Notice TRAIL BLAZERS ANNOUNCE NEW TELEVISION BROADCAST PARTNERSHIP WITH ROOT SPORTS

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Natebishop3 said:
The best leagues make the most money, no? How else do you gauge success? How many people watch and how much money they make. Or is there another way to judge?

The MLS doesn’t have the best players so it doesn’t make as much money. Viewership is lower than the other four leagues. Similarly, women’s basketball and women’s soccer also does not have the best players in that sport. If the best basketball in the world was being player in the WNBA do you think viewership would go up? Or if all the best players in the NBA left for another league, do you think viewership and revenue would go down?

Talent and revenue go hand in hand. They are linked.
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The NHL is far behind the other big 3 in viewership and attendance. Their attendance is worse than MLS, and viewership isn't way higher. NHL is much closer to MLS than it is the others.
 
Natebishop3 said:
I think you’re wrong. I think it would easily pass the NHL and MLB.
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There's 34 MLS games, versus 162 for baseball(with bigger stadiums), and 80 something for NHL. It's near impossible to make up that gap in revenue lost from so many fewer games.
 
RR7 said:
The NHL is far behind the other big 3 in viewership and attendance. Their attendance is worse than MLS, and viewership isn't way higher. NHL is much closer to MLS than it is the others.
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The NHL plays in arenas. Are you talking about per game or overall? The MLS plays in bigger venues, no?
 
SlyPokerDog said:
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As a veteran of the CSNNW and Pac 12 wars I’m not holding my breath.
Either “we want an ungodly amount” then “well we tried, email them wondering why we aren’t on there”

or provider lowballs them and then “call root asking why they aren’t in our service”

would really love to be wrong though obviously.
 
Natebishop3 said:
You can enjoy the MLS. That's fine. I'm not taking anything away from that. But whether they're big in other countries makes little difference, are you going to contest that those four leagues have the best players in the world for those sports?

The MLS is basically like watching AAA baseball. It's not the best. That's why I never really enjoyed watching high school sports. At least on the college level you still get to see some of the best before they go pro. How many MLS players have gone up to the higher leagues? I know some have, but not many.
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Some have and gone on to be the Mario Hezonja for their team
 
MLS will get there. It will just take time. Maybe 20 years?
 
THE HCP said:
Because I don’t watch Blazer games. If they really wanted to watch they would go to my in-laws a few blocks away.
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Hey man! How’d your man LeBron look in playoffs? Maybe a little OLD?
 
this thread delivers....I'm not sure what though

in all the chatter about the models of professional sports leagues, viewership, and TV revenue, nobody has mentioned NCAA football. Millions of fans in stadiums every week of the season, , gobs and gobs of TV revenue, and they don't have to pay the players more than a minimum wage. Now there is a model geared for Success!
 
wizenheimer said:
this thread delivers....I'm not sure what though

in all the chatter about the models of professional sports leagues, viewership, and TV revenue, nobody has mentioned NCAA football. Millions of fans in stadiums every week of the season, , gobs and gobs of TV revenue, and they don't have to pay the players more than a minimum wage. Now there is a model geared for Success!
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If ever there was a microcosm of how America does business...
 
wizenheimer said:
this thread delivers....I'm not sure what though

in all the chatter about the models of professional sports leagues, viewership, and TV revenue, nobody has mentioned NCAA football. Millions of fans in stadiums every week of the season, , gobs and gobs of TV revenue, and they don't have to pay the players more than a minimum wage. Now there is a model geared for Success!
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and it looks like it could be a 12 team playoff...
 
oregonlive.com

Canzano: State sports scene deserved more from NBC Sports Northwest
By John Canzano | The Oregonian/OregonLive

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The Trail Blazers will now be seen on ROOT Sports.Sean Meagher/The Oregonian

There was a deal to be had -- be sure -- but the suits who controlled the fate of NBC Sports Northwest just couldn’t bring themselves to do it. As a result, the Trail Blazers are now headed to ROOT Sports in a widely reported regional television deal that will bring our state’s NBA franchise into more households.

A lot of them in Seattle’s footprint.

NBC Sports Northwest?

“It’s a dead-man walking,” said one industry insider.

I don’t blame the Blazers one bit. The organization did the best deal it could find. But I’m told by those familiar with the negotiations that our state’s lone regional sports network fumbled away its early negotiating advantage. The end result is that Oregon will be left without a sports network to house a wide variety of state sports products.

You deserved better.

I’m talking to you now, reader. Our state’s 4.2 million residents deserved to have an RSN that could have continued to serve the Blazers up as a tentpole offering. But also, it should have done a better job featuring rich peripheral content of the Ducks, Beavers, Timbers, Thorns, Hops, Winterhawks and a variety of other sports in our state.

Portland State?

Sure.

University of Portland?

Yup.

How about high school sports and the hungry prep sports audience?

Absolutely.

I’m not fan of a spoon-fed media coverage. NBC Sports Northwest, previously known as Comcast Sportsnet NW, often broke out the pom-poms. It didn’t pretend to be objective and regularly pushed a pro-Blazers agenda. A lot of us shook our heads as the network openly rooted for the NBA team it “covered” and even dismissed employees who spoke or Tweeted critically about the franchise. It wasn’t journalism. It was content. Still, there was a place for the regional sports network in our state and I’ll be disappointed to see the thing die.

The entity isn’t publicly announcing it will shutter. But that’s where it’s headed, be sure. NBC Sports Northwest desperately needed the Blazers to help drive subscriptions and sell sponsorship packages. I’m told by those close to the negotiations that our state’s NBA franchise wanted very much to continue the local partnership but left the early negotiating period feeling as if it had little choice but to listen carefully to ROOT.

The Blazers signed a four-year contract with ROOT. It marked the end of a 14-year partnership with NBC Sports Northwest and left a lot of people wondering what went sideways.

“There was an early deal to be done,” said one industry executive. “I mean, it may have not been as lucrative a deal as NBC Sports Northwest would have hoped for but it would have been better than a certain death.”

This feels a little like one of those Greek myths now. The entity overplayed its hand, forgot that it couldn’t thrive without the Blazers and in the end, essentially negotiated itself out of existence.

I give the thing three months.

The aim here isn’t to bash a media business for misplaying its early negotiating advantage. Rather, to lament that our state now doesn’t have a regional sports network to serve our residents. Apologies to ROOT, which broadcasts across five states, but it’s basically Seattle’s sports network. Seeing the Blazers positioned alongside the MLB Mariners and NHL Kraken won’t sit well with a lot Oregonians. It shouldn’t. But that’s where we are today and no amount of shoulder programming will make ROOT ever feel like its our state’s own network.

The Blazers are pleased because they’ll be seen in roughly double the households now. That’s the spin. Fans will be happy to hear that ROOT is now in discussions with Hulu and YouTube to explore streaming options. Also, ROOT is available on DirecTV. In the end, though, I’m more concerned with the larger message: Our state needed its own television network. One committed to the state.

This isn’t a positive development for any of our state’s sports entities. It’s not good for industry employees who will have to find new jobs. It’s not productive for viewers, who could have enjoyed rich content had NBC Sports Northwest ever really bought in to serving the state’s television audience the way it deserved all along.

In four years, maybe a broadcast entity located in Oregon will get another shot at the negotiation. Or maybe a MLB franchise in Portland would ignite the launch of a regional network that would serve the rest of the state. But that feels far away today. Meanwhile, the Blazers will march on. So will the other entities. They’ll be fine, I guess. But I can’t help but think about the lost opportunity for Oregonians this week. There was a deal to be had. But NBC Sports Northwest just didn’t get it done.

---
 
As somebody who is in the industry, I’d ask all the time why they wouldn’t do PSU/UP and local HS games. There is TONS of content out there, they just didn’t go after it. Obviously I kept hearing how their was “no money to made in it”........sucks. But honestly, did anybody watch that channel if there wasn’t a Blazer game on?
 
I haven’t read this whole thread. Does this mean Dan Marang is out of a job?
 
THE HCP said:
As somebody who is in the industry, I’d ask all the time why they wouldn’t do PSU/UP and local HS games. There is TONS of content out there, they just didn’t go after it. Obviously I kept hearing how their was “no money to made in it”........sucks. But honestly, did anybody watch that channel if there wasn’t a Blazer game on?
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No money to be made? Wouldn't local businesses be interested in advertising during HS games? Maybe local businesses just can't afford to pay for it?

Alright RipCityTwo, Oregon needs a regional sports network. We've got vloggers and journalists, IT people etc.

Could we do it? 4 years to turn a profit on local HS/College sports, then we can take the Blazers away from Root.
 
THE HCP said:
As somebody who is in the industry, I’d ask all the time why they wouldn’t do PSU/UP and local HS games. There is TONS of content out there, they just didn’t go after it. Obviously I kept hearing how their was “no money to made in it”........sucks. But honestly, did anybody watch that channel if there wasn’t a Blazer game on?
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Nope and this is the same problem as the Pac 12 networks. NBCSNNW should have gone after the timbers and any other local sports content they could get. I would have watched any local live sporting events (winterhawks as well) over the garbage they have out when its not a blazers game. Early on they had a local reality show to choose a outdoor show host. Im not usually into that thing but watched because it was local. It made it one season.

Pac 12 cant even show all the OSU and UO baseball games... they decide to show fringe sports that i doubt much of the audience watched.

Im not clued in enough to know who is to blame, but I am ashamed that the Timbers and Blazers are both on ROOT when there was a local channel. Streaming is the way now and ROOT wants nothing to do with it. These "we are in talks with Hulu and others" is the same shit they spewed when they signed CSNNW without satellite, same story with the Pac 12 netowrk. I doubt it happens.

Timbers fans have been quite upset with Root and I have a feeling there are even more Blazer fans that are cord cutters.
 
Such a good guy I feel bad for him but he was not good at this from day one. Calabro is 100x better.
 
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