulannouncing.com/2016/fs1-morn...ormat.html

"...and what about FS1’s history-making week which gave the network its highest-ratings and beat ESPN for the first time in all dayparts?

We had the highest single day in FS1 history. Then you have the announcement we had the highest week in FS1 history. We have internal goals that we set, that are on backs of napkins for Jamie and myself. We’re starting to have to create new ones. …My goal originally was to create habit-forming programming. We didn’t have that when we got here. There were some really quality shows. But there wasn’t a full slate of programming. We do know what the sports fans want. They want people, and talent, who are incisive and entertaining. Now we’re two puzzle pieces away from having that lineup that we desire in the daypart."

But remember people FS1 has no shot going against ESPN and conferences like the Big East/Big 10 are dumb for not having all of their content on ESPN.

To be fair, the people predicting FS1 had no shot against ESPN had no way of knowing that ESPN would decide to make themselves the sports media arm of the social justice warriors.

stever,

Just curious, what's your deal against FS1??

Are you against any competition for ESPN?

I don't have anything against FS1. I actually like Undisputed quite a bit. But the problem I have is that the Big East put everything with FS1. I think strategically that was a huge mistake. I mean, the top 10 basketball conferences only the CAA besides the Big East isn't on ESPN. There's a reason for that.

So you're against any conference that signs an exclusive deal with FS1.

What about conferences that sign exclusive deals with ESPN? Why is that ok?

(10-28-2016 10:20 AM)stever20 Wrote:  I don't have anything against FS1. I actually like Undisputed quite a bit. But the problem I have is that the Big East put everything with FS1. I think strategically that was a huge mistake. I mean, the top 10 basketball conferences only the CAA besides the Big East isn't on ESPN. There's a reason for that.

Every game is on national tv, the BE got more money, and three years into it, they have the national champion. It was a huge gamble, but as of today, it has paid off.

(10-28-2016 10:23 AM)MplsBison Wrote:  So you're against any conference that signs an exclusive deal with FS1.

What about conferences that sign exclusive deals with ESPN? Why is that ok?

I think a conference that signs an exclusive deal with FS1 is taking a major gamble. I think end of the day for instance with the Big Ten there was no chance in hell that they ever would go only FS1. Coaches wanted no part of that. Look at what happened with the MWC when they left ESPN totally. Look at C-USA same thing.

(10-28-2016 10:26 AM)MU88 Wrote:  

(10-28-2016 10:20 AM)stever20 Wrote:  I don't have anything against FS1. I actually like Undisputed quite a bit. But the problem I have is that the Big East put everything with FS1. I think strategically that was a huge mistake. I mean, the top 10 basketball conferences only the CAA besides the Big East isn't on ESPN. There's a reason for that.

Every game is on national tv, the BE got more money, and three years into it, they have the national champion. It was a huge gamble, but as of today, it has paid off.

Every game is NOT on national tv. You have games on FSN that aren't national. And starting next year, more and more games won't be on national tv. Also have games on FS2 where for a lot of folks- the channel isn't even in HD.

(10-28-2016 10:30 AM)stever20 Wrote:  

(10-28-2016 10:26 AM)MU88 Wrote:  

(10-28-2016 10:20 AM)stever20 Wrote:  I don't have anything against FS1. I actually like Undisputed quite a bit. But the problem I have is that the Big East put everything with FS1. I think strategically that was a huge mistake. I mean, the top 10 basketball conferences only the CAA besides the Big East isn't on ESPN. There's a reason for that.

Every game is on national tv, the BE got more money, and three years into it, they have the national champion. It was a huge gamble, but as of today, it has paid off.

Every game is NOT on national tv. You have games on FSN that aren't national. And starting next year, more and more games won't be on national tv. Also have games on FS2 where for a lot of folks- the channel isn't even in HD.

Totally, the Big East should just quit while they are ahead and should beg for ESPN to take them back

I wouldn't be surprised if you see Big East games on ESPN in a few years, after the CBS sublicensing deal ends.

stever #10,

I'm not denying that. But those are all practical considerations.

I want to talk about ideology.

- should there be competition for ESPN?
- should conferences never sign exclusive deals with networks, regardless if that's CBSSN, FS, ESPN, etc. ?

(10-28-2016 11:07 AM)MplsBison Wrote:  stever #10,

I'm not denying that. But those are all practical considerations.

I want to talk about ideology.

- should there be competition for ESPN?
- should conferences never sign exclusive deals with networks, regardless if that's CBSSN, FS, ESPN, etc. ?

1- I definitely want competition for ESPN.
2- I definitely think it's a mistake to do exclusive deals with networks. I mean, look at the ACC with ESPN. To get everything they got money wise, they had to expand up to 15, Give ND a deal where ND gets ACC bowl spots, and expand their basketball schedule up to 20 games.

Fair enough.

Thing is, with all the money the networks are dolling out, and now setting up conference networks, and with how TV is changing , I almost wonder if networks are going to start demanding exclusivity in the future.

Not rooting for that, but wouldn't be surprised.

To be sure, there's a lot of puffery and spin in that Awful Announcing piece. Here are the actual ratings of The Undisputed vs. First Take (going all the way up to earlier this week):

https://sportstvratings.com/espn2s-first...-but/6435/

As you can see, First Take has lost some of its audience compared to last year, but it's still drawing 2 to 3 times as many viewers as Undisputed on the average day. The only outliers have been the first week that Undisputed was on the air and the days where they had lead-ins from promotions during the very highly-rated NLCS involving the Cubs on the previous night.

There are a few takeaways from this:

(1) Skip Bayless has SOME value - Believe me - I personally hate Bayless and the vapid low information "embrace debate" garbage that he represents with a passion, but the ratings do show that he has some unique value over the vast majority of pundits on-the-air. You can see the First Take directly lost viewers once he left and FS1 is doing much better in the Undisputed time slot than before. That being said, we're grading on a very steep curve here. As noted previously, First Take still has 2 to 3 times the audience over Undisputed, so it's not as if though FS1 is beating ESPN2.

(2) Remember that this is FS1 competing with ESPN2 (not the ESPN mothership) - That last sentence needs to be emphasized further: FS1 is competing with ESPN2's space here and NOT the ESPN mothership (which still draws even higher ratings with SportsCenter and other programs that it shows in those timeslots). Remember this context that the comparisons being made here are with ESPN's *secondary* network... and that secondary network is still drawing 2 to 3 times as many viewers.

I've always been a skeptic about FS1's *non-event* programming ever realistically competing with the ESPN. It's not just a matter of TV programming: remember that ESPN is an entire sports ecosystem that is pretty much impossible to replicate. It starts with the #1 cable sports network at the top. However, it also has the #1 sports web site, the #1 sports radio network, the #1 sports mobile app and the #1 sports streaming service. That provides a dominant cross-promotional platform that NO ONE (even outside of sports) has here. This is something that every single media company has attempted to create for the past 20 years, yet none of them have found success at all.

Now, FS1 does have good *event* programming (and I'd say they have the best sporting event content outside of ESPN). Who would have thought even 5 years ago that the Cubs making it to the World Series, which is basically about as big of a historic sporting event as you can get, would be shown on a channel called FS1? The Big Ten content next will bolster it and they already have the Pac-12, Big 12, Big East, FIFA/World Cup, UEFA and USGA/US Open. (I'm less enthusiastic about their UFC and NASCAR focus. Both of those platforms are providing "empty calories" from a viewership standpoint, where they draw high ratings numbers on paper but the audience isn't very desirable to advertisers. It's the opposite for, say, golf and tennis that have lower overall viewer numbers but very high ad spending.) FS1 definitely has the best sports lineup outside of ESPN.

The big thing for FS1 is that it doesn't really seem to have a great network identity (which is ironic since the formation of the over-the-air Fox network leaned on a strong youthful identity from the get go and Fox News has an uber-strong political identity to a fault). This creates very little crossover from their high quality sporting events like MLB and P5 college sports. In contrast, ESPN has a consistent look and feel where EVERYTHING they show seems like a big event. Look at what happens when SportsCenter, College GameDay or Mike and Mike visits a location - you're not getting those crowds for a Fox show. Even NBCSN has seemed to become the yuppie/hipster sports network (with its focuses on the English Premier League and NHL) and TNT's Inside the NBA crew really sets the tone for their coverage (and is simply an incredibly well-run TV show). I guess FS1 is going for the "Embrace Debate" identity, although I'm not sure that's a great thing for the quality of their actual sports coverage. It's as if FS1 has taken the position that ESPN is TOO serious (which I personally can't stand, as I wish there was an NPR equivalent for sports as opposed to more bloviating opinions on the air).

Frank,

At some level -- maybe not 100% -- but at some level, I refuse to believe that ESPN adds significant value beyond the event itself. Go ahead, flame away with passion.

And if you believe me, then it should just be a matter of FS (or anyone) getting the platforms in place, easy enough to use, and in homes/on devices, to enable them to compete directly -- if/when they then secure the events that people care about watching.

$0.02

(10-28-2016 01:21 PM)MplsBison Wrote:  Frank,

At some level -- maybe not 100% -- but at some level, I refuse to believe that ESPN adds significant value beyond the event itself. Go ahead, flame away with passion.

And if you believe me, then it should just be a matter of FS (or anyone) getting the platforms in place, easy enough to use, and in homes/on devices, to enable them to compete directly -- if/when they then secure the events that people care about watching.

$0.02

Depends what you mean by ESPN adding value. If you're talking about the quality of the broadcast itself, then that's a subjective opinion. For instance, I think TNT's NBA coverage is far superior to ESPN's NBA coverage.

However, if you're talking about TV ratings, then ESPN definitely adds value because it's on that channel and as a result of the cross-promotional platforms noted above. For instance, you get beat into your head all week that FSU-Clemson and 3 different Big Ten games are going to be on ABC and the ESPN networks on Saturday from all different directions: TV, radio, web and mobile. That absolutely adds value from an objective perspective and pushes viewership numbers up. There's also the fact that ESPN is simply the "default" sports channel - if there's a game that's halfway interesting on ESPN, it gets a lot of priority unless another network has a legit marquee event as competition (like NFL games or the Cubs in the playoffs). This is also why I never bought that the Big Ten would completely leave ESPN unless Disney REALLY lowballed them on rights fees. As long as ESPN was in the same ballpark as Fox on the rights fees, the Big Ten wasn't going to move entirely off of ESPN. You can see the same calculation with literally every other sports entity that has market power in America: the NFL, MLB, NBA and all 5 college power conferences. ESPN's biggest value is shown in the *average" game - you'll get people to turn on FS1 to watch the Cubs play in the NLCS or the Women's World Cup Final, but if you put the exact same game on ESPN vs. FS1, there's just no question that ESPN will get the bigger audience. If that's not additional value, then I don't know what is.

to me Wednesday night showed a HUGE issue for FS1.....

the MLB coverage on Fox ended at 11:20...

Sportscenter on ESPN 2 drew 211k viewers
MLB postgame on FS1 drew 186k viewers

then midnight.
Sportscenter on ESPN2 drew 190k viewers
Katie Nolan and FSL on FS1 drew 60k and 47k respectively

so folks that turned to sports either went to ESPN2 (or ESPN for NBA) and didn't go to FS1.