Regional Sports Networks Going Bankrupt

[wicked]

Diamond also got dumped with a ton of debt, in addition to making bad decisions. fork Sinclair.

 

[Readallover]

More sports coming to Amazon Prime with this deal
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/b...eorganization-sinclair-settlement-1235790585/

 

[Roscablo]

There's this paragraph, which comes up short of explaining a key factor in this mess:

Regional sports networks have been bleeding money in recent years, as viewers have dropped their cable TV subscriptions in favor of streaming. That has led to slumping revenue and shortfalls against the massive, long-term broadcasting deals networks have made with pro sports leagues.

That is FAR from the whole story. Truth is that five or six years ago, Diamond's RSNs stubbornly and short-sightedly priced themselves out of carriage on top streaming services YouTubeTV and SlingTV. Can you imagine how much revenue they would have brought in at say, $2 a month ($24 a year) in carriage fees from the millions of YTTV and Sling viewers all these years? Instead, they told YouTube and Sling to pound sand.

The two have more than 9 million subscribers between them. Under my made-up fee number, that'd be $18 million a month or $216 million a year -- more than $1 billion over five years, with pretty much zero added expense to the RSNs. Plus, ad rates (maybe even subscriber numbers) would have gone up.

That makes this one of the most boneheaded decisions in TV history. The people who ran Fox regionals and now Diamond might even be stupid enough to be newspaper publishers.

I don't know what the decision making in this process was/is. Probably that the regional sports channels ask too much. But I totally would have gotten a YouTube TV or Hulu subscription when I went away from cable when I changed internet providers if they had regional sports. That said I got our current provider, and now we are down to one regional sports channel, which I watch a ton and honestly would probably pay for it by itself but I am not sure how many would, for the whole price they had for several. It really makes no sense.

 

[justgladtobehere]

I don't know what the decision making in this process was/is. Probably that the regional sports channels ask too much. But I totally would have gotten a YouTube TV or Hulu subscription when I went away from cable when I changed internet providers if they had regional sports. That said I got our current provider, and now we are down to one regional sports channel, which I watch a ton and honestly would probably pay for it by itself but I am not sure how many would, for the whole price they had for several. It really makes no sense.

I cannot find it again, but article I read about NESN and YouTube TV. It mentioned the dispute was over NESN's streaming service and YouTube TV and Diamond had a similar dispute.

 

[mpcincal]

Bumping the thread back up for this: Comcast Will Drop Bally Sports RSNs After Failing to Reach a New Deal | Cord Cutters News

My dad and I found out rather abruptly tonight watching the Angels game (I know, I know) against the Phillies and as the Angels were batting in the bottom of the eighth, the signal cut out at midnight EDT (9 p.m. for us), and we got announcement on the screen that they couldn't reach a deal.

 

[Starman]

Went black in Michigan, too.

 

[BitterYoungMatador2]

Went black in Michigan, too.

John Keating, "They saaaaaay...." *click*

 

[playthrough]

I'm just here to marvel at "Cord Cutters News".

 

[maumann]

Bally's Twitter feed today: "Hey, at least we agreed on a deal with DirecTV!"

 

[Readallover]

https://www.nexttv.com/news/comcast-and-diamond-sports-prepare-for-blackout

 

[wicked]

Comcast has refused to engage in substantive discussions despite Diamond offering terms similar to those reached with much larger distributors of ours.

Which "much larger distributors" would these be? Comcast is still the biggest cable company in the country, I think. By default, Comcast would probably be Bally's largest distributor.

 

[Readallover]

no more NBA on TNT?
https://www.cnn.com/2024/05/01/media/warner-bros-discovery-could-lose-nba-rights/index.html