Sinclair(Bally's Sport) nearing a deal for NBA streaming rights for direct to consumer offering

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MplsGopher said:
Again, if you aren’t on YTTV then you have failed. Legacy Sat/cable are trash.

In any of those cases though, absolutely absurd to expect anyone to pay even $60/mo (let alone more) and then expect them to be willing to pay extra, additional to access mainstream sports like MLB, NBA, and NHL. Just beyond absurd.

The only reason to pay for a live TV channel bundle is sports!!! So it G-D better well already include all mainstream sports.

Maybe if you like handball or ping-pong, you’ll have to pay extra. But not friggin MLB. Gtfo
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Does YTTV have any regional sports networks? If not, it seems they've chosen not to be a good choice for sports fans. You act like the Twins are obligated to give away their games to YouTube for free.
 

howeda7 said:
Does YTTV have any regional sports networks?
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checking the YTTV website, I see these sports-related channels listed:
ACC Network
B1G Network
CBS Sports Network
ESPN - ESPN2 - ESPNEWS - ESPN U
FS1 - FS2
Golf Network
NBA TV
NFL Network
SEC Network

from what I can see, it looks like Fubo TV carries BSN and some other sports channels.
 

YTTV has every sports channel included. Ball-less Sports have failed by not being included in modern live TV.

Legacy sat/cable are trash.
 


In the article linked above, a lawyer for Sinclair - the company that purchased the RSN's and set up Diamond Sports to run the channels - predicted that Diamond and Bally will go out of business after the current season.

"Let's be clear what's going on here: This is a liquidation of the business," David Seligman, attorney for Sinclair Inc., which purchased 19 regional sports networks including BSN in 2019. "This is going to be in operation for another year, and then it's going to be shutting down the business."

an attorney for Diamond disputed Seligman's conclusion.

the article also notes that Diamond has reached agreements with the NBA and NHL teams it carries to broadcast games this season, but does not have similar agreements with the MLB teams it has contracts with.
 


Isn't that just because Diamond is suing Sinclair? Probably their (Diamond's) execs are just hoping to squeeze a bigger severance for themselves.

Stick a fork in the b___ard. Good riddance.


Twins will be on TV again, some where, some way. They won't just not put games on some kind of platform for fans to watch.
 

I simply quit watching Twins/Wild/TWolves when I switched to YTTV 1.5 years ago. Thought about paying separately for the app but just heard too many bad things with it. I guess I just learned to live without those 3 sports. And the funny thing is, my willingness for attendance on those 3 sports is also down to nothing. (of course some of the attendance hesitation is my lack of desire to go into downtown Mpls). For me it’s been a trickle down effect, but I guess I’m saving a bunch of money by not subscribing nor attending in person.
 

somewhat off-topic, but it appears that ESPN is moving ahead with plans to offer a DTC (direct-to-consumer) or streaming option for ESPN by 2025.

a lot of questions still about pricing - and how this would impact the deals ESPN has with all of the cable and satellite providers. I have seen estimates - or guesses - that a stand-alone ESPN streaming service could go for $30 a month.
 

Yeah I still don’t get that. Why would you not get YTTV and get all the sports, and news.

Those are the two things you need live.

No point in any other channel being live anymore
 



saintpauljeff said:
I simply quit watching Twins/Wild/TWolves when I switched to YTTV 1.5 years ago. Thought about paying separately for the app but just heard too many bad things with it. I guess I just learned to live without those 3 sports. And the funny thing is, my willingness for attendance on those 3 sports is also down to nothing. (of course some of the attendance hesitation is my lack of desire to go into downtown Mpls). For me it’s been a trickle down effect, but I guess I’m saving a bunch of money by not subscribing nor attending in person.
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I've hammered this many times before, but it seems beyond short-sighted that all of the pro sports teams don't have some package of games on OTA TV. There are quite a few people that don't get BallySports, but everybody can get OTA if you have an antenna (and I think they all offer online streaming as well). Sure, you may take a small hit in your immediate TV revenue, but it's just a price you have to pay to maintain/grow your fanbase, which in turns buys your merch, pays for tickets, etc.

I'm in the same boat in that I more or less stopped caring about the Wolves and Wild due to not ever being able to see them. The Twins I listen to on the radio, so I still follow them. I was complaining about this a while back, and my wife had a very good point - when we agree to give hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars to build them their facilities, it should be written in the contract that some percent of their games appear on OTA TV (maybe 10% at a minimum) as a sort of public service as a "thank you" for the obscene amounts of money gifted to these organizations.
 

forever a gopher said:
I was complaining about this a while back, and my wife had a very good point - when we agree to give hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars to build them their facilities, it should be written in the contract that some percent of their games appear on OTA TV (maybe 10% at a minimum) as a sort of public service as a "thank you" for the obscene amounts of money gifted to these organizations.
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They tried to put various things in the stadium bill like that, but usually that "all" games had to be free OTA or MLB had to allow the local news to show highlights of games that were still ongoing etc. Those would have been poison pills designed to kill the bill, as MLB is not going to structure its TV rights to suit the Minnesota legislature.

However, something like 10% as you suggest probably would have been doable and been under the team's control. At the time they did have at least 10% of the games OTA though. And they really shouldn't have gone away from it.
 

when I was growing up, I think there were maybe 20 Twins games a season that were shown on free TV. at one point, the owners believed that putting games on TV would hurt attendance. as time passed, more games were shown on TV.

from 1961 to 1982, Twins games were shown on WTCN, WCCO or KMSP. can't find details on how many games were shown per season.

as far as I can tell, the first Cable/Pay per view deal for the Twins was Spectrum Sports from 1983 to 1985. Twins Vision existed in 1987 & 1988. then the Midwest Sports Channel from 1989 to 2001. Fox Sports North in '02 & '03. Victory Sports in 2004. Fox Sports North from 2005 to 2020. BSN from 21-23.

during the cable era, there were a limited number of free over-the-air games on KMSP and WCCO, but that ended in (I think) 2005.
 

short ornery norwegian said:
during the cable era, there were a limited number of free over-the-air games on KMSP and WCCO, but that ended in (I think) 2005.
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The Twins had over the air games until around 2010 or 2011. Sunday games on WFTC were the last ones. Bert's infamous incident was one such game in 2006 because they only did the Sunday pregame hit live the rest were taped.
 



short ornery norwegian said:
when I was growing up, I think there were maybe 20 Twins games a season that were shown on free TV. at one point, the owners believed that putting games on TV would hurt attendance. as time passed, more games were shown on TV.

from 1961 to 1982, Twins games were shown on WTCN, WCCO or KMSP. can't find details on how many games were shown per season.

as far as I can tell, the first Cable/Pay per view deal for the Twins was Spectrum Sports from 1983 to 1985. Twins Vision existed in 1987 & 1988. then the Midwest Sports Channel from 1989 to 2001. Fox Sports North in '02 & '03. Victory Sports in 2004. Fox Sports North from 2005 to 2020. BSN from 21-23.

during the cable era, there were a limited number of free over-the-air games on KMSP and WCCO, but that ended in (I think) 2005.
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I think it was generally 25 games in the 1970s when I started to watch. Might have grown to as many as 50 by the mid 80s before Spectrum & WCCO2-MSC-FSN-BSN.

Almost never televised at the Met/Dome during the Griffith regime.
 

howeda7 said:
The Twins had over the air games until around 2010 or 2011. Sunday games on WFTC were the last ones. Bert's infamous incident was one such game in 2006 because they only did the Sunday pregame hit live the rest were taped.
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What was Bert's incident?
 


got this from my local tele-comm manager: another sports channel bites the dust.

FYI - effective December 31st at 11:59pm ET, Diamond Sports Group will cease operations of Stadium College Sports (fka Fox College Sports).

Stadium College Sports carries a variety of events from various colleges including coaches shows. they also carry high school football.

I've never watched it. it's on a digital tier of channels and I'm too cheap to pay extra for it.
 

short ornery norwegian said:
got this from my local tele-comm manager: another sports channel bites the dust.

FYI - effective December 31st at 11:59pm ET, Diamond Sports Group will cease operations of Stadium College Sports (fka Fox College Sports).

Stadium College Sports carries a variety of events from various colleges including coaches shows. they also carry high school football.

I've never watched it. it's on a digital tier of channels and I'm too cheap to pay extra for it.
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It seems pretty definitive that Diamond is completely done at the end of the current NBA/NHL season. The Twins might have to cut an over the air deal for a year and then work with the Wolves/Wild on a joint venture. I guess there's nothing stopping them from doing it now, but it's hard to negotiate with providers while they're still paying for Bally's.
 

It's still so good.

.... against .... ah, Jeter ... we gotta do this F'ing thing over again because I just F'ED it up ................ oh we're live?! I didn't know that!

:ROFLMAO::ROFLMAO::ROFLMAO:
 

For whatever little it's worth (very little I suspect), HBO Max (I will never refer to it as just "Max", f'ing stupid) now offers a sports add-on package that they branded B/R for Bleacher Report, that offers "select" MLB/NBA/NHL games. For an extra $10/mo in addition to your base subscription.

So you might get to see a few Twins/Wolves/Wild games that way. :sneaky:
 

MplsGopher said:
For whatever little it's worth (very little I suspect), HBO Max (I will never refer to it as just "Max", f'ing stupid) now offers a sports add-on package that they branded B/R for Bleacher Report, that offers "select" MLB/NBA/NHL games. For an extra $10/mo in addition to your base subscription.

So you might get to see a few Twins/Wolves/Wild games that way. :sneaky:
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They offer whatever games are on the TBS/TNT platform.
 

There you go, that makes sense I guess.

Yeah again ... I can't ever imagine myself paying a month subscription for access to live sports of just one major platform.

You pay for YTTV, and you get all of them. Well at least the non F'ing stupid ones (like Ball-less Sports).

All these BS little "+" things are not what I'm talking about, but I don't buy those either.
 

Bally tries to kick the can down the road again: from cord cutters news.com:

On November 15th a federal judge approved Bally Sports’ request for more time to file its plan to reorganize and re-emerge from bankruptcy, even as the troubled company indicated it would seek to file a third extension down the line, according to a person familiar with the situation. Now Bally Sports has asked for that extension that would give it until May 28th, 2024 for some of its deadlines to find a way to exit bankruptcy.

Back on the 15th, the judge did approve a deal between the NBA and Bally Sports’ parent company, Diamond Sports Group. The deal was announced earlier this month and covers 15 teams through the 2023-2024 season. However Bally Sports was unable to reach a deal with the MLB and no deal has been announced yet for the NHL.

The current deadlines include November 29 to file its reorganization plans and January 29 to get approval, now it seems Bally Sports is hoping the judge agrees to extend the deadline.

Potentially derailing things is an objection filed by Sinclair, the former parent of Bally Sports, who noted the tentative cooperation agreement doesn’t include a quarter of a billion dollars in fees owed to the media giant, according to Awful Announcing. The objections relate to the master service agreement between Bally Sports and Sinclair.

In addition, a lawyer for the MLB said it would present its own offer sheet proposal to Bally Sports, indicating the two sides haven’t come to a deal yet. The MLB is reportedly hoping to force Bally Sports to fully agree to its current contracts or to cancel.

Bally Sports is also working to strike a deal with the NHL to keep some or all of its teams on its RSNs.
 

and more fun with Diamond/Bally --

from Yardbarker:

The Cincinnati Reds might become the next MLB team to find a new broadcast home.

On Tuesday, Steve Watkins of the Cincinnati Business Reporter wrote that Bally Sports Ohio, the Diamond Sports Group regional network, may drop the team after fulfilling its contractual obligations for the 2024 season.

The Reds signed a deal with Bally Sports in 2016 to begin broadcasts in 2018. That deal pays the Reds about $60 million a year, an industry insider told me.

Watkins added that the network, which broadcasts games for the Reds, the Cleveland Cavaliers and Columbus Blue Jackets, lost $17.7 million through the first nine months of 2023.

(and the St. Louis Cardinals follow suit......)

Diamond Sports, the parent company of St. Louis regional sports network Bally Sports Midwest, could drop local broadcasts as soon as next year, according to recent court proceedings.

Multiple reports, including ones from the Sports Business Journal and Bloomberg, note the Diamond Sports Group could shut down after fulfilling obligations for the 2024 MLB regular season, which ends in late September.

The St. Louis Business Journal reports that Bally Sports Midwest posted a profit of $2.5 million last year, which has been followed by a net loss of $13.8 million to this point in 2023.
 

I did a trial of Fubo last week. Overall I was not that impressed. It kept saying I was in Kansas City and giving me the wrong local channels. They could "fix" it but it would revert back the next day. Beyond that it was OK, but the lag vs regular satellite was pretty severe. Around a full minute, which is problematic when watching sports. In the end, not enough cheaper to be worth the aggravation, at least for now.
 


Bally looking to drop more MLB teams - (I'm Shocked!). from MLB trade rumors:

The ongoing Diamond Sports Group bankruptcy could soon affect another two franchises. Evan Drellich and Mike Vorkunov of the Athletic report that the broadcasting corporation is considering dropping its in-market TV deals with the Cleveland Guardians and Texas Rangers before the 2024 season.

“Our intention is to broadcast almost all of (our) Major League Baseball teams next year,” one of Diamond’s attorneys said in today’s bankruptcy proceedings (relayed by Drellich and Vorkunov). “There are a few, a very few, for which we do not have agreements in place. And that, frankly, at this point, are too expensive for us to broadcast without concessions. I am told that those discussions are taking place, there have been reach-outs to both of the teams involved.”

(Texas Rangers - as in defending World Series Champs....)
 


as noted in the above post, there was a hearing today in bankruptcy court. (This does not involve the Twins) some details:

Major League Baseball and the bankrupt Bally Sports Regional Networks are close to an agreement that would see the media company continue to televise most if not all the 11 teams currently under contract for the 2024 season before ending the deals in October.

“We are in a position to believe that we have a framework to move forward,” MLB’s outside counsel James Bromley told the court. “We have a lot of conditions and issues that we still need to work through. But we think at this point, it’s appropriate to ask the court if we could take the hearing from today’s calendar and move it to a date in January. So January 9, and 10 if possible in order to allow the parties to come to a fully documented settlement.”

The pending agreement with MLB is not fully done. There are three teams of the 11 not on board. DSG is looking to cut the fees of those three teams, in return for ending their contracts at the end of the ‘24 season. Two clubs–the Cleveland Guardians and Texas Rangers–had lawyers at the hearings (they are two of the three teams; it’s unclear the third)

(MLB teams on Bally Sports: Detroit, Miami, Cleveland, Kansas City, St. Louis, Cincinnati, LA Angels, Atlanta, Texas, Tampa Bay, Milwaukee)
 

New Development - and it could - I say could - be big. Amazon in talks to invest in Diamond Sports. From Forbes magazine:

Amazon is in talks to acquire a stake in Diamond Sports Group, according to multiple reports, a move that could eventually bring games from the regional sports network’s 40 teams to the Prime Video streaming platform—as Amazon expands further into live sports and Diamond struggles to stay afloat following a bankruptcy filing this year.

It’s unclear how much money Amazon would invest in Diamond Sports Group, according to the Wall Street Journal, citing people familiar with talks around a potential deal.

Diamond—a Sinclair Broadcast Group subsidiary and the nation’s largest regional sports company—holds the TV rights to more than 40 teams across the MLB, NBA and NHL, broadcasting them on a chain of local cable networks branded Bally Sports.

If a deal goes through, Diamond would still operate its Bally Sports networks, but the games would be streamed on Amazon Prime Video at some point in the future, according to the Journal.

A deal between Amazon and the company would have to be approved by a bankruptcy judge, Axios noted, as Diamond filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy early this year when it owed $9 billion to lenders—a debt load it intended to slash by $8 billion through an ownership transfer from Sinclair to the lenders.

A streaming deal with Amazon could also help alleviate Diamond’s drops in subscriber revenue, as virtually all cable broadcasters contend with cord-cutting and the risk of declining ad revenue in an age dominated by streaming services.
 

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