Convention Update: Sports

There were no fireworks at the session on sports programming yesterday.  I showed up prepared to air the laundry between distributors and programmers so I wore a referee's shirt.

But the panel was more committed to discussing ways the two natural opponents

were working together to increase consumer access and options to sports product. Interesting story about the panel in Multichannel News today.  Here are some excerpts:

Several sport programmers Tuesday sang the praises of their content’s value, to passionate fans and as fodder for new-media platforms, while cable operators cautioned that spiraling prices have to be held in line. Both sides, however, seemed to agree that the sports programming business is “in stress”—because of rising costs—but not broken, during a Cable Show panel called “Good Sports: Understanding the New Sports-Media Ecosystem.”...

...Robert Wilson, senior vice president of programming for Cox Communications, sounded a similar note about the sports “ecosystem.  It’s working, but it’s under extreme pressure. We are trying to be the voice of the consumer.”

...Panelist Melinda Witmer, Time Warner Cable’s chief programming officer, said that while distributors may want to super serve sports fans, non-sports fans don’t necessarily want to foot the bill for that content.

...Sean Bratches, ESPN’s executive vice president of sales and marketing, pointed out that “Sports fans in America have never been better served,” Bratches said. “ESPN has never been more highly viewed than last year. 

…The average sports fan spends almost two hours a day with ESPN media,” he said. Instead new media gives ESPN the “ability to showcase sports content that traditionally hadn’t been highlighted,” according to Bratches.

He said, “The more you super serve the fan, the more they’re ingesting more of the content.” Bratches added that ESPN is working with operators like Wilson to exploit sports content on outlets such as on-demand and HDTV.

...Willner suggested that increases in sports costs, and hence cable prices, might prompt lawmakers and the Federal Communications Commission to try to intervene, which “could do some serious damage to our business.”

To ward that off, Bratches said the cable industry needs to communicate the value the $40 to $50 expanded basic package, which is less than the price of a ticket to many sporting events, to lawmakers in Washington, D.C.