How can the ESPN channel still be running in the UK?. I looked at BARB and some weeks the top program only gets 10000 viewers?, how can this channel be profitable?
Cheap to run; good overflow channel for BT and there are a lot of people that only subscribe to BT for the U.S. Sport. In addition I believe BT get monies for using ESPN name. Obviously it makes a profit for BT..
I've always felt that BARB households are less likely than average to watch ESPN; of course there's no way i can prove this although i do know someone who works in television data tracking.
BT are covering CFL this season. Here is their schedule for the first weekend of the season (as it currently stands)
Canadian Football League
Ottawa v Montreal. June 25th, 2015 at 12:30am
ESPN
Ottawa take on Montreal in week one of the Canadian Football League.
Canadian Football League
Hamilton v Calgary. June 27th, 2015 at 2:00am
BT Sport 2
All the latest action from the Canadian Football League.
Canadian Football League
Winnipeg v Saskatchewan. June 28th, 2015 at 1:00am
ESPN
All the latest action from the Canadian Football League.
Canadian Football League
Edmonton v Toronto. June 29th, 2015 at 9:30am
ESPN
College Football Live is back in July, I'm told. Last year I remember there being at least a couple of shows in April and it returning around mid-June (not sure about May) but it is to be a July return this year.
BT are covering CFL this season. Here is their schedule for the first weekend of the season (as it currently stands)
Nice little bonus this, I do like to catch a bit of the CFL - I find it more appealing than college football.
This is slightly off-topic and probably better placed in a Premier Sports thread - but out of interest, does anyone know which coverage feed Premier Sports are taking for their coverage of the Stanley Cup? Is it NBC (US), CBC (Canada) or an international feed?
Nice little bonus this, I do like to catch a bit of the CFL - I find it more appealing than college football.
This is slightly off-topic and probably better placed in a Premier Sports thread - but out of interest, does anyone know which coverage feed Premier Sports are taking for their coverage of the Stanley Cup? Is it NBC (US), CBC (Canada) or an international feed?
Premier are using the international feed with Dave Strader commentating.
As the NHL International has got a mention worth noting that the NHL/Medge rights deal from 2011 has ended up in court. The NHL allege that Medge are not making their payments. No response from Medge to the court summons has led to a resubmission of the complaint by the NHL at the end of May (the original suit was filed April 16th 2015)
Premier are using the international feed with Dave Strader commentating.
Thanks dfkb. From looking at Dave Strader's Twitter feed, he is doing the English language international feed with Kevin Weekes. Was there an international feed for early rounds of the NHL Playoffs (going by Dave's Twitter, it doesn't seem so) and if not, which feeds were Premier Sports generally using - NBC or CBC/Sportsnet?
In BT Sport news, I only caught a little bit of last night's Game One of the NBA Finals but it appeared as if they were using the US domestic ABC broadcast with commentary from Mike Breen, Mark Jackson and Jeff Van Gundy. I'm not sure what they did last year (I was on holiday during much of the NBA Finals), but I know in the final year of Sky Sports' NBA contract in 2013 they took the international feed for the Finals.
Compare this to UK TV's coverage of Major League Baseball's World Series, where successive broadcasters including BT Sport have taken the MLB International feed with Gary Thorne and Rick Sutcliffe rather than Fox.
Thanks dfkb. From looking at Dave Strader's Twitter feed, he is doing the English language international feed with Kevin Weekes. Was there an international feed for early rounds of the NHL Playoffs (going by Dave's Twitter, it doesn't seem so) and if not, which feeds were Premier Sports generally using - NBC or CBC/Sportsnet?
Bit of a mixture really, maybe more of the Canadian feeds for some of the earlier all-Canadian rounds. More NBC overall I would guess though.
I missed an article in TV Sports Markets dated June 26th regards the NHL's International rights. It says the NHL rights have reverted to the league:
Medge problems raise questions about NHL rights
26 JUNE 2015
Medge Consulting Sports has ceased to exist as a media rights agency, and its rights to the National Hockey League have reverted to the league after it missed payments, TV Sports Markets understands.
Good to see PTI/ATH returning to BT/ESPN from Saturday 1 August, with several showings per day, albeit on the following day rather than the same night as previously.
Have they sorted out the rights issues? - especially re the NFL that destroyed previous transmissions with such heavy editing.
Evidently Channel 4 are not showing the SNF NFL this year - I wonder if BT/ESPN might show it? If so, that could have a bearing on the rights.
In any event, great to have Kornheiser/Wilbon/Realli et al back. This is their 3rd(?) run, with at least 2 before.
Just before the season started the NHL awarded IMG the international distribution rights starting 2016-17
IMG to distribute NHL and World Cup of Hockey globally
06 October 2015 | Posted in Agencies, Ice Hockey, Global, | By Michael Long
IMG to distribute NHL and World Cup of Hockey globally
IMG has secured a contract to distribute media rights to the National Hockey League (NHL) and the 2016 World Cup of Hockey on a global basis.
Beginning with the 2016/17 season, the multi-year deal covers the rights to the elite ice hockey league in all territories outside the US, Canada and the Nordic countries.
It also includes the rights to the 2016 World Cup of Hockey in the same territories, with IMG set to market and distribute them alongside the National Hockey League Players’ Association (NHLPA) as well as the NHL.
“This partnership will be based on a collaborative approach,” said Hillary Mandel, a senior vice president and head of media, North America at IMG.
“Our global sales team’s expertise and extensive knowledge of each regional market allows us to work strategically with both organizations on a sales and consultancy basis. This is an exciting opportunity to make the NHL far more accessible for both its existing global fan base and a new generation of hockey fans.”
The 2016 World Cup of Hockey will be played at the Air Canada Centre in Toronto from 17th September to 1st October and will feature eight teams – Team Canada, Team Czech Republic, Team Finland, Team Russia, Team Sweden, Team USA, Team Europe and Team North America.
ESPN Plus will be the name of the international sports broadcaster’s new video-streaming service that will launch in spring 2018, Bob Iger, the chief executive of parent company Disney, confirmed yesterday (Thursday).
ESPN Plus will be based on a redesigned ESPN application.
Iger said that the service would have “more live sports than you can get on any channel, site or app.”
In August, ESPN said that the OTT service would offer coverage of about 10,000 live events per year, including contests from Major League Baseball, the National Hockey League, Major League Soccer, grand slam tennis and college sports.
In a conference call to discuss the company’s latest financial figures, Iger said that direct-to-consumer streaming services would be the top priority in 2018.
He refused to comment on recent reports of merger talks between Disney and rival media company 21st Century Fox.
- ESPN lost around 2 million subscribers
- ESPN Plus gained more than one million subscribers
- subscriber declines slowed between 2017 and 2018 compared to between 2016 and 2017
I am a fan of the content but with the current clinical edge or uncertainty about direction at BT Sport regards sports rights got to wonder if they look at the figures will such an agreement be renewed beyond 21 or22 (whichever it is). Also I am afraid that the majority of this content has such a small audience reported via BARB which unfortunately hasn't grown.
ESPN International no longer holding distribution rights for content such as NHRA, Indycar and AFL for example mean separate deals are required for BT to retain that type of content anyway if desired so potentially in line with some other non-renewals we could see the demise of this channel at the end of this deal.
I can't see BT wanting to continue with the ESPN NCAA coverage American Football, Basketball etc.
It was the more popular stuff like Indy Car they probably wanted and those could well be lost from next year.
With NCAA American Football I presume the rights are wider than the ESPN and ABC matches as they show the Saturday afternoon (US time) CBS game from the SEC and also some Fox games. Also see they now have Notre Dame home games. I know rights holders for those seem to continually change as they are unaffiliated so seem to sell to a revolving group of channels.
I can't see BT wanting to continue with the ESPN NCAA coverage American Football, Basketball etc.
It was the more popular stuff like Indy Car they probably wanted and those could well be lost from next year.
With NCAA American Football I presume the rights are wider than the ESPN and ABC matches as they show the Saturday afternoon (US time) CBS game from the SEC and also some Fox games. Also see they now have Notre Dame home games. I know rights holders for those seem to continually change as they are unaffiliated so seem to sell to a revolving group of channels.
Certainly no Fox games shown on BT (or Notre Dame home either AFAIK).
I can't see BT wanting to continue with the ESPN NCAA coverage American Football, Basketball etc.
It was the more popular stuff like Indy Car they probably wanted and those could well be lost from next year.
With NCAA American Football I presume the rights are wider than the ESPN and ABC matches as they show the Saturday afternoon (US time) CBS game from the SEC and also some Fox games. Also see they now have Notre Dame home games. I know rights holders for those seem to continually change as they are unaffiliated so seem to sell to a revolving group of channels.
Certainly no Fox games shown on BT (or Notre Dame home either AFAIK).
May have been away as sure I watched ND on there a couple of weekends ago.
They only show matches that ESPN have international distribution rights for and I don’t know enough about the various Conferences to know what that is!
NBC certainly have international rights for Notre Dame home matches, they can be purchased in this country either PPV or through a season pass with NBC Sports Gold.
BT Sport has for about 15 minutes overnight no fewer than 3 different college football games scheduled simultaneously across 1, 3 and ESPN, one of these as it happens being an away Notre Dame game. The games on 1 and 3 later overlap with college basketball. on ESPN.
Comments
Cheap to run; good overflow channel for BT and there are a lot of people that only subscribe to BT for the U.S. Sport. In addition I believe BT get monies for using ESPN name. Obviously it makes a profit for BT..
College Football Live is back in July, I'm told. Last year I remember there being at least a couple of shows in April and it returning around mid-June (not sure about May) but it is to be a July return this year.
Nice little bonus this, I do like to catch a bit of the CFL - I find it more appealing than college football.
This is slightly off-topic and probably better placed in a Premier Sports thread - but out of interest, does anyone know which coverage feed Premier Sports are taking for their coverage of the Stanley Cup? Is it NBC (US), CBC (Canada) or an international feed?
Premier are using the international feed with Dave Strader commentating.
https://iapps.courts.state.ny.us/nyscef/ViewDocument?docIndex=K_PLUS_wjsqedUzQ92crmSlEPzw==
Thanks dfkb. From looking at Dave Strader's Twitter feed, he is doing the English language international feed with Kevin Weekes. Was there an international feed for early rounds of the NHL Playoffs (going by Dave's Twitter, it doesn't seem so) and if not, which feeds were Premier Sports generally using - NBC or CBC/Sportsnet?
In BT Sport news, I only caught a little bit of last night's Game One of the NBA Finals but it appeared as if they were using the US domestic ABC broadcast with commentary from Mike Breen, Mark Jackson and Jeff Van Gundy. I'm not sure what they did last year (I was on holiday during much of the NBA Finals), but I know in the final year of Sky Sports' NBA contract in 2013 they took the international feed for the Finals.
Compare this to UK TV's coverage of Major League Baseball's World Series, where successive broadcasters including BT Sport have taken the MLB International feed with Gary Thorne and Rick Sutcliffe rather than Fox.
Bit of a mixture really, maybe more of the Canadian feeds for some of the earlier all-Canadian rounds. More NBC overall I would guess though.
Thanks for the information.
https://iapps.courts.state.ny.us/nyscef/ViewDocument?docIndex=K_PLUS_wjsqedUzQ92crmSlEPzw==
http://www.sportbusiness.com/tv-sports-markets
Can anyone here access the article? Just interested to know more detail (if there's any)
http://www.sportbusiness.com/tv-sports-markets/medge-problems-raise-questions-about-nhl-rights
Have they sorted out the rights issues? - especially re the NFL that destroyed previous transmissions with such heavy editing.
Evidently Channel 4 are not showing the SNF NFL this year - I wonder if BT/ESPN might show it? If so, that could have a bearing on the rights.
In any event, great to have Kornheiser/Wilbon/Realli et al back. This is their 3rd(?) run, with at least 2 before.
http://www.sportspromedia.com/news/img_to_distribute_nhl_and_world_cup_of_hockey_globally
see also
http://www.nhl.com/ice/news.htm?id=781895
http://img.com/news/news/2015/october/img-to-market-nhl-and-2016-world-cup-of-hockey-wor.aspx
MTG won the broadcast and online rights for the Nordic countries until 2021 (announced in July 2015)
http://www.mtg.com/press-releases/mtg-to-show-nhl-ice-hockey-until-2021-and-2016-world-cup-of-hockey/
MLBAM holds digital rights for six years (including current)
http://www.nhl.com/ice/news.htm?id=776246
https://www.sportbusiness.com/sport-news/new-ott-service-be-called-espn-plus
https://media.sportbusiness.com/news/subscriber-base-falls-for-espn/
- ESPN lost around 2 million subscribers
- ESPN Plus gained more than one million subscribers
- subscriber declines slowed between 2017 and 2018 compared to between 2016 and 2017
Was the seven year agreement between BT and ESPN until end of 2022 (or 2021) can anyone recall or workout with certainty?
http://sport.bt.com/sport-football/news/bt-sport-and-espn-extend-deal-S11363956012885
I am a fan of the content but with the current clinical edge or uncertainty about direction at BT Sport regards sports rights got to wonder if they look at the figures will such an agreement be renewed beyond 21 or22 (whichever it is). Also I am afraid that the majority of this content has such a small audience reported via BARB which unfortunately hasn't grown.
ESPN International no longer holding distribution rights for content such as NHRA, Indycar and AFL for example mean separate deals are required for BT to retain that type of content anyway if desired so potentially in line with some other non-renewals we could see the demise of this channel at the end of this deal.
It was the more popular stuff like Indy Car they probably wanted and those could well be lost from next year.
With NCAA American Football I presume the rights are wider than the ESPN and ABC matches as they show the Saturday afternoon (US time) CBS game from the SEC and also some Fox games. Also see they now have Notre Dame home games. I know rights holders for those seem to continually change as they are unaffiliated so seem to sell to a revolving group of channels.
Certainly no Fox games shown on BT (or Notre Dame home either AFAIK).
May have been away as sure I watched ND on there a couple of weekends ago.
NBC certainly have international rights for Notre Dame home matches, they can be purchased in this country either PPV or through a season pass with NBC Sports Gold.