Rivalry game on BTN? Why?

Submitted by trueblue262 on

My apologies if this has been discussed in earlier threads, but WTF? Why would this game not make the ABC or even ESPN slate? Not sure how everybody else feels, but I can't stand the watching games on BTN.

Lac55

October 15th, 2012 at 11:03 AM ^

The main issue for me are the announcers/analysts calling the games. They all suck pretty bad and it makes games harder to deal with. The B10 network definitely does well enough to afford some top notch people to get the job done. I don't care if they have a B10 background or not, get some quality in those booths.

jls1144

October 15th, 2012 at 11:03 AM ^

The good thing about the BTN, they won't stop covering the game if it gets out of hand. I came home Saturday from work hoping to catch some of the second string. Instead I found BYU vs Oregon State.

MichiganPoloShirt

October 15th, 2012 at 11:18 AM ^

Some people are never satisfied now your bitching about the commentators? Who even listens to BTN commentating just push mute and listen to the radio broadcast, better yet don't even watch the game just wait for the espn highlights since your so concerned about commentating

Lac55

October 15th, 2012 at 2:16 PM ^

Chill out bro. Some people feel the commentary is below average. If you don't feel the same way, cool. That's your opinion, but you can't be mad at people with higher standards/expectations for how they want to view and listen to the game.

CdubGoBlue

October 15th, 2012 at 11:32 AM ^

I, unfortunately, have a good friends wedding at 4pm CST and will be able to catch about 30 minutes of it.  A noon kick (11am here) would have been perfect, a late game and I could have it on at the reception somehow, but 330 has me missing almost all of it.

As a kick in the nuts, it's on BTN, so I can't even stream it on the WatchESPN app due to BTN's non-agreement with Comcast.  DVR is just not the same...no way I can hold off until Sunday to find out the results.

WolvinLA2

October 15th, 2012 at 12:52 PM ^

I too have a friend's wedding that day, a friend who graduated from Michigan, a friend who was an athlete at Michigan, a friend whose father was a captain of the Michigan football team and an assistant coach under Bo. A friend who grew up in Michigan, so he appreciates the UM-MSU rivalry. And obviously, most of the wedding party went to UM and most of the guests are either M or MSU fans.

How did this happen? It's a story, but includes women having too much power. Wedding was supposed to be on the UMass game, but had to be changed. Unfortunately, shit happens. Plan a summer wedding and this never would have been an issue.

quiggz

October 15th, 2012 at 11:33 AM ^

In Canada its tough to get BTN, my cable provider has it, but how they set it up you only get one game as there is only one BTN channel slot. Just can't see paying 10 dollars extra per month for a package where I have to hope Michigan is the game in question. Not to mention the other crappy channels they bundled with it. So i guess i'll be firstrow'n it and porting it to the tv via VGA cable. Ahhh technology.

In conclusion, Canadian telecommunications suck.

Blazefire

October 15th, 2012 at 11:41 AM ^

The BTN is good for the conference, so I want them to do well. I wish they had a few more of the headline games. Sometimes it feels like a bit of an afterthought.

derpDerpDerp

October 15th, 2012 at 11:46 AM ^

Worst thing about watching BTN games for me, by far, is the annoying sound effect they play whenever the down and distance graphic drops down below the score. It's this mechanical whir that is both entirely unnecessary (do they really need to draw attention to information that is already displayed on the field as well?) and overused (probably 50+ times per game).

LSAClassOf2000

October 15th, 2012 at 12:40 PM ^

So, I did some looking and it turns out that BTN is in fact the second-tier provider in the conference television agreement, rather than the third as I said in a post yesterday. In any event, the conference does still get some airplay nationally - ABC will air OHIO / Purdue at noon, and ESPNU picked up Minnesota Wisconsin. ESPN2 gets Nebraska and Northwestern at 3:30, and of course, we're on BTN then. BTN also took Penn State and Iowa at 8 PM.

It should be noted that some of the games that were first-tier pickups are probably games that will get bigger audiences. For example, ESPN took LSU and Texas A&M for their noon game, and ABC took South Florida and Louisville at 3:30 PM, so if we were going to end up on the bigger network, I imagine it would have been there, but of course, Louisville is ranked higher in the polls than we are. I am not sure if that goes into the decision, although I have to think that, if they are catering to more casual fans who do follow the polls, it might. I am pretty sure the relative lack of national interest is MSU - particularly a 4-3 MSU -  is a big part of it too.

Yeoman

October 15th, 2012 at 12:19 PM ^

There's something baffling to me about a lot of this thread: why would it matter to ESPN how important this game is in Michigan? They aren't the Michigan Sports Network or Fox Sports Detroit--they need at least a regional audience, if not national. Outside of the Chicago alumni base and Toledo, out-of-state interest in MSU football is nil. I have never, since I moved back to Cincinnati, seen a bar flying a State flag during football season. Or seen a State bumper sticker. Or met a State fan, if you exclude the parents of a current State player (who weren't State fans until their son decided to play there).

From here it's probably the most invisible of the 12 B1G schools. Maybe Iowa comes close.

a non emu

October 15th, 2012 at 12:23 PM ^

My issue is simple. RCN in Boston simply does not carry the BTN. It does not exist in their channel lineup in this area. Not in the premium, sports or any other package. Which basically means I either change my cable service for maybe 3 days a year, or watch a crappy illegal stream or go to a bar.
I really wish the BTN would stream the damn thing online and allow people to buy packages. I would gladly pay for that. Just seems like they are leaving money on the table given that they have already made the infrastructure investment to support Btn2Go.

FrankMurphy

October 15th, 2012 at 3:19 PM ^

The model you're talking about is intuitive, economical, and efficient, which is why it doesn't exist (outside of Netflix). The cable companies should be entirely obsolete now that technology allows content providers to reach the consumers directly, but their influence is too well-entrenched for them to let themselves be marginalized. Because it's the cable companies who pay the networks for the right to carry their channels, they put strict restrictions on the networks' ability to offer their content through other means. That's why no TV network provides a way for customers to subscribe to their stream directly and cut out the middle man. 

The TV networks are also not entirely stoked about the idea of cutting out the cable companies and creating a free market system, since many of them have multiple channels and they can freely move programming between channels because the cable companies carry all of their channels (e.g., ABC, ESPN, ESPN2, ESPN Classic, ESPNU, etc). If they allowed the consumer to subscribe to a single stream a la carte, they would face the pressure of ensuring that in each time slot, they're airing the most popular programming possible for that time of day. 

His Dudeness

October 15th, 2012 at 1:17 PM ^

You are familiar with the dumpster fire that is the B1G, correct? We have literally zero representation in the BCS top -25. Not a single team. Conferences we have that ini common with: Mac, Sun-Belt, WAC... Yep, that about sums it up.

Big_H

October 15th, 2012 at 1:46 PM ^

If you have dish can you still call them and order the BigTen Network just for a day? My dad did this the other year and they charged him 5 dollars or something. Does anyone know if this is possible??

FrankMurphy

October 15th, 2012 at 1:58 PM ^

It's not unprecedented for the Michigan-MSU game to be aired on BTN. I remember that the '09 MSU game was aired on BTN. 

On a related note, does anyone know how it's determined which games air on ESPN/ABC and which games air on BTN?

kakusei

October 15th, 2012 at 2:12 PM ^

I don't know about college football specifically, but i do work in the broadcast rights business (MLB-related) so can provide some insight. For baseball at least each broadcaster is given first choice to games based on a rotating priority system (ESPN may have top choice one week, but last choice the next.) they then choose the games they want to broadcast an then the other broadcasters choose among which games are left (it is actually much more complicated than this as there are many other factors, including how much money each broadcaster is paying for their rights, etc., but I'm just trying to make it simple for explanation purposes). I imagine something similar happens in CFB - so either BTN ha a high priority this week and choose M-MSU or ESPN passed on the game. This is just my speculation from what I've dealt with in baseball.

TheFrigz

October 15th, 2012 at 2:11 PM ^

As bad as sports announcers are in general, the BTN announcers always find some way to be worse than the rest.  Just painful to listen to.  Luckily I'll be at the game.