doctornick
Well-Known Member
So when you think about it, sports broadcasts are carried via the following ways in the US:
1. Over the Air Networks (i.e. ABC, CBS, NBC, FOX, CW)
2. Paid national cable channels (e.g. ESPN, FS1, TNT, etc)
3. Paid regional sports networks (e.g. NBC Sports Networks, Bally Sports, Spectrum Sports, etc)
4. Exclusively on streaming (e.g Prime, Peacock, Apple, etc have exclusive content)
Historically, a person getting cable/satellite could use it to get the first 3 all in one place and #4 didn't exist.
What this service does is basically replace #2 and it does so pretty effectively - ESPN and FS1 are the main players of cable sports (including college conference affiliated networks). #1 can be acquired with an antennae for most folks. IMHO this works for people who watch most bigger national broadcasts for sports as opposed to local teams.
#4 is where the fracturing occurs and it has gotten work as Apple, Prime and now Netflix have dipped into the stream exclusive place. Among legacy media, I feel like Peacock has been the most aggressive for putting sports only on streaming (Paramount+ and MAX do this a bit but not to the same degree). This is probably the area where sports fans will miss out the most since it would take a sports bundle of basically everyone to get all of this content - this is where the biggest shift has occurred from the halcyon days of "cable gets you everything".
#3 is the area of growth IMHO. This is also where streaming based cable substitutes - YouTubeTV, Sling, Hule Live TV, etc - have their big pull because you can often get your local NBC Sports provider or Bally, etc with them. If you want to follow your local MLB, NBA or NHL team and that's your prime sports interest then an offering like Venu might not be as valuable.
Ironically, of course, the Bally suite of channels was previously owned by FOX and briefly by Disney who had to divest them. It would be interesting to see if there is a way to incorporate such networks into a service like Venu because that is where I think you'd get a big jump in interest. Maybe it could be some sort of "add on" and different tier?
1. Over the Air Networks (i.e. ABC, CBS, NBC, FOX, CW)
2. Paid national cable channels (e.g. ESPN, FS1, TNT, etc)
3. Paid regional sports networks (e.g. NBC Sports Networks, Bally Sports, Spectrum Sports, etc)
4. Exclusively on streaming (e.g Prime, Peacock, Apple, etc have exclusive content)
Historically, a person getting cable/satellite could use it to get the first 3 all in one place and #4 didn't exist.
What this service does is basically replace #2 and it does so pretty effectively - ESPN and FS1 are the main players of cable sports (including college conference affiliated networks). #1 can be acquired with an antennae for most folks. IMHO this works for people who watch most bigger national broadcasts for sports as opposed to local teams.
#4 is where the fracturing occurs and it has gotten work as Apple, Prime and now Netflix have dipped into the stream exclusive place. Among legacy media, I feel like Peacock has been the most aggressive for putting sports only on streaming (Paramount+ and MAX do this a bit but not to the same degree). This is probably the area where sports fans will miss out the most since it would take a sports bundle of basically everyone to get all of this content - this is where the biggest shift has occurred from the halcyon days of "cable gets you everything".
#3 is the area of growth IMHO. This is also where streaming based cable substitutes - YouTubeTV, Sling, Hule Live TV, etc - have their big pull because you can often get your local NBC Sports provider or Bally, etc with them. If you want to follow your local MLB, NBA or NHL team and that's your prime sports interest then an offering like Venu might not be as valuable.
Ironically, of course, the Bally suite of channels was previously owned by FOX and briefly by Disney who had to divest them. It would be interesting to see if there is a way to incorporate such networks into a service like Venu because that is where I think you'd get a big jump in interest. Maybe it could be some sort of "add on" and different tier?
