Bloodletting at ESPN

[Caveat Emperor]

Amazon Prime is going to do (some) Thursday night NFL games this season so Netflix may get in the game.

After watching what has happened with ESPN, why on Earth would you jump into this rat race?

[Chip R]

After watching what has happened with ESPN, why on Earth would you jump into this rat race?

They have to see if it's going to make financial sense. Twitter did it last year but you can't watch Twitter on your TV. Amazon is a rival for programming. I'm a cordcutter and the Dolphins are my team. If they are on Thursday night football, my choices are to go to a bar and watch or stay at home and watch on my TV with Amazon Prime. That means I'm not watching Netflix. Maybe they don't jump into the NFL with both feet. Maybe they try it out with a NCAA game of the week or something. If there aren't any problems, maybe they talk to the NFL and see if they can work something out. Netflix has a goodly amount of money they can throw at the NFL to show one game a week.

[M2]

For a long time I was convinced that internet providers (most of whom are also cable providers) would fight back against streaming video by imposing bandwidth caps and/or charging more money for faster access -- to the point where it would just make more sense to subscribe to a cable package as well.

There's just so little competition in the space (I have a whopping two choices when it comes to high speed internet service) that I just assumed prices would remain high.

They're trying to get rid of net neutrality again so they can do exactly that. If they get their way, they'll be throttling capacity and putting up toll booths all over the place.

[Caveat Emperor]

They have to see if it's going to make financial sense. Twitter did it last year but you can't watch Twitter on your TV. Amazon is a rival for programming. I'm a cordcutter and the Dolphins are my team. If they are on Thursday night football, my choices are to go to a bar and watch or stay at home and watch on my TV with Amazon Prime. That means I'm not watching Netflix. Maybe they don't jump into the NFL with both feet. Maybe they try it out with a NCAA game of the week or something. If there aren't any problems, maybe they talk to the NFL and see if they can work something out. Netflix has a goodly amount of money they can throw at the NFL to show one game a week.

Netflix doesn't need it -- they're putting their money (correctly, IMO) into new original content to replace all the old content that's being pulled off due to studios and networks realizing that these old shows can be monetized on their own streaming services in the future. They've got 50 million users already at a solid price point -- if they bid on the NFL, how many more people are realistically going to add Netflix to watch games? That's the calculus they've gotta do, and if they can't make up the cost of the bid in new subscribers, it means they'll have to either cut back on adding programming elsewhere (a catastrophic mistake) or raise prices (also a mistake).

Amazon? Maybe -- but again, do they really need the NFL to push their prime services? Also, you have to remember that one of the driving forces behind networks bidding up the NFL content packages was to use the games as a platform to push other things -- it's why you're stuck with endless live reads about the new episode of "2 Broke Girls" or "Prison Break." Networks are OK writing off some portion of the NFL as a "loss" because they believe they can make it up on the back end by pushing viewers to other places on the TV network. When the games are on a subscription service like Amazon, what else are they pushing? The games don't add value to the service the way they do to the "Big Four" networks.

[WrongVerb]

Netflix doesn't need it -- they're putting their money (correctly, IMO) into new original content to replace all the old content that's being pulled off due to studios and networks realizing that these old shows can be monetized on their own streaming services in the future. They've got 50 million users already at a solid price point -- if they bid on the NFL, how many more people are realistically going to add Netflix to watch games? That's the calculus they've gotta do, and if they can't make up the cost of the bid in new subscribers, it means they'll have to either cut back on adding programming elsewhere (a catastrophic mistake) or raise prices (also a mistake).

Amazon? Maybe -- but again, do they really need the NFL to push their prime services? Also, you have to remember that one of the driving forces behind networks bidding up the NFL content packages was to use the games as a platform to push other things -- it's why you're stuck with endless live reads about the new episode of "2 Broke Girls" or "Prison Break." Networks are OK writing off some portion of the NFL as a "loss" because they believe they can make it up on the back end by pushing viewers to other places on the TV network. When the games are on a subscription service like Amazon, what else are they pushing? The games don't add value to the service the way they do to the "Big Four" networks.

Didn't you just kind of answer your own question about Neflix in your second paragraph? If Netflix sees adding football games as a loss-leader to push people to other programming (and then can justify a rate increase (btw, I'd pay $30-$40/mo for full access to Netflix's entire library)) that would make reasonable sense for them to do it.

[Caveat Emperor]

Didn't you just kind of answer your own question about Neflix in your second paragraph? If Netflix sees adding football games as a loss-leader to push people to other programming (and then can justify a rate increase (btw, I'd pay $30-$40/mo for full access to Netflix's entire library)) that would make reasonable sense for them to do it.

Not really.

If you're watching the NFL on Netflix, you're already subscribing to Netflix -- they've got you as a customer. The Networks rely on ratings to drive advertising revenue -- if they have 15 million people watching an NFL game, they want to push part of that audience to other shows to increase ratings and increase ad rates for those shows. If live-reads for a show during an NFL game drives viewers to a show who otherwise wouldn't watch or the audience from an NFL game stays around to watch the next piece of network programming, those extra eyeballs translate to more advertising money for the network. That's why the networks jam as many commercials and live-reads for their own products into games.

Netflix doesn't have advertising and they don't rely on ratings for revenue; they don't care if you watch Orange is the New Black or the MST3K reboot -- they just care that they have enough content to keep you paying $10-$15 per month for your account. So the "audience push" value for Netflix is precisely nil, unless they radically change their business model away from flat-rate pricing (which would be a huge mistake, IMO).

[M2]

Though Netflix could make make advertising revenue off of live sports. I believe the WWE Network is now making some real money off of advertising.

[Stray]

Social media has kinda upended things. Everyone with a smartphone is a journo, every journo is a normal person. Not a secret that journos lean way too the left, but a social media feed just kinda magnified it to everyone. Of course they're real people who are entitled to their own opinions on whatever, but for the sake of these outlets I think everyone would be better off with professional and personal accounts. If Random Joe follows college basketball writer Seth Davis, they're doing so for college basketball news. When Seth Davis spends the better part of a year pushing an agenda to try and get his favorite candidate elected, people lose trust not only in him, but the profession. Journalism is a disaster right now because social media opened up a window into the personal opinions of people we're supposed to trust as objective messengers.

ESPN chose a side and injected polarizing topics into an entertainment outlet. That's gonna lose every time.

I don't care how reporters and pundits feel about politics, I just wish everyone would get back to sports. I liked when it was a getaway, now I avoid everything that isn't live sports. It sucks.

[Chip R]

John Clayton has gotten the ax.

[Joseph]

Hope his mom can keep him in the basement a while longer.

[cumberlandreds]

John Clayton has gotten the ax.

Do they have any actual reporters left?

[bucksfan2]

John Clayton has gotten the ax.

I like Clayton, I think he always gave some good insight. But when you break it down, does it make sense to keep a guy on like Clayton and his seniority, especially when he is based in Seattle? At the end of the day, its ESPN, don't you think they can get someone in there 20 years younger who can do just as good of a job?

ESPN had operated for years under the impression that SC was bigger than any anchor/personality, but they continued to keep some of the old soldiers around has ceased to be useful. Not that Clayton ceased to be useful, but its always nice to get a fresh perspective in there.

[Boston Red]

I like Clayton, I think he always gave some good insight. But when you break it down, does it make sense to keep a guy on like Clayton and his seniority, especially when he is based in Seattle? At the end of the day, its ESPN, don't you think they can get someone in there 20 years younger who can do just as good of a job?

ESPN had operated for years under the impression that SC was bigger than any anchor/personality, but they continued to keep some of the old soldiers around has ceased to be useful. Not that Clayton ceased to be useful, but its always nice to get a fresh perspective in there.

It would be funny if someone in ESPN management wrote a memo to this effect prior to the firings and some of the elder statesmen got a sweet age discrimination lawsuit to boost their severance pay.

[Assembly Hall]

ESPN had operated for years under the impression that SC was bigger than any anchor/personality, but they continued to keep some of the old soldiers around has ceased to be useful. Not that Clayton ceased to be useful, but its always nice to get a fresh perspective in there.

I will agree with part of that. Guys like Berman, Vitale, and Kiper's "schtick" wore off along time ago. But I liked Katz and Clayton. In the end, I really don't watch ESPN that much. If I do it is for a game or I catch "Mike and Mike"(which has went to hell in a hand basket as well). If I want MLB talk, I watch the MLB network. Same goes for the NFL network. Somewhere down the line ESPN just lost what they had.

[Chip R]

This isn't bloodletting but life imitating art.

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