Misc Fox Sports Southwest / Bally Sports Southwest / FanDuel Sports Network Southwest Status

[LeBowen]

The best thing Spurs ownership can do is doing what the Suns did and move to free to air TV.
Would mean losing out on some money directly from the broadcaster, but the viewership would skyrocet and there would surely be way more revenue from the commercials.

 

[Russ]

FanDuel always looked like a shoestring operation, relegated only to small markets.

It was unstable with no production value and little on-air talent.

Something was bound to happen.

 

[Exstatic]

I

The best thing Spurs ownership can do is doing what the Suns did and move to free to air TV.
Would mean losing out on some money directly from the broadcaster, but the viewership would skyrocet and there would surely be way more revenue from the commercials.

That would be full circle. Local feed TSN was bought by FS local, which was spun off to Bally after ESPN bought FS,which was sold to FanDual Sports When Bally struggled.

 

[Neuromancer]

This blows. Really gonna suck when FanDuel Sports goes down and we can't watch games. I don't have faith that the FO will prioritize broadcasting the games over the air so fans can actually watch the team. I'm going to have to use league pass on a fucking VPN or something

 

[LeBowen]

This blows. Really gonna suck when FanDuel Sports goes down and we can't watch games. I don't have faith that the FO will prioritize broadcasting the games over the air so fans can actually watch the team. I'm going to have to use league pass on a fucking VPN or something

If noone holds the local broadcast rights, blackouts shouldn't be a thing?

 

[Manu20]

The best thing Spurs ownership can do is doing what the Suns did and move to free to air TV.
Would mean losing out on some money directly from the broadcaster, but the viewership would skyrocet and there would surely be way more revenue from the commercials.

If that would be the case I would have to get a VPN and League Pass as I'm in South Texas Rio Grande Valley area. We do get local KENS games broadcast on 4.1KGBT tho.

For some reason we do get all the Mavs game (Except National Televise game) locally also on 4.1KGBT.

 

[Manu20]

If noone holds the local broadcast rights, blackouts shouldn't be a thing?

Obvious answer would be No but thinking how bizarre the blackout rules I doubt they would change it mid season :/ Fingers crossed tho!

 

[Neuromancer]

If noone holds the local broadcast rights, blackouts shouldn't be a thing?

Hey good point. Tiny victory lol

 

[LeBowen]

Obvious answer would be No but thinking how bizarre the blackout rules I doubt they would change it mid season :/ Fingers crossed tho!

Common sense logic is that league pass blackouts happen because someone else pays for the exclusive broadcasting rights in that area.
If noone holds the rights, then there shouldn't be any blackouts.

And as greedy as the league is, they're pretty strict with these things and there's no chance they'd allow half the league to be affected by blackouts while noone is actually broadcasting.

 

[scott]

League Pass works pretty well for me outside of games against the Lakers and Clippers, so m opinion should be taken with a grain of salt, but I think the league should do this:

1. Leave each team to work out its own local broadcast rights deals. Whether the team wants to air them for free, or work it out with a cable package, that is completely up to them.
2. Eliminate blackout rules so that anyone can get access to any game via League Pass (excluding National TV deals since obviously the league has already made a deal with those platforms to exclusively carry those games). Share revenue with teams based on streaming traffic. So many people have cut the cord, I feel like there is probably a significant population of local viewers who would get League Pass if it was the way to watch every game of their local team, and it's already cheaper than whatever people are paying for that FanDuel package, which is nuts to me.

 

[Arguendo]

If money is the objective, sure, some more people will pay... though probably not enough to offset the money teams were getting from the regional sports networks.
The Texas Rangers, as an example, had around 300K subscribers to its games on Victory+ at $100 per season... So $30 million minus operating costs, compared to the $95 million per season it made from DSG.

For long term brand health though? Free is the way to go. Think of all of the people in random areas of the country who are Cubs and Braves fans because they started watching those games on basic cable before they'd even been to Atlanta or Chicago (and before those teams were even any good).

There are three NBA teams in Texas, imagine if one of those teams had the balls to make every game available for free on YouTube. They would dwarf the other two teams in developing a long term following, which leads to more merch sales, higher ticket revenue, generations of fans, and more value when you sell the team. (And who knows what kind of YouTube ad revenue they could collect.)

I'm sure someone smarter than me has already run these numbers, and I realize players cost money, but I still don't understand limiting your audience when you are trying to build an institution like a pro sports franchise.

Damn, I hadn't even thought of YouTube, that's very interesting and offers way more potential than OTA.
Between YouTube ads plus in-game ads, lots of potential profit with very little overhead, millions of subscribers instantly and tons and tons of clip/highlight potential where any given dunk/block could be worth $100Ks as a viral video with everyone linking to your official YouTube acct, players could do select videos for that channel, throw on a podcast and highlight show to those subscribers which would basically include every sports reporter/journalist + every Spurs fans + every Wemby fan + every hardcore NBA fan... holy shit crazy how no one has done that yet? And Spurs are uniquely situated with Wemby plus being a small market. LA/NY would never do this, too much local money, but in SA? It's freaking perfect.

I grew up loving the Cubs and watching tons of Braves games bc WGN and TBS, Spurs could be that for the 21st century with way way way more reach and ad potential.

 

[Arguendo]

This blows. Really gonna suck when FanDuel Sports goes down and we can't watch games. I don't have faith that the FO will prioritize broadcasting the games over the air so fans can actually watch the team. I'm going to have to use league pass on a fucking VPN or something

They'll be televised somewhere, and those telecasts will be streamed on Supra-stream.com and Methstreams.ms, amongst other places. I pay for Amazon+ Peacock (only for NBA too) + youtubeTV, 3 subscriptions should be enough to watch the NBA, but nope, so I'll get the rest subscription free.

 

[BacktoBasics]

If noone holds the local broadcast rights, blackouts shouldn't be a thing?

I fucking wish

 

[ace3g]

https://twitter.com/x/status/2008954707713351908

 

[ace3g]

https://twitter.com/x/status/2009111754572485112

 

[ace3g]

https://twitter.com/x/status/2009379157105385698

 

[ace3g]

https://twitter.com/x/status/2017230227072487838

 

[NotoriousHOP]

I loathe the FanDuel app but, if it goes down, I hope the Spurs can negotiate a replacement network rapidly. Maybe if FanDuel had sunk a few dollars into improving that interface, maybe more people would have kept their subscriptions.

 

[Neuromancer]

Spurs better have something prepared in case FanDuel shits the bed next week. Can't have a player like Wemby with no way to watch

 

[LeBowen]

The NBA won't allow any games to be left without a broadcast.

Also, both home games before all-star break are on national TV, it's also sorted on that end.

 

[Neuromancer]

The NBA won't allow any games to be left without a broadcast.

Also, both home games before all-star break are on national TV, it's also sorted on that end.

I'm sure they'll still have league pass at minimum but would prefer to not have to use that if I don't have to

Would be great if they did like Phoenix does and just broadcast over the air

 

[LeBowen]

I'm sure they'll still have league pass at minimum but would prefer to not have to use that if I don't have to

Would be great if they did like Phoenix does and just broadcast over the air

Said it before, over the air is a no brainer, but other than that I'm not sure why would anyone be against league pass.

 

[MannyIG]

League Pass works pretty well for me outside of games against the Lakers and Clippers, so m opinion should be taken with a grain of salt, but I think the league should do this:

1. Leave each team to work out its own local broadcast rights deals. Whether the team wants to air them for free, or work it out with a cable package, that is completely up to them.
2. Eliminate blackout rules so that anyone can get access to any game via League Pass (excluding National TV deals since obviously the league has already made a deal with those platforms to exclusively carry those games). Share revenue with teams based on streaming traffic. So many people have cut the cord, I feel like there is probably a significant population of local viewers who would get League Pass if it was the way to watch every game of their local team, and it's already cheaper than whatever people are paying for that FanDuel package, which is nuts to me.

I thought 1 was exactly how it works right now? I don't think they'll do #2 since it puts a big dent in the value of the national broadcast and they make so much money from those TV deals.

 

[MannyIG]

I love being out of market and just paying for League Pass. The only games I can't watch are the Wiz games and I go to that one anyway or its on local TV. I do hate all the national boradcast apps I need now. I hate Prime's interface, I hate Peacocks interface too. At least ESPN's is good. The NBA App is fucking FIRE though. Its amazingly well designed.

 

[scott]

I thought 1 was exactly how it works right now? I don't think they'll do #2 since it puts a big dent in the value of the national broadcast and they make so much money from those TV deals.

My suggesting isn't that the NBA do #1 or #2... it's that they do them both.

I don't think they'll do that, but that's what I think they should do if their goal is to maximize viewership and the fan experience. Putting the customer first is a business strategy that usually pays off! My proposal would leave the revenue stream for the national broadcast deals in tact though, since I'm proposing those games still be blacked out from League Pass.