Congratulations, sports fans! It is a wonderful time to consider leaving your cable television provider AND the rising cost of internet-based streaming services to watch sports.
That’s right! Those who live within 40 to 50 miles of traditional over-the-air local television network affiliates are quietly being lured to “Come back home!”
Last week, Google-owned YouTubeTV and Disney’s assortment of sports outlets (ABC, ESPN, ESPN2, SEC Network, etc.) got into the latest tiff where paying customers at home were cut-off from television stations they pay to receive.
Nearly ten million YouTubeTV customers learned that their usual assortment of Saturday college football games had vanished due to this spat between corporate giants.
Before we delve into those details, here is a partial solution which sports television consumers might wish to consider ASAP
For a one-time $20-$40 investment at your local big box retailer, you can plug in a small antenna into the back of your television. That’s my little $25 antenna shown in the feature picture for this post.
An antenna like mine may be all you need to watch all or some of these exceptional college football games on television Saturday, November 8 – for free:
ABC (all kick-off times are CST):
11AM – 8-0 BYU at 8-1 Texas Tech
2:30PM – 8-0 Texas A&M at 6-2 Missouri
6:30PM – 5-3 LSU at 7-1 Alabama
11AM – 9-0 Indiana at 3-5 Penn State
2:30PM – 5-4 Iowa State at 6-2 TCU
8:00PM – 6-3 Nebraska at 3-5 UCLA
2:30PM – 7-1 Oregon at 6-2 Iowa
6:30PM – 7-1 Navy at 6-2 Notre Dame
Sure, you are going to miss most of the ACC football games (ESPN) and several other top college football games this week.
Can you survive with a single (but quality) college football game on your television beginning Saturday at 11AM (CST) through the late evening hours every week – all at no charge?
The NFL has always been seen via over-the-air television every Sunday!
The very smart and wealthy folks who run the NFL have wisely spread their product across a large array of television platforms. The league’s TV partners are willing to shell-out billions to carry the NFL’s weekly football games.
FOX primarily covers the NFC’s early and late Sunday afternoon slate of games. CBS is the primary outlet for AFC games during Sunday’s early and late time slots.
NBC’s Sunday Night Football finishes the day with one more free over-the-air game – usually involving a couple of top NFL teams.
You don’t even need YouTubeTV, ESPN or your local cable television company to watch NFL games on Sunday!
Only ESPN’s Monday Night Football and Amazon Prime’s Thursday Night games require your monetary investment in cable television or a streaming service to watch their weekly NFL offerings.
Did I mention NBA basketball is now available via both NBC and ABC – for free!
After more than two decades on cable television’s TNT, the NBA just returned to over-the-air “free” television on NBC beginning last month.
The network will televise one game every Tuesday night and another on Sunday night on its local over-the-air NBC affiliates for the entire regular season.
Meanwhile, ABC will carry a Saturday evening “prime time” NBA game once again this season (beginning in late January). They will also show several Sunday afternoon NBA games on your local over-the-air affiliate during the season, too.
The lengthy NBA playoffs (April through late June) will primarily be shown by the pirates of cable TV and paid streaming services. However, June’s NBA Finals will be carried by your “free” local ABC affiliate.
What are YouTubeTV and Di$ney fighting about (as if we didn’t already know)?
On Thursday October 30, YouTubeTV (which has nearly ten million subscribers paying more than $80 per month) posted a short note on Twitter (X.com):
“Members, when we renew our contracts with network partners, we advocate for fair pricing to offer you the best TV experience. Our contract with Disney has reached its renewal date, and we’ll not agree to terms that disadvantage our members while benefiting Disney’s TV products.”
Last weekend’s November 1 slate of college football games on ABC and the ESPN family of networks vanished for YouTubeTV subscribers. More than 20 channels owned by Disney disappeared from YouTubeTV as this latest “war” began.
YouTubeTV is now dangling a possible $20 credit (it’s OK to laugh here) to customers if the outage continues for several weeks.
If there was only a practical solution…? (Didn’t we already cover that?)
Meanwhile, the geniuses at Disney launched their own counter-offensive at YouTubeTV.
“Google’s YouTubeTV has chosen to deny their subscribers the content they value most by refusing to pay fair rates for our channels, including ESPN and ABC. YouTubeTV and its owner, Google, are not interested in achieving a fair deal with us. Instead, they want to use their power and extraordinary resources to eliminate competition and devalue the very content that helped them build their service.”
These two gigantic multi-billion dollar conglomerates want their customers to believe that they (YouTubeTV and Disney) are actually looking out for the little guys. R-i-g-h-t!
Is Disney trying to drive YouTubeTV customers to subscribe to its $30/month ESPN App?
That’s a tricky question.
ESPN has gobbled-up much of the most prestigious major sports events (college football/basketball/baseball, NFL, NBA, NHL, and many others). They have paid billions for the right to succeed or fail in that effort.
ESPN (Disney) depends on being able to extract what is called a “carriage fee” from cable television and streaming operators for the right to carry their high-demand line-up. Disney realizes that sports television consumers want ESPN as their primary channel at most cable TV and online TV steaming services.
ESPN’s “take-it-or-leave-it” carriage fee is (generally) about $20 per customer – per month!
That cash goes right into the coffers of ESPN/Disney so that they can overpay for the rights to carry premier sports programming.
ESPN’s advertisers pay a premium, too. The company gives advertisers a way to reach a large audience of the primarily male buying segment (ages 25-49).
That is why you see so many ads on football games for automobiles, beverages, insurance/financial services, furniture, fast food, and a host of other products frequently purchased by men.
If sports consumers switch to the $30/month (at least for now) ESPN app and ditch their cable television or streaming services entirely, Disney may gain a paying customer for their app but lose that lucrative monthly carriage fee from cable and streamers.
The amount of the monthly carriage fee is primarily what YouTubeTV and Disney are squawking about.
If YouTubeTV agrees to pay the increased fee demanded by Disney/ESPN, then customers can expect to pay all or most of that increase in their future monthly bills.
The nifty economic concept known as the elasticity of demand is very much at play. At some price point, the exiting customers will outnumber new subscribers.
The truth is: Both parties are greedy!
YOU are the customer, and the customer is king!
It’s time to do a little homework, YouTubeTV customers.
Visit a few websites for some large retailers in your area to determine the prices and specs for an over-the-air television plug-in antenna. You might even be able to watch college football on ABC, FOX, CBS, and NBC this Saturday!
Take time to understand the following information prior to buying your new plug-in antenna for home TV viewing!
The majority of local television stations converted to a digital format (leaving the VHF dial position and taking a UHF location) around June, 2009. Those TV stations can be picked-up on your home television set with a decent (fairly cheap) digital antenna like the one that I am using.
Before you buy any antenna, first go to the FCC’s website and check out the number of your local television stations (click here).
Type in your zip code and review your area’s local television stations – especially their “band” designation. Here’s what it looked like for Monroe, Louisiana.
Any station listed as “UHF” (above) is a digital signal. A moderately priced digital antenna will work great as long as you live within 30 miles of the TV station’s transmitter.
HOWEVER, you might notice that some TV stations did not convert to a digital signal in 2009.
They remained in what is called the “Hi-V” band (as in “VHF” – just like the station was in the 1960’s and 1970’s). Some of us oldsters used “rabbit ear” antennas on home television sets back then to receive VHF television signals.
Those few TV stations which decided to remain in the “Hi-V” band had their own reasons for not switching to digital.
They believed that changing their signals from VHF to the digital UHF band might result in a smaller coverage area and a less reliable signal to viewers. Another reason some didn’t make the switch was purely economic. It cost money to purchase the technology required to make those changes.
In cities like Shreveport, all of the primary network affiliate stations which provide college football (ABC, CBS, NBC, and FOX) have converted to digital. Below is the FCC’s television coverage information for Shreveport.
Your new digital antenna should work like a charm in northwest Louisiana.
For Monroe, Louisiana sports fans, the ABC affiliate (Channel 11 – KMLU) and CBS affiliate (Channel 8 – KNOE) remained “Hi-V”. That means that you will probably not be able to receive those two TV station’s offerings with a digital antenna like mine. Don’t give up! Read on.
Baton Rouge has similar issues. The local ABC affiliate (Channel 2- WBRZ) and CBS station (Channel 9 – WAFB) did not convert to digital. They remained “Hi-V”, so your new digital antenna is unlikely to pick-up their signal within Louisiana’s capitol city.
Houston – you also have the same problem! Both the ABC (KTRK-Channel 13) and CBS (KHOU-Channel 11) television stations remained on the “Hi-V” end of the spectrum. You’re likely out of luck trying to get their signals using most digital TV antennas in the H-town area, too.
To resolve a “Hi-V” issue – you may need to purchase (one time!) a more expensive antenna which is equipped to receive both Hi-V and digital signals. Those antennas typically cost more than $100 and work best when located in a high spot inside your house such as the attic or attached on the side of your house near the roof. (Be careful when roaming around in your attic. An A/C service technician nearly fell through mine recently!)
Those living in remote areas (50+ miles from the TV station’s transmitter) will likely need an outdoor “aerial” antenna. You may wish get a professional to handle that installation. If you do it yourself, please be careful!
Double check – Did you check your zip code on the FCC site before spending any money to purchase even a cheap digital antenna? Please do this first!
After a few weeks, you may be ready to ditch cable TV and streaming services for good.
In the process, you will save hundreds of dollars every year to (perhaps) finally go on that special golf vacation you’ve always dreamed about!
The post Consider Watching Sports on TV – for FREE – once again! appeared first on SwampSwamiSports.com.
