DC United moves all tv games behind flosports paywall - And the fans are irate

A few comments.

1) I couldn't believe the following aspect of the article. "A subscription to FloSports — which includes access to 25 sports, including auto racing, mixed martial arts, wrestling and Big Ten competitions — costs $150 annually or $30 per month. But United plans to offer the same fully inclusive packages at reduced rates. The price has not been finalized, Porter said."

That excerpt drove me nuts. How in the world could they not know how much flosports is going to charge for the fans to watch the game? It shows that owners don't give a damn about the fans.

2) I thought the headline of the article using the term "cuts the chord" was interesting, but shows the origination of the term cutting the chord really isn't really understood or used properly by the press and even executives. To me, cutting the chord represents people fighting back against exorbitant cable costs. People don't want to pay $200 a month for cable. So people basically cut the chord to try to save money.

Cutting the chord really initially was people going to free tv only.

But now there are all sorts of OTA services - like flosports - that are coming in and thinking they are future. I laugh however when people like flosports say ESPN lost its way. The only reason why people don't like cable is for one reason - the cost.

Yet, these people use the term cutting to chord when they are asking fans to pay a ton for some very specialized stream?

The other day I saw that one of the milesplit founders or key people who now works for flosports - Jason Byrne- even has launched a website to help people cut the chord and save money. I thought it was pretty ironic. He like thousands of people is irate that it costs so much to watch stuff, yet he works for a company that charges mom and dad's $150 a year to watch their kids track meets.

So the logic is people want to save every penny they can on ESPN, TNT, etc but will want to shell out $30 a month to watch college track or wrestling or now DC United?

I think parents are much more likely to pay a ton to watch their kids than the DC fan is going to pay. I'll be surprised if this deal lasts for 4 years.

I think it's pretty short sighted. Yes, if you want to maximize revenue in the near term, gorge the shit out of your fans. But if you want to become big time, don't.

They aren't the same team they were in the 90s/early 00s, and this isn't going to help them get back to that level. Fine by me!

This one looks simple to me.

Flosports has no soccer presence. They have a lot of VC money, but presumably are losing money.

They need to keep trying to make a name for themselves.

DC United has a new stadium and a lot of expenses. The article below explains they wanted to get paid for their broadcast rights instead of letting someone do it for free in return for exposure (think local cable sports or local TV). So Flo bid more than everyone else and got the contract.

Time will tell if this works or if they overpaid. (I'd argue they overpaid, but they don't have much of a choice. This is a possible new market for them and they need to find growth. )

Personally I think it's short sighted for DC United. They currently have the opportunity to grow a fan base since they have Wayne Rooney and going PPV isn't the best option right now. But 13 of 34 games during the year will be on ESPN or FS1 so maybe enough fans can see games that way.

I'm assuming this is only for inmarket games. (Currently people out of market can watch all MLS games for $5 a month on ESPN+. If this is nationwide let me know). But let's say 10,000 fans subscribe to this at $9 a month. That's $90,000 a month. $1.1 million a year. That's a drop of the bucket for a sports team. Think they'll get 100,000 local fans to pay for this? Multiply by 10? So who knows what Flocasts paid. DC United wants fans to subscribe, but if Flocasts is paying the fee and it's a flat fee regardless, then the burden is on them and DC United gets its money no matter what. In the past, DC United had to pay for some of the production costs of its games. Now presumably Flo will pay.

Also it says subscriptions are going to be $9 a month. If that subscription applies to track and field that is WAY cheaper than it is now- $30 a month/ $150 a year. Which supports my belief now that Flo largely was about broadcasting niche sports to parents, relatives, etc. Broadcasting to casual sports fans is a different thing.

But the more niche, the smaller the audience the more you should expect to pay.

One cabeat, If this deal is for nationwide rights, then the numbers are different and ignore what I wrote.

Left out my link which is... behind a paywall

https://theathletic.com/737910/2018/12/28/dc-united-media-rights-broadcast-deal/

And I saw this deal is only for those living in DC area. Doesn't apply to rest of nation.

Best comment I saw was a deal like this should be done in addition to having a TV deal. DC united could have Flosports for extra behind the scene content and local games as well for those who have cut cord but also have a local TV deal. That would be best for fans. To watch the rest of DC united games you need a cable TV subscription as the games are on ESPN and FS1.

I have to assume that there is good instant money in it for DC United, which is why they agreed to it. But I agree with the sentiment that soccer is growing in popularity in the USA, which would mean the best way to keep growing your market right now is to keep it freely available. Maybe they are badly pressed for revenue right now, but surely they'd have more fans in five years from now if they'd simply found a way to keep this on major TV.

But are we sure the major TV network was giving them a decent deal? If the advertising wasn't there, then it might not have been lucrative to even the TV network.

I'm really surprised DC United is doing this...agree it doesn't seem like it will help them in the long run.

We're season tix holders with Atlanta United FC and soccer is definitely getting a fair amount of buzz down south. That said, it's still a super niche fan base relative to the other professional sports.

I think the problem w/ all these subscriptions is that folks have a "nickel and dime" threshold.

We have our $200 Comcast package for the live sports. That includes the Comcast uncharge for RedZone.

We have to stop somewhere. We don't do Netflix. We don't have HBO. :( We'd like 'em but we have to stop somewhere.

ESPN+ had a few games for AUFC last season, and we did the free week/cancel for one game, but after that just chose not to watch. That's "only" $5 a month, but I guess the subscription folks all assume we the public can't do basic math and add up all the $5/$10 packages that will end up with cord cutters paying the same or more than the cable the cut. Plus, of my friends who have cut the cord, Comcast keeps raising the price of internet.

You spelled cord wrong. Cord, not chord.

regarding Grant Wahl saying soccer hasn't grown enough in the US- that's wrong. He should clarify and say that maybe MLS has not captured enough new fans to support this. But there are more than enough soccer fans in the US, and they aren't interested in MLS because of the low quality- those fans spend their soccer-watching time on Spain, Germany, England, Italy, Mexico, etc.

MLS likes to say they are "growing the game". That's not true- they are trying to grow their wallets and they don't care about anything else.

glad you are enjoying Atl UTD- they had a great coach who actually knew how to train tactics.

Soccer isn't really a niche sport- it might seem that to a lot of us, but there are millions of soccer-first fans in the US that are not the target of MLS and they don't watch MLS. I would say that MLS is a niche league. Don't confuse the popularity of soccer with the popularity of MLS in the USA.

Sport Climbing almost made this move, but the opposition was near-unanimous against it, and the (excellent) coverage is free and live, thus saving this sport from the Flovultures.

AUFC wrote:

ESPN+ had a few games for AUFC last season, and we did the free week/cancel for one game, but after that just chose not to watch. That's "only" $5 a month, but I guess the subscription folks all assume we the public can't do basic math and add up all the $5/$10 packages that will end up with cord cutters paying the same or more than the cable the cut. Plus, of my friends who have cut the cord, Comcast keeps raising the price of internet.

I've been thinking of "cutting" myself as I like to stick it to the man but you are correct, it's not like you save a ton if you some sort of cord-free cable like Sling/youtubetv . I mean maybe with sling and internet it's 150 a month instead of 200. So yes you save 600 bucks but it's not mindblowing. I was thinking of going the sling route as maybe a few months I'd just use their airtv player and not watch any cable. So if I had nothing for a few months, I could save an extra $45-50 a month.

Only when the phone service's internet is good enough will we really have a chance to save big bucks.

Cutting the cord refers to the willingness to not have to depend on expensive can packages thanks to the a la carte options that many services offer. The problem with that is the imevitanle copy cat/bandwagon effect. Everybody has a service (ESPN, NBC Sports, etc) so the streaming will total as much or more than your cable bill. However, people act as if they do not have a choice. No one is making you subscribe to everything you lemmings!

reddit(dot)com/r/soccerstreams

All you ever need.

Man, this really struck a cord with you

btw-it'd be cool if you don't curse in comments so us normal folks can quote your reply with having to go through it looking for "profanity"

So, according to DC United and their "FAQ" about the deal, it will cost $8.99/month and you get access to all of FloSports!

If you are a DC United fan and a track fan (of which I am), why would I not do this? It sure beats the regular subscription price to just FloTrack.

(Note, this only applies if you are "in markert". If you are "out of market", ie not in the DC/Richmond/Baltimore metro area, you just buy ESPN+ at $5 month to get the MLS games. You don't get FloTrack, but eh, that's what I come to LetsRun for)

Honestly, who is going to pay money to watch terrible coverage of a has been Wayne Rooney and a bunch of nobodies play other teams with one has been and more nobodies.

I know nothing about flosports but it seems that their M.O is to buy the rights of sports with low/developing fanbases and kill it off by overpricing.

Makes me appreciate the coverage this side of the pond where I can watch every athletics meet for free on BBC and Eurosport and the champions league on free to air. The channels I do pay for like Sky Sports show 100's of premier league games, la liga games, NFL games, every main tour golf event, NBA games and every other sport imaginable for the same price as a flotrack subscription??

Wait until the DCU fans see the quality of the footage and commentating. If it's anything like Flotrack they are going to feel like they woke up in an alternate dimension where gimbals apparently don't exist.

I still don't understand how the videos can be of such poor quality on Flotrack. Anybody charging for video ought to have decent camera equipment.

never been a fan of aunt flo wrote:

Wait until the DCU fans see the quality of the footage and commentating. If it's anything like Flotrack they are going to feel like they woke up in an alternate dimension where gimbals apparently don't exist.

I still don't understand how the videos can be of such poor quality on Flotrack. Anybody charging for video ought to have decent camera equipment.

It can't possibly be worse than the camera work/broadcast thru the local ABC affiliate the last few years. That was horrible. My guess is that DCU will be handling the in-game camera work and will directly feed it to FloSports.

Almost every FloTrack broadcast I've seen seems like the camera work is being done by a 75 year old person with Parkinsons using a 1985 Camcorder.

never been a fan of aunt flo wrote:

Wait until the DCU fans see the quality of the footage and commentating. If it's anything like Flotrack they are going to feel like they woke up in an alternate dimension where gimbals apparently don't exist.

I still don't understand how the videos can be of such poor quality on Flotrack. Anybody charging for video ought to have decent camera equipment.

You must not have been on flotrack for 5 years. The quality had improved tremendously, and the knowledgeable commentary of events like NCAA XCs is way better than ESPN