DIRECTV to discontinue the Big Ten network?

[cumberlandreds]

Originally Posted by LoganBuck

I think you are getting false info here. Direct TV is putting on the full court press to sign up Time Warner customers because of the Big Ten Network fights. The ads are all over the radio here in Ohio.

Is it true that Dish Network moved BTN from Basic to Midlevel packages, for those outside of the Big Ten footprint? I heard that rumor from my brother in law last week.

DISH moved it to the Sports Pack if you live outside of the Big Ten country. They are basically treating it like another RSN. You have to pay an $5.99 a month to receive it and a host of other RSN's from around the country.

[FlightRick]

FWIW, the IU board I go to (oh, what an off-season it's been for my beloved Hoosier Hoops) says this is a patently false rumor, and is only confusion related to DTV shuffling channel assigments and then telling some customers that this will affect the availability of "overflow" Big Ten games. Whatever that means.

That said, put me in the pile with the handful of folks who've joked that they'd like to see the B10 Network flop and go out of business. Not because of any personal animosity towards the conference or its fans (though fall is a trying time, when you'd suddenly swear that OSU *must* be graduating 1.2 million students per year in order to justify the number of people you meet who simply assume that the football game that weekend is at the center of your social schedule)... but just to set a precedent for future ill-gotten attempts to create a network where none need exist.

And then the Big Ten fans have to be smart enough to channel their anger AT THE BIG TEN and not at their service providers. Trying to turn something that's a ten-times-per-year special attraction for most fans into a 365-days-per-year basic cable network is greedy, misguided, and to put it bluntly, retarded. Instead of being lemmings, the fans should rub the conference's nose in its own abject failure while opining "bad doggie." Because thinking a single sports conference is a viable national "brand" and thinking it's a strong enough brand to force the hands of service providers (asking them to shoulder the cost/risk of distributing your content, instead of taking that risk yourself via a syndication network or even -- if you really think you have a product your loyal niche fans will pay for -- a pay-per-view set-up where the free market will insure you are only broadcast in areas and homes where your product is a profitable one) is pretty much the corporate equivalent of dropping a turd in the living room of the very people who make it possible for you to exist.

End rant.


Rick

[cumberlandreds]

They may want to go the SEC route. They just signed a huge deal with ESPN for the next 15 years.

http://www.sportsbusinessjournal.com/article/59824

[Blimpie]

Originally Posted by cumberlandreds

They may want to go the SEC route. They just signed a huge deal with ESPN for the next 15 years.

http://www.sportsbusinessjournal.com/article/59824

..and that $150 million per year that ESPN is shelling out to the SEC is for the rights to air sloppy seconds.

CBS has also forked over considerable coinage and will get to air the premier matchups every week.

[paintmered]

Originally Posted by cumberlandreds

They may want to go the SEC route. They just signed a huge deal with ESPN for the next 15 years.

http://www.sportsbusinessjournal.com/article/59824

The SEC deal might be bigger, but the Big East also signed a huge ESPN deal a year or two ago.

[*BaseClogger*]

Originally Posted by Caseyfan21

Hopefully every cable service drops the BTN and we can go back to watching all our favorite Big Ten team's on our regular channels. That network trying to strong arm cable companies was garbage from the beginning and I hope it goes belly up when TV companies realize that people only watch and care about this network for a few college football games a year.

Those of us who lived out-of-market would wholly disagree with that...

[Boston Red]

Originally Posted by *BaseClogger*

Those of us who lived out-of-market would wholly disagree with that...

So get ESPN GamePlan, which used to have all of the games that are now on Big Ten Network. You get all the games that you wanted anyway, and all of the DirecTV subscribers do not have to subsidize your Big Ten football watching. Seems like the best case scenario to me.

[BRM]

Originally Posted by Boston Red

So get ESPN GamePlan, which used to have all of the games that are now on Big Ten Network. You get all the games that you wanted anyway, and all of the DirecTV subscribers do not have to subsidize your Big Ten football watching. Seems like the best case scenario to me.

I don't remember GamePlan carrying every single Big Ten game but I could be wrong. Seems like I was upset a few years back because I couldn't get some of the IU games.

Did Directv's rates actually increase after picking up BTN?

[Boston Red]

I have no specific knowledge of it, but they must have. I am sure the Big Ten Network isn't cheap.

I have the Sports Pack, GamePlan and FullCourt on DirecTV, so I am not averse to paying for my sports coverage. I AM averse to ESPN (with ESPNU) and the Big Ten Network trying to bully providers into making all of their subscribers pay for something that probably a vast majority of them do not want.

And all of those Big Ten games that are now on the Big Ten Network on Saturday afternoons were always on ESPN+, which essentially distributed the games to the local markets and were on GamePlan for the rest of the country.

[*BaseClogger*]

Originally Posted by Boston Red

So get ESPN GamePlan, which used to have all of the games that are now on Big Ten Network.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't ESPN GamePlan cost like $150? Why would I want to have to pay for that when Big Ten Network is free for Directv customers?

Originally Posted by Boston Red

You get all the games that you wanted anyway, and all of the DirecTV subscribers do not have to subsidize your Big Ten football watching. Seems like the best case scenario to me.

First off, like BRM said I don't think you get every Big Ten game. Second, what is the Big Ten Network costing you? Did they rise prices for which I am unaware of? You know you can just ignore the channel like almost every other one, right?

Originally Posted by BRM

I don't remember GamePlan carrying every single Big Ten game but I could be wrong. Seems like I was upset a few years back because I couldn't get some of the IU games.

Did Directv's rates actually increase after picking up BTN?

Exactly

Originally Posted by Boston Red

I have no specific knowledge of it, but they must have. I am sure the Big Ten Network isn't cheap.

If you don't know if prices have gone u[, why complain about a channel?

Originally Posted by Boston Red

I have the Sports Pack, GamePlan and FullCourt on DirecTV, so I am not averse to paying for my sports coverage.

But why pay when you can get it for free?

Originally Posted by Boston Red

I AM averse to ESPN (with ESPNU) and the Big Ten Network trying to bully providers into making all of their subscribers pay for something that probably a vast majority of them do not want.

I don't get ESPNU with my package. Did your subscription prices go up?

Originally Posted by Boston Red

And all of those Big Ten games that are now on the Big Ten Network on Saturday afternoons were always on ESPN+, which essentially distributed the games to the local markets and were on GamePlan for the rest of the country.

Yes, but as has been repeated several times Big Ten Network has cost much less than GamePlan and oh, by the way, it carries more than just football games...

[guttle11]

You have to look at it from the BTN's perspective. They can't grow to what they aspire to be on a sports tier. They may not even be able to survive.

The BTN realizes they are a sports tier network in most of the country. The problem is that Time Warner and the others want them on a tier in Big Ten country. Most of their audience comes from there, and that's their only chance to get big ad dollars. They have to be on extended basic in Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Indiana, Wisconsin...

[Boston Red]

Originally Posted by *BaseClogger*

Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't ESPN GamePlan cost like $150? Why would I want to have to pay for that when Big Ten Network is free for Directv customers?

Well, that's exactly the point. Those of us who actually want the games should have to pay for them. Not the 90% of DirecTV viewers who would never watch a Big Ten football game, much less a thrilling midweek Purdue/Northwestern field hockey game.

[Boston Red]

Originally Posted by guttle11

You have to look at it from the BTN's perspective. They can't grow to what they aspire to be on a sports tier. They may not even be able to survive.

If it cannot survive, all the better.

[guttle11]

Originally Posted by Boston Red

If it cannot survive, all the better.

All the better for what? Your bill is going to rise, with or without the BTN. If you have it and it goes away, your bill will not go down.

[Boston Red]

I wouldn't be surprised if it did. The BTN, I'm sure, charges AT LEAST $1 per subscriber, per month. If DirecTV raised their rates $1 when they picked up the BTN, they very well might reduce them by a buck if the BTN went away.