got a new striker today, i've been kind of underwhelmed by the offseason moves, hopefully they pan out. time for pete to win another trophy or move on
lol, come on man.
The TV deal is only better for cord cutters in the KC area, it's much worse for everyone else. I have ESPN+ so it's not as big of a deal for me, but being able to watch on television in addition to multiple streaming options was better for everyone else
A lot of Bally subscribers will still be in an area to get a broadcast plus cordcutters will get a free stream. ESPN+ still works for people outside of the region. I think it's a win for people trying to access games although I don't know what the money side looks like for the club.
Who is the new deal much worse for?
The deal is much worse for everyone outside of the KC area who watched matches on Bally's. So most people in the entire states of Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, Iowa, northern Oklahoma, and western Illinois. Again I have ESPN+ already so it's not as big of a deal for people that already have it, but most people in these areas don't, so they will have to add ESPN+ while still having to pay for Bally's on our sports tier. It's not as big of a deal as the cord cutters in greater KC not being able to see games the past few years, that was definitely shitty, although they did have the same choice we did, but it's definitely not as good as it was before.
Another thing about having Bally's that people outside of KC will have to get used to, and that they're definitely going to bitch about, are those games on Univision(TUDN). Those are exclusive national broadcasts, but the league let the local broadcasters simulcast these matches. They still will get to, but now the local market isn't everyone who got Bally's KC, it's just the greater KC area. So these matches, usually 4-6 a year and possibly a playoff game, will have to either be watched on TUDN, a channel a lot of people in this part of the country don't get, or they have to watch these matches on Twitter, yes Twitter. ESPN+ does not have rights to national broadcasts on TUDN or Fox. I have TUDN on DirecTV foreign language tier, and they do have an English language broadcast using the sap button, but it's a horrible broadcast and if I'm not home I can only stream it on Twitter.
I don't have to worry about this because, again ESPN+, but I worry about how well the Sporting KC app will hold up as a streaming option. I don't know how often you have used it in the two years it's been launched, but it's been absolutely horrible and that's without any video capabilities, that's a very new feature to the app.
They did a good job in making sure all their fans have some option to watch now, but the options are definitely not as reliable as before. They're also definitely losing money on this deal, so they should get credit for that. The deal with Bally's still had a year left, so they had to pay to get that and 38 The Spot has no where close to the advertising revenue that Fox Sports KC had when they made that deal before the bottom fell out on regional sports networks. I wouldn't be surprised if the team is getting nothing but the full share of their advertising revenue.
