Definitely Not A Cop said:

---

Frok said:

---

FtWorthHorn said:

---

MW03 said:

---

When (not "if" according to Travis) ESPN loses this battle, it will be 10x as expensive to watch sports,

---

Isn't the more likely outcome that the amounts the leagues get paid fall dramatically?

---

It depends, is the demand for sports consumption still there? If so some service will pick it up with some sort of new bundling model.

However I do wonder if there is as much interest in younger folks with sports. My kids don't really watch much sports at all. At their age I was already hooked.

---

Were the games taking 4.5 hours when you were that age?

---

Considering the attention span of the younger demos along with the sheer number of distractions, I don't see why a network would pick up the MLB. Games are too long (even with the new pitch clock), too numerous, and are boring as hell to watch on TV outside of the WS. Too much dead air in baseball games and kids these days simply aren't going to stay tuned to it.

I do think the pitch clock has sped up the game and made it much more enjoyable for TV. But yeah, I agree. I mean South Park was making jokes about how kids hated baseball over 10 years ago.

Off tangent, but I would like to see the scoring statistics from the year before the pitch clock and after to see if it made any difference to the game besides time.

FtWorthHorn said:

---

MW03 said:

---

When (not "if" according to Travis) ESPN loses this battle, it will be 10x as expensive to watch sports,

---

Isn't the more likely outcome that the amounts the leagues get paid fall dramatically?

---

I would think the next round of broadcast rights deals will be much lower than they currently are. The bubble has to burst on that

I just received an email from Spectrum saying it's all resolved.

Definitely Not A Cop said:

---

I do think the pitch clock has sped up the game and made it much more enjoyable for TV. But yeah, I agree. I mean South Park was making jokes about how kids hated baseball over 10 years ago.

Off tangent, but I would like to see the scoring statistics from the year before the pitch clock and after to see if it made any difference to the game besides time.

---

Been to two Rangers games this year and the pitch clock has absolutely improved the experience. Great move by MLB, but just don't think it's enough.

https://awfulannouncing.com/espn/5-biggest-questions-disney-charter-spectrum.html

Really good writeup on the Charter/Disney deal. If you want to pass up clicking I'll summarize below.

We (traditional media) don't know what to do with digital anything long term and nobody was willing to blow it all up...this time.

I had heard that while ESPN got the rate increase, Charter was able to get rid of several channels (and that article had the link to what they were): Freeform, FXX, Disney Junior, Disney XD, FXM, Baby TV, Nat Geo Wild and Nat Geo Mundo. With Disney+ and Hulu, those were all unnecessary. I would think the next iteration that ESPNU and ESPN News can be removed since ESPN+ is an option. It's nice to have an overflow station since ESPN still insists on starting college football games when it's clear the 11 am or an earlier game is still going to have about 5 minutes, but that seems like it would not have been difficult.


I expect Xfinity/Comcast and AT&T to be nearly identical in their next deal.

Several times this month I've gotten texts from Spectrum like this and I'm assuming they're blocking or changing the channels on the app. Agree, I think any big cable operator is going to get the same deal and we'll plod along until the next big chasm happens