Bailing Out From Bally Bankruptcy Could be Bombastic

While the nation prepares for the constant flow of March Madness games over the next two weeks, MLB is forced to get ready to take on the financial burden of streaming games to fans of as many as 14 teams. After days of rumors, the NY Post reports that the Bally Sports Regional Networks (currently owned by Diamond Sports) group is expected to file for bankruptcy within the coming week, allowing it to drop scheduled telecasts of the majority of games of the teams it holds the rights to.

The report has MLB taking over the production and offering local packages for fans within the team's current rights areas. This is significant because 14 teams is one short of half of MLB, and a bankruptcy likely impacts the individual teams' ability to collect millions of dollars in anticipated revenue. These regional networks also, in many cases, also have rights to NBA and/or NHL teams, whose telecasts would also be impacted.

This situation bears watching, not only because of the timing, but its potential significance involving millions of dollars in potentially lost revenue for teams in MLB, NBA, and NHL because of this.

 

Not sure what University of Colorado did to bring this on, but their spring football game will be shown on the main ESPN Network. What makes this "interesting" is that this will be the ONLY college spring game shown on the main network, for whatever reason. The University of Georgia spring game will air on ESPN2. However, other spring football game telecasts will appear only on ESPN+ and/or conference channels. Again, wondering how U of Colorado managed to pull this off.  

Another football related mystery involves the XFL, which we normally wouldn't pay attention to. Despite a noticeable decline in viewership over its first three weeks of games, the announcement as come that ESPN/ABC is moving a group of games "up" to its main platforms. Believe it or not, XFL games are now being scheduled to soon air on ABC, ESPN, and ESPN2. 

Local Telecasts May Still Be Down Stream

Perhaps there is a light at the end of the tunnel for viewers of live sports streaming that are understandably frustrated with blackout restrictions. The biggest example is MLB.TV, which continues to enforce blackout restrictions intended for "over the air" viewing even in distant locations. Although blacking out a telecast within a local market is tolerable (based on the reasoning that it could prevent fans from buying tickets and attending), but beyond that is not. The most glaring examples include parts of Nevada, more than a four hour drive away, black out Dodgers games, and that Mariners telecasts are blacked out in Alaska.

The word that MLB has hired Billy Chambers, an executive with Sinclair Broadcasting (which owns a large number of the regional networks which carry MLB teams) to reportedly work with local and regional networks. With overall cable TV subscriptions dropping at a rate of roughly 5% per year since 2019, it appears that MLB recognizes that there are fewer consumers able to watch the local team than in the past. As encouraging as this sounds, the possibility remains that a separate streaming package to watch the local team could keep the blackout restrictions currently in place for MLB.TV. 

Meanwhile, it appears that Al Michaels is not planning on an explanation as to why his call of the amazing Jacksonville comeback vs. Los Angeles in last Saturday's (1/14) NFL playoff game was incredibly tame. It would not have come under fire if his calmness was typical of how Michaels has been calling games over the past 50 years. But it was not. The feeling from here is that, unfortunately, age has caught up with Michaels and the voice we all knew for such a long time simply wasn't there when he needed it. Looks like NBC made the right decision by having moved Mike Torico in to its lead role when they did.

DETROIT - Word is that Jack Morris is off the Tigers telecasts all together. We may never know if it was due to his occasional controversial comments over the past couple of seasons, or it was because he lacked enthusiasm and a broadcast knack throughout his tenure. Reportedly, no one else will be added to the roster of analysts, and that Craig Monroe will be assigned additional telecasts instead.

NFL Telecasts To Flex Their Muscles Even More

 NFL viewers are used to key games flexing and moving in to NBC Sunday Night Football late in the season as usual. This season, we already have three announced changes for SNF, including for this coming Sunday (12/11) with Dolphins vs. Chargers, and for Dec. 18th for NY Giants vs. Washington. For next weekend, three games have been moved to Saturday (12/17) and will each be shown on NFL Network. Those three will also have over the air telecasts in each local market. The marquee of those matchups will be Dolphins vs. Bills in prime time.

Because of the Saturday triple header, the Sunday triple header, and the adjoining Thursday and Monday Night Football telecasts, it means that fans can literally view eight entire NFL games for the week. The NFL has taken to making its telecast schedule even more attractive starting next year. In a long overdue move, there will be flex opportunities for ESPN on Monday Night Football. (The fact that playoff contenders will be put in to situations of having additional 'shorter rest' games late in the season is a separate discussion.) There is also expected to be an increase in the number of Monday night doubleheaders on the schedule. In addition, CBS and Fox will have a different divide of their telecast schedule starting next season. Although the AFC on CBS and NFC on Fox model remains, as of next season it only means that each network will have an equal number of "their" Conference games. In other words, no matter which Conference your favorite team is in, you'll have to check your local listings.

INDIANAPOLIS: Dan Dakich, the former Indiana University basketball player and Assistant and Interim Head Coach, is no longer hosting the midday (Noon to 3 PM) sports talk show on The Fan 107.5. (as of Dec. 8). The station was the first to make the announcement, with the Dacich announcement only saying that he is "no longer hosting", but with no reason given. His plan is to focus on his 9 AM to 11 AM show on Outkick.

COLORADO CITY AZ: You can't make this one up. KXFF 106.1 in Colorado City AZ has changed to "Fox Sports Radio Utah". How they can claim one state with all of that is confusing enough. Along with Fox Sports national programming, their regional play-by-play coverage is also spread out. They will air the Utah Jazz, and University of Utah games, along with the Las Vegas Golden Knights and Raiders. Hard to believe, but there will actually be some local flavor, with plans in the works to air Region 10 high school games.

 

 

College Football Conference Battles Could Involve the Networks

Although not official (as of press time), the big change for the Big 10 Conference media rights deals to start in 2023 will be significant for both the networks and the viewers. If ESPN continues its reported bailout of the Big 10 package after the coming season, it appears the expanding Conference's football games will be shared by three over the air networks. As hard as it will be to get used to after all these years, ABC would not be one of them. Fox Sports will be continuing, while CBS and NBC are expected to have exclusive telecast windows each Saturday. 

The expectation is that Fox will continue its "early" window of Noon ET starts, and that NBC will air a prime-time game (which for this year continues on ABC). The expectation is that CBS will get the late afternoon spot of a 3:30 ET start. However, there is a catch (and it's not a wide receiver catch) for CBS in 2023. As of now, CBS is still scheduled to carry an SEC football matchup during that same time slot, even though 2023 is the final season of CBS' current contract. It will be interesting to see how this plays out.

It is highly unlikely that either conference would consent to regional distribution and/or their important matchup of the week being moved to CBS Sports Network. It is also unlikely that NBC would even consider switching out of prime time to accommodate CBS. How would this be handled?

This is purely speculation, but The Broadcast Booth thinks that ESPN/ABC would step in and pick up those SEC telecasts which were supposed to go to CBS. That would clear CBS to air Big Ten games when scheduled, but at a steep cost. The hunch is that the SEC keeps the millions of dollars in revenue from CBS while ESPN gets them for a nominal fee. If ESPN truly does stay away from these negotiations, some of the best matchups for 2023 college football just might take place between the networks.

Meanwhile, as we go into the first full weekend of NFL exhibition games, the networks are getting ready for the start of the regular season. Fox Sports has revealed its announcing assignments for Week 1 (Sept. 11). Its new #1 team of Kevin Burkhardt and Greg Olsen start with the doubleheader game between Green Bay and Minnesota. Joe Davis and Daryl Johnston will call the San Francisco at Chicago game (early), while Adam Amin and Mark Schlereth will call the Philadelphia vs. Detroit game. 

 

Fox Sports is also coming off its (8/11) telecast of the MLB Field of Dreams game. Granted, they got stuck with a meaningless game between two sub .500 teams, which gave them more reasons to distract from the game itself. Sorry, but the telecast was difficult for the hardcore baseball fan to get in to. It was more than the constant distraction by showing the happenings aside from the field of play. Having one color for the score box added to the challenge of both teams wearing uniforms which made them hard to recognize. The comparative lack of other scores and baseball news also didn't help. It's not surprising that Fox's ratings were down roughly 50% from last year, when the first ever Field of Dreams game took place and involved two contending teams. (The Fox MLB telecast did comfortably beat out the NFL exhibition game between the Giants and Patriots on NFL Network which was head to head.)

 

However, the bigger issue actually came from MLB Network earlier in the day. It was understandable that MLB Network planned an extensive pre-game show of their own to hype the event. MLB Network was airing the Cleveland vs. Detroit game, which began at 1:00 PM ET, more than six hours before the Field of Dream game's first pitch. At game time, Cleveland was leading the American League Central with two teams within three games of them. With Minnesota idle, Twins fans were among those with an interest in that telecast. Yet, because MLB Network was so locked in to their pre-game hype starting at 4 PM ET, they had the nerve to cut out of the Cleveland game just to go to their pregame programming from Iowa.

 

Although they did a couple of their "live look-ins" the rest of the way, the Cleveland vs. Detroit game was going to the 9th inning when they cut away. It so happened that the Tigers came up with two in the 9th to tie the game before Cleveland won it in the 10th. Cutting away from a live game, especially when it was close, just to have interviews, was inexcusable. If it was that important, then skip the commercials between innings and during pitching changes to cut away for the interviews. It's harder to get fans excited about division races when the official network doesn't deem live coverage important enough to wait 25 more minutes.

 

 

 

 

There Will Never Be Another Vin

It just doesn't seem possible to have a day in our lifetime without Vin Scully being around, even though he retired after the 2016 season. His passing was a huge loss for sports fans even beyond baseball. The tributes coming in from fellow broadcasters, including those at the national level, is incredible, while also being extremely believable. 

I will always remember the distinct combination of his sense of humor and his passion for baseball, even in his later years. Perhaps the most incredible thing about his 67 years of calling Dodger baseball was how "with it" he was during his last few seasons, continuing the same high level of excellence he brought all those seasons before. All of the great calls, and an amazing history of getting to call so many of the most significant plays and event in sports. The Larsen World Series perfect game, the Koufax no-hitters, the Aaron 715th homer, Dwight Clark making "the catch" vs. Dallas in the '82 NFL playoffs, the Buckner play (or lack thereof) ending the '86 World Series, the Gibson homer in '88, and so many more all had the Scully touch to add to their greatness.

Another of my major "only Vin Scully could do this" moments came during the late 80's. I don't recall the season or the date, but the Dodgers had a Saturday night game in Houston which went something like 20 or 21 innings. Vin called all but one inning of that game, with all but his three innings on radio being on TV. The only inning he "missed" was spent recording promos for the next telecasts because the game was running so late. 

 

As can happen in the great game of baseball, the next afternoon, the Dodgers had a one-run lead going in to the bottom of the 9th. Someone for Houston (might have been Craig Biggio, but not sure) hit a game tying homer. Vin's call was, "Deep to left field! DON'T TELL ME!! Tie game!!". That was so special. He had the sense of humor to know how funny it was that the game was likely headed back to extra innings with two exhausted bullpens in action. But he also knew that Dodgers fans watching would know exactly what he was talking about. (The good news for Scully is that this game ended in 10 innings.)

 

It was my pleasure to meet him once or twice in person in the late 70's while I was covering games. Just the chance to exchange a greeting was fine, as even then he had more than 25 seasons in the booth. More importantly, it was mine, and all of our pleasure to be able to listen to him all those years.

 

Meanwhile, even though the All-Star Game did not do well in the ratings, regular season ratings have shown improvement for many of the local and regional team telecasts. Texas Rangers telecasts lead the way with an impressive 42% increase (based on viewership statistics prior to the All-Star break), with the Angels and Seattle Mariners telecasts rounding out the top three. Although the Yankees have the most viewers of any individual team, their increase was 13% from 2021. On the national level, the Yankees vs. Mets national telecast on ESPN last week (7/27) was ESPN's highest rated weeknight regular season telecast in 15 years.

The Marquee Network, owned by the Chicago Cubs which shows every Cubs game it can, has come under fire this year over pulling segments which are critical of the team. However, their game coverage has been solid, and credit is deserved for their programming decision on Tuesday (8/2). The MLB trade deadline had passed at 5 PM Chicago time, with many fans surprised that the team did not trade away a couple of its star players. Team President Jed Hoyer scheduled a media conference for 6:30, even though the Cubs were playing the Cardinals in St. Louis starting at 6:45.

What Marquee did was to go to the media conference live as it began. It was still in progress when the Cubs vs. Cardinals game started at 6:45. To its credit, Marquee went to a split screen, showing both the game action and the media conference live. This included not cutting away for commercials after the top of the first inning was over. When the media conference finished, Marquee went to full screen of the game and announcers Jon Sciambi and Jim DeShaies came on and recapped the earlier action.

NFL fans welcome the action back on Thursday (8/4) as the Hall of Fame game between Jacksonville and Las Vegas is shown nationally on NBC. A full slate of NFL exhibition games takes place next week.

Musical Chairs - Announcer Style

The past weekend (July 22-24) brought an interesting twist for Chicago baseball fans watching either the White Sox or Cubs locally. The 4-game White Sox series vs. Cleveland and the Cubs 3-game series vs. Philadelphia each had something in common. Both teams had different play-by-play voices for every game in those series. 

 

It has become enough of a challenge for sports fans to find their team's games with so many television and streaming packages to go along with a variety in the local packages. Now there isn't even consistency in the telecasts.

 

The White Sox vs. Cleveland series began on Friday night with an Apple TV exclusive telecast, with Steve Nelson calling the game. A split doubleheader on Saturday had the local telecast on NBC Sports Chicago with Jason Benetti calling play-by-play. The evening game was a Fox regional game, with White Sox radio voice Len Kasper assigned to call the game for Fox. (As a side note, Kasper worked the game with A.J. Pierzynski as analyst, giving the regional telecast, also seen in Cleveland, a clear White Sox flavor.) Then, the Sunday game was back on NBC Sports Chicago. However, Benetti had to call the Cubs vs. Phillies game for Peacock, and Kasper was back on the radio call. As a result Connor McKnight, who fills in for Kasper on radio and handles surrounding coverage, was brought in to call play-by-play. The result was four different people calling the four games.

The Cubs at Phillies series was also shown by Apple on Friday night, sticking fans of both teams with the horrible early crew for Apple TV games. On Saturday, the Cubs were on their Marquee Network with Jon Sciambi calling the game. Then, the Sunday game was on Peacock, which had White Sox voice Jason Benetti calling the Cubs game. 

It was also interesting to note that Marquee Network, already coming under fire for removing criticism of Cubs management from its airwaves, chose Ryan Sweeney to be the Cubs analyst for Peacock, instead of Jim DeShaies who is the primary analyst on Cubs actual telecasts. (Sweeney is among the rotating studio analysts.)

Benetti had an even busier week in the days ahead, concluding negotiations to leave ESPN in order to jump to Fox Sports and become an important part of its college football coverage starting almost immediately. Benetti is expected to be calling many Big Ten football and basketball games for the network, thus reducing his travel time. Previously, ESPN assigned him to games around the country. Now, he will be able to call more games in the Midwest, a likely factor in his decision to jump.

Over at NBC Sports, the network continues to expand upon its recent success with auto racing coverage. This weekend (July 30/31) it will feature both Indy Car and NASCAR events on the main platform. In an interesting decision, Dale Earnhart Jr. will serve as analyst on both races. NBC is reportedly getting in to the mix for future Big Ten Conference rights, likely as a result of the increase in revenue Comcast has with help from Peacock and NBC Sports of late.

 

Fox Sports appears to be going with Joe Davis as Darryl "Moose" Johnston as its #2 announcing team for the upcoming NFL season, although there has not been anything official as of press time. 

 

NFL Network fans will be seeing Rich Eisen for years to come, with Eisen agreeing to a multi- year extension of his contract. 

NEW YORK: It's great timing for WFAN AM-FM to be able to announce a multi-year extension for its Yankees broadcasts. The Yankees have aired on WFAN since 2014, having moved over from WCBS, which is now the flagship station for the Mets games. As play-by-play voice John Sterling begins to reduce his schedule, speculation rises that Brendan Burke, known for his NHL on TNT play-by-play role, is in line to eventually take over for Sterling.

Some "Memorial" Mistakes Surround Holiday Weekend

We all know that not all sportscasters are up to date on every sport they cover or talk about. It is especially understandable when former pro athletes turn sportscaster and do not have the expertise of other sports for their first couple of years. Some that have always been sports reporters don't always pay as close attention to all of the sports they cover either.

 

Mark Schanowski has been a TV sportscaster for many years in Chicago. For just over one year, he has been with WLS-TV, the ABC station handling weekends. On Saturday (5/28), Schanowski was doing the station's 5:00 PM news sports segment. Toward the end of his report, he mentioned the running of the Indy 500 to take place the following day. Obviously, it's an important story.

Schanowski finished the story by saying (to the effect of), "And you can see that race right here tomorrow morning starting at 11 AM!". There was one big problem with that. Mark's report was on the local ABC station, while the Indy 500 airs on the local rival NBC-TV station. It's likely that Schanowski was supposed to refer to the Formula 1 Monaco Grand Prix rate, which aired on ABC later on Sunday afternoon after the scheduled ending of the Indy 500. There was no other mention of anything else related to auto racing during his entire sports segment.

A minor double checking would have prevented Schanowski from promoting an event on a rival channel and allowed him to promote what his channel was showing. Ooops.

 

Another holiday weekend mistake was unintentional, but does provide a lesson for TV crews. On Saturday (5/28) evening, YES Network was showing some of Yankees Manager Aaron Boone's post-game press conference. The angle of their camera clearly showed the post of the Tropicana Field wi-fi and password information. 

 

Although this information is only for people within the stadium (insert Rays attendance joke here), this should serve as a warning about posting of wi-fi information in relation to where media members could be using cameras.

 

Elsewhere on the sports media scene, NBC Sports has confirmed that Al Michaels will continue to work for NBC even after taking on Amazon Prime's Thursday Night Football telecasts beginning with the upcoming season. Michaels will call at least one NFL post-season game for NBC as well as being involved with Olympics telecasts. 

 

Mark Chernoff, after some time off following his 28 years with New York's WFAN, is returning to airwaves this week (May 31) with a lower profile. He will join 101.7 The Boss in Monmouth/Ocean New Jersey as morning sports anchor. He will be a part of the Robby & Rochelle morning show.

 

Meanwhile, WFAN 101.9 and 660 has added Rutgers University football and basketball to its play-by-play roster beginning with the upcoming season. WFAN will air the football games when there are no broadcast conflicts, while sister station WCBS will air the basketball broadcasts. This adds to an already crowded local play-by-play schedule which includes the Yankees, Giants, Nets, and occasional Devils broadcasts. 

 

University of Iowa football broadcasts will be heard in Chicago. Starting with the upcoming season (Sept. 3) season opener of Iowa vs. South Dakota State, WCKG 1530 will air the games via the Iowa Football Network. Gary Dolphin, who has called Iowa play-by-play since 1996, will again be joined by Ed Podolak as analyst.