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Cable, satellite, and telco-TV subscribers face paying an extra $12 a year for two new sports channels that are certain to be added to the lineup by this summer.
Rupert Murdoch’s dream is to launch a cable sports network that can successfully rival ESPN. That dream begins to come true in August when News Corporation launches FOX Sports 1, a makeover of the Speed Channel that will cost subscribers more. Soon after, the Fuel Channel will relaunch as FOX Sports 2, a companion network.
The networks will carry programming acquired from deals with a range of sports leagues. FOX Sports 1 will feature Major League Baseball games starting next year. For the late summer and early fall of this year, the new sports channels will be packed with the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series (and truck races), pro archery which implies that new bowstring, UFC matches, and a range of college football and basketball games.
While the initial price of the new sports networks is relatively cheap at $1 a month per subscriber, in contrast with ESPN’s $5.15 monthly asking price, Murdoch and other Fox executives hope to one day rival ESPN, which guarantees bidding wars for sports programming that will escalate cable programming costs and subscriber bills.
Chase Carey, president of Fox, acknowledged the cost to acquire rights for sports programming have increased, but he believes sports programming will continue to be a priority for subscribers willing to tolerate higher bills for premier sporting events that may be featured on platforms such as the WSM Casino.
“We think sports is a huge arena that has room in it to build a really attractive businesses,” Carey told analysts on an earnings call last month.
[flv width=”360″ height=”290″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/Bloomberg Market Is Big Enough for Fox Sports 1 3-6-13.mp4[/flv]
Lee Berke, president of LHB Sports Entertainment Media, talks about News Corp.’s plan to start a national sports network to debut in August. Fox Sports 1 will be available to more than 90 million pay-TV homes, New York-based News Corp. said yesterday in a statement. He speaks with Betty Liu on Bloomberg Television’s “In the Loop.” (4 minutes)
FOX SPORTS 1 PROGRAMMING HIGHLIGHTS
COLLEGE BASKETBALL – Dozens of exclusive prime time games on Monday and Thursday nights, plus Saturday and Sunday coverage of the Big 12, Pac-12 and Conference USA.
COLLEGE FOOTBALL – Led by Notre Dame at Stanford, the Big Ten Championship Game and Pac-12 Championship Game (2014) on FOX, dozens of exclusive, live games from the Pac-12, Big 12 and Conference USA on Thursday nights and Saturdays; triple- and quadruple-headers on Saturdays; Saturday pre- and postgame coverage.
MLB – Beginning in 2014, select League Championship Series and Division Series games; regular-season games over 26 Saturdays; live game-in-progress look-in show.
NASCAR – Select NASCAR Sprint Cup Series races as soon as 2015; NASCAR Camping World Truck Series races; NASCAR Sprint All-Star race; all SpeedWeeks events leading up to the Daytona 500 including: Daytona 500 Qualifying, Sprint Unlimited at Daytona (2014, 2017-22) and the Budweiser Duel, now in prime time; NASCAR Sprint Cup Series and NCWTS Practice and Qualifying sessions; NASCAR RaceDay, providing pre- and post-race coverage; NASCAR Victory Lane, a weekly wrap-up show; and Race Hub, a daily mid-day studio show with the latest from drivers, owners and garages.
SOCCER – Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday afternoon coverage of the world’s most prolific club soccer competitions, the UEFA Champions League and UEFA Europa League, and CONCACAF Champions League featuring many of the world’s greatest and most successful clubs; the world’s oldest soccer competition, the FA Cup; CONCACAF Gold Cup; CONCACAF Qualifiers, FIFA Women’s World Cup coverage in 2015 and 2019; FIFA Men’s World Cup coverage in 2018 and 2022; delayed matches in prime time; weekly magazine and highlights shows.
UFC – Featured on Wednesday nights; live FIGHT NIGHTS through 2014, the first is scheduled for launch night, Saturday, Aug. 17; FOX event preliminary cards; UFC Tonight, the weekly authority for UFC news and information; 14 Saturday pay-per-view preliminary cards; hundreds of hours of library programs and events.
Willing. Right. I do love paying large amounts of money for things I don’t watch and have no way of removing from my bill. This ridiculous notion is why more and more people are moving to streaming and going back to OTA.
I hope this belief that everyone wants and is willing to pay for sports channels bites them all in the ass.
To be fair, I think a lot of people would probably welcome FOX Sports 1 over the Speed network, which seems to have a lot of fringe programming that few are likely to tune in for.
The real story here, I suppose, is that more sports programming that may have been free-to-air in the past is now moving onto the cable dial and upping the bill.
sighs, yet another sports channel, this is one of my big pet peeves, sports should have its own package, take it out of regular packages to make them cheaper (and it would be a lot cheaper to take all sports channels out) and let the sports lovers pay the extra for the channels (back to the price it is now). No one in my family watches sports except my son and he only watches whats on regular tv or u.s.a. so we dont need those channels. also we live in texas and we have a ton of telenova channels (maybe… Read more »
Dont forget Debra that there are a large number of sports fans paying towards to the cost of the channels you like to watch.
Too bad ALL of the channels are GARBAGE! If the sports channels go away, so will the crappy reality shows. That will make the channel be worth my $$$$. If it’s not, they can die.
Just another reason to cut the cord! I refuse to pay for all this garbage sports programming along with the reality trash. Every team doesn’t need their own channel!?!?!