Forum
Welcome to The Final Four Is Not on the Schedule discussion board. A forum for the serious and casual MSU fan. Opinions welcome – stay respectful.
https://twitter.com/danwetzel/status/1560277713281134594?s=21&t=HkCnKaBuQWThHcIIgkP0Zg
I don’t think this perspective is wrong; I’m not excited about so many games being streamed on Peacock. To be fair, it was always going to head in this direction but I think we’d have a better viewing experience as hoops fans if ESPN were still airing B1G basketball games.
Glass half full perspective: Now that FS1 and Peacock have a superior product in B1G basketball, they’ll improve their platform/broadcast production and we won’t see much of a drop off.
Thoughts?
We get into this in next week’s podcast, actually. I think Wetzel’s perspective has some legitimacy, but only some. I think ESPN takes the bigger hit here…MUCH bigger. You simply cannot lose the Big Ten audience and not feel it substantially. I also think we will see FS1 and Peacock step up their game and now there may finally be the kind of content which will allow real competition with ESPN
the open question is, what happens with all Of the ESPN owned events (CC, holiday tournaments and Big Ten/ACC Challenge).
@rodmsu1968 I agree. I love the preseason and holiday tournaments and even when ESPN does the "24 hours of college basketball" to open the season. For all their faults, it was pretty big for them to have both ESPN and ESPN2 from 12PM to 12AM on a Saturday running a combined 12 basketball games straight essentially. (6 per channel) There were always 3 to 4 Big Ten games in those slates.
Believe me, I'm not shedding any tears for ESPN, but there are some things that will be missed. (I include Dickie V. with that as well and glad that he is cancer free now too!) Jay Bilas may not be popular to some, but he at least provides analysis and a different thought pattern to the game. He wants to see many changes (not just with paying players) in the game or at least TRY something different.
I will miss ESPN, there are a lot of other issues with ESPN but I enjoy their hoops coverage. I honestly don't think the product is as good when it's on BTN or FS1, just my opinion. I hope they are able to keep a lot of the preseason tournaments and marquee matchups on ESPN.
@msupaul3 Right before the pandemic FS1 started to do some cool stuff with their production. One thing I loved was leaving the preview show to watch team introductions live with no commentary. It really set the tone and was different than what ESPN was doing with pregame. Unfortunately they stopped doing that after the pandemic.
Hopefully they do some innovating and improve their broadcast product before this deal takes affect.