September 14, 2023 • 33 mins
The Thursday edition FOX Thursday Night Baseball, Prime Thursday Night Football and plenty of news from the streaming world on today's edition.
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We at Stream On welcome your interaction so stay tell us what is on your mind? No problem just as on social media
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Email- jimwilliamsmedia@gmail.com This show is part of the Spreaker Prime Network, if you are interested in advertising on this podcast, contact us at https://www.spreaker.com/show/2690175...
Cord cutters and cord nevers want a place to keep up with live TV with sports or news?
Well, we have the best possible option at the best cost in the business. It doesn’t matter if you like sports, or news, or entertainment they have it all in one place at a price that will have you cutting the cord today!
Check them out at https://www.sling.com/
Have questions or comments?
We at Stream On welcome your interaction so stay tell us what is on your mind? No problem just as on social media
Twitter @JWMediaDC
Instagram: @jimwilliams200
Email- jimwilliamsmedia@gmail.com This show is part of the Spreaker Prime Network, if you are interested in advertising on this podcast, contact us at https://www.spreaker.com/show/2690175...
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:37):
Good Thursday afternoon, and everybody,I'm Jim Williamson, you know, are
you ready for some baseball? That'sright? Baseball tonight. Box is going
to do a rare week in theseason anyway weeknight game. It's going to
(00:57):
be game one of a very importfour game series at Camden Yards starting tonight
between the Tampa Bay Race, whoare right now presently two and a half
games behind the Baltimore Orioles. Andthe series all four games will be on
(01:18):
television tonight. It'll be on Fox. That's seven o'clock start for there.
Tomorrow night. It's part of theApple TV package, so it'll be on
Apple TV tomorrow night, and thenon Saturday night and Sunday afternoon it moves
to the MLB Network. Okay,So, if you're a baseball fan and
you know of the drama of therace for the pennant, which these two
(01:42):
teams, you know, the Raysand the Orioles have surprised everybody, you
know, look at it. It'skind of like the divisions have been flipped
a bit. Now. We allknow Tampa Bay has been good, you're
in and you're out. But thefact that the pennant races between in the
Al East between the Rays and theOrioles and the Jay's the Red Sox and
(02:04):
the Yankees are trailing them. Isa bit ironic, but hey, you
know, sometimes irony is a goodthing. In this case, it is
if you're a Raised fan or anOrioles fan. So the Oriels are two
and a half games up on theRays. They will be spending the weekend
in Baltimore at beautiful Camden Yards,playing meaningful baseball in Baltimore, which has
(02:30):
not been played in quite a while. So let's just see how that works
out tonight nationally on Fox, Tomorrownationally streaming on Apple TV, and then
of course we get them on MLBNetwork on Saturday night and Sunday afternoon.
Okay, so I know you're probablythinking, well, Jess, Thursday,
(02:53):
it's got to be football, right, Well, yeah, you're right.
Amazon is all set tonight because theyhave what it could be an interesting game.
It is the Vikings at the Eagles. Now you know, minniessos oh
and one and the Eagles are oneand oh and it's the opening night for
(03:17):
year two of Amazon's Thursday Night Footballand a couple of things that we need
to know here about this this isyear two of an eleven year contract.
The league was very pleased, aswas Amazon and Prime Video and the results
(03:38):
from last year. Now it wasdown ratings wise, a bit from what
people expected. I don't know whythey expected this. I mean it had
been for years on you know,Thursday Night Football was originally started and they
had CBS had it for a littlewhile, and then it aired on Fox
(03:59):
for a while, and it wassimul cast, you know, on Prime.
But you know Prime got they loseat last year, and people,
you know, said, well,gosh, you know, look at the
numbers that went down from the broadcast. I mean, you know, look
they lost, you know, theylost a bit of their audience in the
Nielsen race. Now, depending onhow these ratings you believe, will take
(04:21):
the ones from Amazon, which was, you know, eleven point seven million
people average watched they watch the packagethey won every Thursday night had they been
linear. Okay, so think aboutthis for just a moment. You go
from free broadcast, which is whatyou know they had on fought, to
(04:44):
a pay streaming service. Okay,there's got to be a learning curve.
Number one. Number two, thefact that they yet eleven million dollars viewers
on a consistent basis over the seasonis stunning. I mean, come on,
that is pretty amazing. Now,there were some gems and nuggets in
those reports, and I think thatthey're worth chatting about for just a second.
(05:09):
One is, for the first timein you know, the history of
television of the National Football League,no matter what you were watching it on,
whether it was the linear TV likeABCNBC, you know, CBS,
Fox, or if it was cablelike ESPN or the NFL network, they
(05:31):
always averaged their audience you know,average over fifty. This was the first
time in the history of that broadcastingsituation where the audience average was forty seven.
So those people who streamed the gameson you know, on Prime,
(05:53):
the audience average was forty seven.Here's another important nugget. Eighteen to thirty
four, which is usually just abump, right, it's you know,
they get a bump here, bumpthere. It was up eighteen percent.
Never again, and I'm sorry,never before, should say never before has
it been that. I They've neverhad a double digit bounce, let alone
(06:16):
in eighteen percent bounce. Okay,So those are two points that need to
be brought up because in the firstyear of this. You know, there's
ten years left on it of thisdeal. The streaming aspect of Thursday Night
Football with Prime and how they've doneit can't under it can't be underplayed.
(06:42):
Okay, you're getting an audience that'syounger, you're cultivating with the eighteen to
thirty four an audience that is,you know, more in tune with streaming.
And then you had a third thingthat we didn't mention yet. That
third thing is that the average viewerwatched twenty minutes more of each stream than
(07:08):
watched traditional broadcast. So what thatmeant was they were either watching more of
the pregame show or more of thepostgame show than they would have on traditional
television. Now that's a good newsnot only for the league, but it's
good news for advertisers who are involvedwith Amazon. Okay, So it's been
(07:31):
a net positive and going into seasontwo with tonight's opening game, there's going
to be even more investment from PrimeVideo and Amazon as well as the league
in this streaming concept. Okay,what they've done, and many of you
(07:57):
already know it, is that theyhave carved out a Black Friday game right
now, as we all know onThanksgiving the Thursday night game isn't it is
on NBC, just like the ThursdayNight game which opens the season is on
NBC. Well, rather than takea game away from Amazon, what the
(08:24):
league did is they created a BlackFriday game. You know, this year
it's going to be the Dolphins andthe Jets. I know a lot of
people we all would have liked tosee Aaron Rodgers at the helm of the
Jets, but unfortunately he was injured. But again still that that's likely to
be a very good game. Imean, the Dolphins certainly are our challenge
(08:48):
to the Bills in that division andcould very well be you know, a
playoff and Super Bowl contending team.And they're very entertaining team, if you
know, if we see if theyplay any where, you like they did
against the Chargers the other day andthe opener. They've got one of the
fastest and most entertaining teams in allof in all the NFL. So the
(09:09):
Dolphins and the Jets game, whichwould be on a on a Friday night,
is also going to be free,so it's not behind the paywall.
Anybody who wants to can stream it. So I really think that what's going
on. Here is some interesting stuffand we're also looking and we will keep
you updated on this. And thatis Amazon's trying some things on their broadcasts
(09:35):
which you know, some heavy duty, cutting edge stuff which will be seeing
you know, I don't know ifwe'll see it this year, but we
certainly we'll see it in years tocome, with graphics and with other kinds
of things that will keep you updatedon any number of things, everything from
fantasy to you know what in gamegambling aspects are going in what direction?
(09:56):
You know how where's the money movingin that regard. So there's a lot
of different issues that and fun thingsthat are down the road and not far
down the road. As we moveon with Thursday Night Football. So Thursday
Night Football gets underway tonight on Prime. Seven o'clock is your pregame show?
Eight o'clock is the Is the gamenow? Michael's Kirk curb Street on the
(10:22):
call. All right, So theboys are back and Freddy Gardelli we wish
your Freddy friend of the show.No, Freddie and Alan the gang will
be equal to the task as theystart year two of Amazon's Prime Thursday Night
Football. Okay, so Vikings Eaglesin that game played up at the link
(10:43):
about ninety miles or so north ofwhere we are right now, so on
the East coast. So we've gottalked about baseball on Fox. One other
note, and I think it's importantto note, is that those of you
who are streaming on Max right havewandered for a while where you know what
(11:09):
happens to the Turner sports pot,you know content, Well, starting with
baseball and the playoffs, they willbegin. The Warner Discovery will begin to
put to play those games and streamthose games on Max. So you'll be
able to to watch the Baseball playoffson Max. You'll be able to then
(11:33):
watch the NBA and the NHL onMax because those two will be matriculated over
as well. Okay, so Baseball, when the playoffs come, those of
you who are subscribers of Max,you'll be happy to know that coming to
UH Max soon will be the UHthe Playoffs in October. So that's something
(11:58):
to to look forward to. Bythe way, happy thirtieth year to Fox
Sports and their NFL experiment which changedthe changed the way people watched the game.
Frankly because when very few people tookFox at the at the beginning,
(12:20):
seriously when they bought the NFL rights, that changed the game entirely from a
standpoint of affiliations and relationships with Fox. What happened on the day they signed
the contract in Detroit, CBS's affiliatewent from Channel two to Channel sixty two,
(12:45):
Fox begining, you know, adominant local presence in a number of
cities, all because of Fox isyou know, involvement with the National Football
League and of the many young announcersthey signed to do football and baseball at
that time, it was Joe Buck, it was Chip Carey, it was
(13:09):
of course Kevin Harland we know,and our buddies, you know, with
Kenny Albert and Tommy Brennaman, allof those guys, with the exception of
Harlan, who was thirty five atthe time, we're in their twenties,
mid to late twenties. And theonly guy left out of that group is
(13:33):
our our pal, Kenny Albert.So congratulations to Kenny for staying with Fox
for thirty years, and congratulations toDavid Helen and what he and Ed Goren
were able to put together with withFox, and of course with the help
of senior production coordinator Billy Brown,who who really was a bit of a
(14:00):
mastermind there. He was the firstone. We now see scoring bugs,
right, we see it up there. You can just look up in the
corner and watch the score board downbelow. And watched this core. There
had not been scoring bugs prior toBilly and that was a Billy Brown original.
That was a Fox original. Sothere you go, and we will
see. As I said before,a happy thirtieth in a row for the
(14:24):
NFL on Fox. Happy thirtieth toKenny for still being with him. A
lot of guys in that group movedon. Joe Buck, of course,
obviously is doing well. He's thevoice of Monday Night Football. Speaking of
which, Monday Night Football's ratings,which came out this morning, had the
(14:48):
Jets game with the Buffalo Bills asthe highest rated NFL football game ever seen
on Monday Night on ESPN. Okay, and they got that. You know,
you were going all the way backto two thousand and four when ESPN
took over that contract from ABC.So since, uh, since two thousand
(15:15):
and four. That was the Jetsgame with Aaron Rodgers, unfortunately Gay being
injured in the four plays in reallyhad that kind of drew that kind of
vibe and got that kind of ratings, and it was over twenty two million
people watching that football game at onepoint time on ABC ESPN, So pretty
(15:39):
amazing, pretty amazing numbers, noquestion about it. So let's just say
kudos to ESPN in too. ABCalso kudos on on that particular game.
One quick shout out to Joe Buck. Joe Joe was one guy who liked
Jimmy Nance and some of the otherbroadcast are very good at building at building
(16:03):
drama, building drama with your voiceand how you you know, inflect and
all. That is an important partof sports broadcasting. And someone you know,
as someone who his career has beenproducing and directing live sports, you
know you know when to move itup. You know when keep it down
(16:25):
and keep it keep it keep itmonotone or level so that you're too excited
to get fans out of the way. But his call of the of the
final play, the return for thetouchdown on on Monday, that was pitched
perfect, It was well done,It was not over the top, and
(16:45):
it was measured. He obviously lookedat one of the lines he said,
you know, flags on the fieldhe was watching for that too. Truly
professional, truly you know, capturedthe essence of the of the moment.
So it was well done Jack,you know Joe who's his father. Jack
(17:06):
was himself a tremendous broadcaster and keepingit in the family, the tradition of
doing things, and brilliantly good onJoe. He did a good job on
that way. So there you gofrom that standpoint. Now some more numbers
that were of interest and shouldn't bea surprise, but in some people,
(17:32):
you know, when I mentioned itthis morning, we're surprised, and that
is Kilco Golf's US Open victory onSaturday drew a record viewership for women's major
tennis final, with over one millionmore viewers than the men's final. Okay,
so it shouldn't really be a surpriseto anybody, I should think not
(17:55):
because number one throughout the tournament.She was, you know, clearly one
of the best stories at Flushing Meadow, at the at the Tennis Center,
nineteen years old, very incredibly wellspoken, very poised young woman and very
(18:18):
talented obviously, so she came throughand beat Essarenka to win the title.
Absolutely brilliant and obviously you know,the audience was compelling. It was a
compelling situation Djokovic on Sunday. Itdoesn't surprise me that, for instance,
(18:41):
the ESPN got higher ratings with Coco. Again, she was a story.
And here's the other thing too.You attract casual fans when you have a
personality, okay, and her personalitybecame infectious during the course of that entire
tournament. There are going to bepeople who will won't watch a single you
(19:04):
know, frame of a tournament,of a tennis tournament any other time,
but either the majors, usually theOpen in New York or Wimbledon, those
are the two that garner the biggestratings. So it doesn't surprise me,
and I'm very pleased to see itthat, you know, that Coco had
(19:25):
a good rating, that ESPNS,you know, did a good job making
sure that that that was the case. Now here's another one that just came
across the desk this morning, andthat is that the w NBA's regular season
drew its best viewership on ESPN inseventeen years, up eighteen percent from twenty
twenty two. Again, that Ithink was something that it shouldn't surprise anyway.
(19:53):
And here's why. The numbers thatwe saw March Madness for the women.
Those were all time high numbers.The numbers we saw for softball and
the women's softball championships in the WorldSeries again bonkers big numbers. So the
(20:15):
fact that that you know that weare connecting in this way where women's sports
is now getting generating you know goodratings shouldn't shouldn't really be a surprise.
I mean, you know, it'scompelling television. It's good, solid content,
(20:37):
and the storylines are good. Thatbasically is the essence of what you
want when you're airing a broadcast.Pardon me for a moment, My buddy
Spencer McLaughlin from You Locked Unpacked twelvesays he needs a second segment. Well,
(21:00):
we don't have segments here, soI'm gonna take a second segments sip
right at the moment. Thank youvery much for indulging me. So,
yes, you know, the women'sdeal is quite important, and what we're
seeing right now is an insert.You know, it's it's really kind of
(21:22):
a birth, if you will.Now, women's tennis has always done well
on television, there's no question aboutthat. All the way going back to
diligion, King Chris Evert Martina everto love him and there really isn't a
compelling men's situation, Josh. Yet. I mean, Djokovic continues to win
and right now, you know,he seems to be a bit of a
(21:47):
juggernaut when it comes to you know, the majors, So so Coco getting
that win and more people watching it. Again, as they say, it
doesn't the project, but I thinkit's a good thing and I hope that
it's a trend that continues. Alrighty, how time for some questions we got
from the mail bag our right minutes. Look over here are okay? Is
(22:12):
this is this going to be abig rivalry? I'm sorry this from Jeff,
and Jeff says asks, excuse me, why is this such a big
rivalry weekend in college football? Well, Jeff, first of all, thanks
(22:33):
for the question. Second of all, you've got Pitt taking on West Virginia
in the backyard brawl. Okay,Now, if you remember last year,
Pitt, you know, in WestVirginia kind of rekindled this. It's really,
to me one of the top fiverivalries and all of college and it's
(22:56):
a fun it's a fun rivalry andit was it was very entertaining last year,
incredibly entertaining it was I think thefirst week end of of college football,
if memory serves, and it drewfour million people on ABC and ESPN.
And so that game is played inPittsburgh. This year's played in West
(23:19):
Virginia, and I have every reasonto believe that that game is going to
do well. It's a it's upagain. It's a primetime game Saturday night.
Fowler and Herb Street will be onthat call. And so yeah,
I mean, I think that thebackyard brawl is a very good one.
Uh. Florida is playing Tennessee again. Normally Florida and Tennessee, which by
(23:45):
the I mean Florida Tennessee is arivalry, but it's it's not the Florida
Georgia rivalry or the Florida Florida staterivalry. It's this kind of a rivalry
that got ginned up from a coupleof coach situations, and as al As
followed the Gators for many, manyyears, I can tell you that it's
(24:07):
a it's not it's not really arivalry. It's just those two teams don't
like each other, and I thinkthat that might be uh, and they're
a niece just like face each otheryear every year, and so you know,
rivalry, we'll give you that,but uh, that's also it's it's
a prime game, a prime timegame SEC Network. So yeah, I
think it'll be entertaining. And andof course we also have, you know,
(24:33):
on on this week, we haveyou know, the situation where you've
got Colorado Colorado State playing each other. Again. I'm not sure how much
Colorado is going to call that arivalry, but it is what it is.
So I think a lot of itis because once you get into the
conference plate, you really aren't goingto play you know that in some rivalry
(24:56):
games get played at the end ofthe year, like you know, Navy
and an Army and uh, youknow, but uh, Oklahoma and Texas
play each other in the middle ofthe season and they're big, you know,
big twelve rivals, and so itdoes happen the beginning of the year
you get some rivalry games. ButI wouldn't say this is the biggest rivalry
(25:17):
week. It's just it is we'relucky enough to get some some rivalry games,
and and that really, you know, it's not a great slate of
games all the way down from youknow, top to bottom like we've had
in a couple. The last coupleof weeks, we had some good ones.
Uh, this one is we gota couple of good ones, but
not not a lot. Okay,not a lot to be looking forward to
(25:38):
on on that situation. But that'sa good question. Uh, Okay,
let me see good time for acouple more Billy What do you got for
me? How will the NFL dealwith the Jets now that Aaron Rodgers you
(26:00):
is not playing? They were scheduledfor six games, Well, Jeff,
they'll still be scheduled for six games. The schedule is set, you know.
I can't see the Jets being bouncedout of those those time slots.
They do have a Sunday night game, so theoretically they could be fletched out
(26:22):
the Thursday game, which I well, actually it's the Friday game, the
Black Friday game, which I referencedearlier. This is the first year that
the NFL has the ability to flexThursday. I don't think that's gonna happen.
I just don't think that they're gonnaflex. I don't think they want
(26:45):
to. And they that was somethingthey were they were giving out to,
you know, was a concession thatthey were giving to Amazon. But I
don't think that they're going to actuallyexercise that now. You know, again
the Sunday night game which comes laterin the year, if it is not
(27:06):
compelling and there are other compelling gamesthat that would warrant taking that slot,
well then yeah, maybe, butat least five of those prime games that
you know, the league thought AaronRodgers are going to play in, and
they're definitely going to still be there. So don't look for the NFL to
change the schedule too much in thatregard. Once it's in there, it's
(27:32):
in there. They can't really domuch with it. Okay, all right,
Tommy, which you have for me, Tommy's wondering, you know,
the NBA season and the NHL seasonare coming up soon. What's to deal
with the regional sports networks. Well, the deal of the real regional sports
networks is that we know the UtahJazz, We know that the the Clippers
(27:57):
in Los Angeles, we know thatthe Phoenix Suns are all making plans to
do what in essence is going backto the future, which is airing games
on you know, local broadcast televisionsome of them and then putting the other
(28:19):
a streaming package which they will beable to market direct to consumers. So
we'll give you far more information asthat comes on, and frankly to find
out, you know, how someof the others are going to you know,
be handled, because there's also situationsin Pittsburgh, their situations in Cleveland,
(28:41):
their situations in Houston that are notquite settled yet, and we'll get
to those when, you know,when it comes the Rockies obviously in Colorado,
that whole situation has got to beput together as well. Uh,
we do know that the Rockies willbe the next team after once the season
(29:03):
is over, they're going to shutterat and t Sports Rocky Mountain. So
that will mean that the Rockies willneed a place to play, and you
know, Major League Baseball as wellas the NBA and the NHL have said,
you know, they're going to stepup and take over the broadcast.
Will obviously there's no need for thatat the moment because the Rocky is going
(29:26):
to finish off the season, butonce the season is over, where Rockies
broadcast will be going forward. Yesterdaythere was some talk that perhaps Major League
Baseball would do a deal with StanCronky's Altitude Group, which you know is
(29:47):
the dominant sports regional network in youknow, in the Rocky Mountain States in
Denver, Colorado. So it's quitepossible that they would end up on altitude.
It's quite possible that Major League Baseballwe want to keep them separate and
and let that fly. So wedon't know what's going on with the Rockies.
We know obviously, if you're aSanto Padre's fan or if you're a
(30:08):
here's a Diamond batsman, you've seenthe Major League Baseball kind of did you
know when they when the teams weren'tpaid by Diamond, who's in bankruptcy at
this moment, that they seamlessly putthem back on the air and nobody missed
anything. So you know, withsome time to put something together, I
think that's going to handle that.As far as the Pens are concerned,
(30:32):
the Pens are owned by the FenwayGroup, which of course is you know,
their owns nesson in New England Sportsnetwork, which is a very successful
one, and they've already said thatthey will basically take on the Pens and
so there will be in Ness inPittsburgh. So for the there is a
potential. I would think John Henryand Tommy Warner to discuss with the Pirates
(30:57):
that maybe the best course forward wouldbe if they joined the Pens on essence,
so we'll keep you we'll keep youposted on that as well. Okay,
all right, gang, look,plenty of stuff to talk about tomorrow.
We'll get ready. We'll get readyas we always do on Friday for
a big college and you know,NFL weekend. We've got plenty of baseball,
(31:19):
and certainly as the Pennant races heatup and and NASCAR starts to wind
down as they get into the realmeat of the chase. So all right,
so tomorrow, plenty of stuff.Let's recap real quick what we got
for today, and that is ofcourse baseball. Tonight, big four game
(31:42):
series between the Rays and the Oriolesat Camden Yard. That's a seven o'clock
game nationally and Fox okay Vikings Eaglesnational streaming on Prime Okay, seven o'clock
pre game, eight o'clock kick.We got college football, which I poemish
forgot their college football tonight on ESPN. It is Memphis hosting Navy. And
(32:12):
that's about it for tonight. Okay, we will have more tomorrow, but
that's about it. Locally, obviouslyif you are a baseball fan, you
can follow regionally what's going on fromthat standpoint. Quick note, just another
thing just came across the wires justa few minutes ago. Max Scherzer will
be out. That's Max Scherzer forthe Texas Rangers will be out for the
remainder of the season. He injuredhis arm, which she did the other
(32:36):
day, and so not good newsfor the Rangers who were hoping that Max
could could help them in that Pennantdrive. So that's one last news bit
for you all. But you know, I really appreciate you dropping by today,
guys. And you know, asit scrolls past there and you're reading
(32:57):
it, it says please subscribe atthe bell and like us, and we
greatly would appreciate if you would dothat. Okay, all right, folks.
For everybody here at stream on,I'm Jim Williams saying good afternoon.
We'll see you tomorrow and by allmeans, have a lovely day. Take care,
Good Thursday afternoon, and everybody,I'm Jim Williamson, you know, are
you ready for some baseball? That'sright? Baseball tonight. Box is going
to do a rare week in theseason anyway weeknight game. It's going to
(00:57):
be game one of a very importfour game series at Camden Yards starting tonight
between the Tampa Bay Race, whoare right now presently two and a half
games behind the Baltimore Orioles. Andthe series all four games will be on
(01:18):
television tonight. It'll be on Fox. That's seven o'clock start for there.
Tomorrow night. It's part of theApple TV package, so it'll be on
Apple TV tomorrow night, and thenon Saturday night and Sunday afternoon it moves
to the MLB Network. Okay,So, if you're a baseball fan and
you know of the drama of therace for the pennant, which these two
(01:42):
teams, you know, the Raysand the Orioles have surprised everybody, you
know, look at it. It'skind of like the divisions have been flipped
a bit. Now. We allknow Tampa Bay has been good, you're
in and you're out. But thefact that the pennant races between in the
Al East between the Rays and theOrioles and the Jay's the Red Sox and
(02:04):
the Yankees are trailing them. Isa bit ironic, but hey, you
know, sometimes irony is a goodthing. In this case, it is
if you're a Raised fan or anOrioles fan. So the Oriels are two
and a half games up on theRays. They will be spending the weekend
in Baltimore at beautiful Camden Yards,playing meaningful baseball in Baltimore, which has
(02:30):
not been played in quite a while. So let's just see how that works
out tonight nationally on Fox, Tomorrownationally streaming on Apple TV, and then
of course we get them on MLBNetwork on Saturday night and Sunday afternoon.
Okay, so I know you're probablythinking, well, Jess, Thursday,
(02:53):
it's got to be football, right, Well, yeah, you're right.
Amazon is all set tonight because theyhave what it could be an interesting game.
It is the Vikings at the Eagles. Now you know, minniessos oh
and one and the Eagles are oneand oh and it's the opening night for
(03:17):
year two of Amazon's Thursday Night Footballand a couple of things that we need
to know here about this this isyear two of an eleven year contract.
The league was very pleased, aswas Amazon and Prime Video and the results
(03:38):
from last year. Now it wasdown ratings wise, a bit from what
people expected. I don't know whythey expected this. I mean it had
been for years on you know,Thursday Night Football was originally started and they
had CBS had it for a littlewhile, and then it aired on Fox
(03:59):
for a while, and it wassimul cast, you know, on Prime.
But you know Prime got they loseat last year, and people,
you know, said, well,gosh, you know, look at the
numbers that went down from the broadcast. I mean, you know, look
they lost, you know, theylost a bit of their audience in the
Nielsen race. Now, depending onhow these ratings you believe, will take
(04:21):
the ones from Amazon, which was, you know, eleven point seven million
people average watched they watch the packagethey won every Thursday night had they been
linear. Okay, so think aboutthis for just a moment. You go
from free broadcast, which is whatyou know they had on fought, to
(04:44):
a pay streaming service. Okay,there's got to be a learning curve.
Number one. Number two, thefact that they yet eleven million dollars viewers
on a consistent basis over the seasonis stunning. I mean, come on,
that is pretty amazing. Now,there were some gems and nuggets in
those reports, and I think thatthey're worth chatting about for just a second.
(05:09):
One is, for the first timein you know, the history of
television of the National Football League,no matter what you were watching it on,
whether it was the linear TV likeABCNBC, you know, CBS,
Fox, or if it was cablelike ESPN or the NFL network, they
(05:31):
always averaged their audience you know,average over fifty. This was the first
time in the history of that broadcastingsituation where the audience average was forty seven.
So those people who streamed the gameson you know, on Prime,
(05:53):
the audience average was forty seven.Here's another important nugget. Eighteen to thirty
four, which is usually just abump, right, it's you know,
they get a bump here, bumpthere. It was up eighteen percent.
Never again, and I'm sorry,never before, should say never before has
it been that. I They've neverhad a double digit bounce, let alone
(06:16):
in eighteen percent bounce. Okay,So those are two points that need to
be brought up because in the firstyear of this. You know, there's
ten years left on it of thisdeal. The streaming aspect of Thursday Night
Football with Prime and how they've doneit can't under it can't be underplayed.
(06:42):
Okay, you're getting an audience that'syounger, you're cultivating with the eighteen to
thirty four an audience that is,you know, more in tune with streaming.
And then you had a third thingthat we didn't mention yet. That
third thing is that the average viewerwatched twenty minutes more of each stream than
(07:08):
watched traditional broadcast. So what thatmeant was they were either watching more of
the pregame show or more of thepostgame show than they would have on traditional
television. Now that's a good newsnot only for the league, but it's
good news for advertisers who are involvedwith Amazon. Okay, So it's been
(07:31):
a net positive and going into seasontwo with tonight's opening game, there's going
to be even more investment from PrimeVideo and Amazon as well as the league
in this streaming concept. Okay,what they've done, and many of you
(07:57):
already know it, is that theyhave carved out a Black Friday game right
now, as we all know onThanksgiving the Thursday night game isn't it is
on NBC, just like the ThursdayNight game which opens the season is on
NBC. Well, rather than takea game away from Amazon, what the
(08:24):
league did is they created a BlackFriday game. You know, this year
it's going to be the Dolphins andthe Jets. I know a lot of
people we all would have liked tosee Aaron Rodgers at the helm of the
Jets, but unfortunately he was injured. But again still that that's likely to
be a very good game. Imean, the Dolphins certainly are our challenge
(08:48):
to the Bills in that division andcould very well be you know, a
playoff and Super Bowl contending team.And they're very entertaining team, if you
know, if we see if theyplay any where, you like they did
against the Chargers the other day andthe opener. They've got one of the
fastest and most entertaining teams in allof in all the NFL. So the
(09:09):
Dolphins and the Jets game, whichwould be on a on a Friday night,
is also going to be free,so it's not behind the paywall.
Anybody who wants to can stream it. So I really think that what's going
on. Here is some interesting stuffand we're also looking and we will keep
you updated on this. And thatis Amazon's trying some things on their broadcasts
(09:35):
which you know, some heavy duty, cutting edge stuff which will be seeing
you know, I don't know ifwe'll see it this year, but we
certainly we'll see it in years tocome, with graphics and with other kinds
of things that will keep you updatedon any number of things, everything from
fantasy to you know what in gamegambling aspects are going in what direction?
(09:56):
You know how where's the money movingin that regard. So there's a lot
of different issues that and fun thingsthat are down the road and not far
down the road. As we moveon with Thursday Night Football. So Thursday
Night Football gets underway tonight on Prime. Seven o'clock is your pregame show?
Eight o'clock is the Is the gamenow? Michael's Kirk curb Street on the
(10:22):
call. All right, So theboys are back and Freddy Gardelli we wish
your Freddy friend of the show.No, Freddie and Alan the gang will
be equal to the task as theystart year two of Amazon's Prime Thursday Night
Football. Okay, so Vikings Eaglesin that game played up at the link
(10:43):
about ninety miles or so north ofwhere we are right now, so on
the East coast. So we've gottalked about baseball on Fox. One other
note, and I think it's importantto note, is that those of you
who are streaming on Max right havewandered for a while where you know what
(11:09):
happens to the Turner sports pot,you know content, Well, starting with
baseball and the playoffs, they willbegin. The Warner Discovery will begin to
put to play those games and streamthose games on Max. So you'll be
able to to watch the Baseball playoffson Max. You'll be able to then
(11:33):
watch the NBA and the NHL onMax because those two will be matriculated over
as well. Okay, so Baseball, when the playoffs come, those of
you who are subscribers of Max,you'll be happy to know that coming to
UH Max soon will be the UHthe Playoffs in October. So that's something
(11:58):
to to look forward to. Bythe way, happy thirtieth year to Fox
Sports and their NFL experiment which changedthe changed the way people watched the game.
Frankly because when very few people tookFox at the at the beginning,
(12:20):
seriously when they bought the NFL rights, that changed the game entirely from a
standpoint of affiliations and relationships with Fox. What happened on the day they signed
the contract in Detroit, CBS's affiliatewent from Channel two to Channel sixty two,
(12:45):
Fox begining, you know, adominant local presence in a number of
cities, all because of Fox isyou know, involvement with the National Football
League and of the many young announcersthey signed to do football and baseball at
that time, it was Joe Buck, it was Chip Carey, it was
(13:09):
of course Kevin Harland we know,and our buddies, you know, with
Kenny Albert and Tommy Brennaman, allof those guys, with the exception of
Harlan, who was thirty five atthe time, we're in their twenties,
mid to late twenties. And theonly guy left out of that group is
(13:33):
our our pal, Kenny Albert.So congratulations to Kenny for staying with Fox
for thirty years, and congratulations toDavid Helen and what he and Ed Goren
were able to put together with withFox, and of course with the help
of senior production coordinator Billy Brown,who who really was a bit of a
(14:00):
mastermind there. He was the firstone. We now see scoring bugs,
right, we see it up there. You can just look up in the
corner and watch the score board downbelow. And watched this core. There
had not been scoring bugs prior toBilly and that was a Billy Brown original.
That was a Fox original. Sothere you go, and we will
see. As I said before,a happy thirtieth in a row for the
(14:24):
NFL on Fox. Happy thirtieth toKenny for still being with him. A
lot of guys in that group movedon. Joe Buck, of course,
obviously is doing well. He's thevoice of Monday Night Football. Speaking of
which, Monday Night Football's ratings,which came out this morning, had the
(14:48):
Jets game with the Buffalo Bills asthe highest rated NFL football game ever seen
on Monday Night on ESPN. Okay, and they got that. You know,
you were going all the way backto two thousand and four when ESPN
took over that contract from ABC.So since, uh, since two thousand
(15:15):
and four. That was the Jetsgame with Aaron Rodgers, unfortunately Gay being
injured in the four plays in reallyhad that kind of drew that kind of
vibe and got that kind of ratings, and it was over twenty two million
people watching that football game at onepoint time on ABC ESPN, So pretty
(15:39):
amazing, pretty amazing numbers, noquestion about it. So let's just say
kudos to ESPN in too. ABCalso kudos on on that particular game.
One quick shout out to Joe Buck. Joe Joe was one guy who liked
Jimmy Nance and some of the otherbroadcast are very good at building at building
(16:03):
drama, building drama with your voiceand how you you know, inflect and
all. That is an important partof sports broadcasting. And someone you know,
as someone who his career has beenproducing and directing live sports, you
know you know when to move itup. You know when keep it down
(16:25):
and keep it keep it keep itmonotone or level so that you're too excited
to get fans out of the way. But his call of the of the
final play, the return for thetouchdown on on Monday, that was pitched
perfect, It was well done,It was not over the top, and
(16:45):
it was measured. He obviously lookedat one of the lines he said,
you know, flags on the fieldhe was watching for that too. Truly
professional, truly you know, capturedthe essence of the of the moment.
So it was well done Jack,you know Joe who's his father. Jack
(17:06):
was himself a tremendous broadcaster and keepingit in the family, the tradition of
doing things, and brilliantly good onJoe. He did a good job on
that way. So there you gofrom that standpoint. Now some more numbers
that were of interest and shouldn't bea surprise, but in some people,
(17:32):
you know, when I mentioned itthis morning, we're surprised, and that
is Kilco Golf's US Open victory onSaturday drew a record viewership for women's major
tennis final, with over one millionmore viewers than the men's final. Okay,
so it shouldn't really be a surpriseto anybody, I should think not
(17:55):
because number one throughout the tournament.She was, you know, clearly one
of the best stories at Flushing Meadow, at the at the Tennis Center,
nineteen years old, very incredibly wellspoken, very poised young woman and very
(18:18):
talented obviously, so she came throughand beat Essarenka to win the title.
Absolutely brilliant and obviously you know,the audience was compelling. It was a
compelling situation Djokovic on Sunday. Itdoesn't surprise me that, for instance,
(18:41):
the ESPN got higher ratings with Coco. Again, she was a story.
And here's the other thing too.You attract casual fans when you have a
personality, okay, and her personalitybecame infectious during the course of that entire
tournament. There are going to bepeople who will won't watch a single you
(19:04):
know, frame of a tournament,of a tennis tournament any other time,
but either the majors, usually theOpen in New York or Wimbledon, those
are the two that garner the biggestratings. So it doesn't surprise me,
and I'm very pleased to see itthat, you know, that Coco had
(19:25):
a good rating, that ESPNS,you know, did a good job making
sure that that that was the case. Now here's another one that just came
across the desk this morning, andthat is that the w NBA's regular season
drew its best viewership on ESPN inseventeen years, up eighteen percent from twenty
twenty two. Again, that Ithink was something that it shouldn't surprise anyway.
(19:53):
And here's why. The numbers thatwe saw March Madness for the women.
Those were all time high numbers.The numbers we saw for softball and
the women's softball championships in the WorldSeries again bonkers big numbers. So the
(20:15):
fact that that you know that weare connecting in this way where women's sports
is now getting generating you know goodratings shouldn't shouldn't really be a surprise.
I mean, you know, it'scompelling television. It's good, solid content,
(20:37):
and the storylines are good. Thatbasically is the essence of what you
want when you're airing a broadcast.Pardon me for a moment, My buddy
Spencer McLaughlin from You Locked Unpacked twelvesays he needs a second segment. Well,
(21:00):
we don't have segments here, soI'm gonna take a second segments sip
right at the moment. Thank youvery much for indulging me. So,
yes, you know, the women'sdeal is quite important, and what we're
seeing right now is an insert.You know, it's it's really kind of
(21:22):
a birth, if you will.Now, women's tennis has always done well
on television, there's no question aboutthat. All the way going back to
diligion, King Chris Evert Martina everto love him and there really isn't a
compelling men's situation, Josh. Yet. I mean, Djokovic continues to win
and right now, you know,he seems to be a bit of a
(21:47):
juggernaut when it comes to you know, the majors, So so Coco getting
that win and more people watching it. Again, as they say, it
doesn't the project, but I thinkit's a good thing and I hope that
it's a trend that continues. Alrighty, how time for some questions we got
from the mail bag our right minutes. Look over here are okay? Is
(22:12):
this is this going to be abig rivalry? I'm sorry this from Jeff,
and Jeff says asks, excuse me, why is this such a big
rivalry weekend in college football? Well, Jeff, first of all, thanks
(22:33):
for the question. Second of all, you've got Pitt taking on West Virginia
in the backyard brawl. Okay,Now, if you remember last year,
Pitt, you know, in WestVirginia kind of rekindled this. It's really,
to me one of the top fiverivalries and all of college and it's
(22:56):
a fun it's a fun rivalry andit was it was very entertaining last year,
incredibly entertaining it was I think thefirst week end of of college football,
if memory serves, and it drewfour million people on ABC and ESPN.
And so that game is played inPittsburgh. This year's played in West
(23:19):
Virginia, and I have every reasonto believe that that game is going to
do well. It's a it's upagain. It's a primetime game Saturday night.
Fowler and Herb Street will be onthat call. And so yeah,
I mean, I think that thebackyard brawl is a very good one.
Uh. Florida is playing Tennessee again. Normally Florida and Tennessee, which by
(23:45):
the I mean Florida Tennessee is arivalry, but it's it's not the Florida
Georgia rivalry or the Florida Florida staterivalry. It's this kind of a rivalry
that got ginned up from a coupleof coach situations, and as al As
followed the Gators for many, manyyears, I can tell you that it's
(24:07):
a it's not it's not really arivalry. It's just those two teams don't
like each other, and I thinkthat that might be uh, and they're
a niece just like face each otheryear every year, and so you know,
rivalry, we'll give you that,but uh, that's also it's it's
a prime game, a prime timegame SEC Network. So yeah, I
think it'll be entertaining. And andof course we also have, you know,
(24:33):
on on this week, we haveyou know, the situation where you've
got Colorado Colorado State playing each other. Again. I'm not sure how much
Colorado is going to call that arivalry, but it is what it is.
So I think a lot of itis because once you get into the
conference plate, you really aren't goingto play you know that in some rivalry
(24:56):
games get played at the end ofthe year, like you know, Navy
and an Army and uh, youknow, but uh, Oklahoma and Texas
play each other in the middle ofthe season and they're big, you know,
big twelve rivals, and so itdoes happen the beginning of the year
you get some rivalry games. ButI wouldn't say this is the biggest rivalry
(25:17):
week. It's just it is we'relucky enough to get some some rivalry games,
and and that really, you know, it's not a great slate of
games all the way down from youknow, top to bottom like we've had
in a couple. The last coupleof weeks, we had some good ones.
Uh, this one is we gota couple of good ones, but
not not a lot. Okay,not a lot to be looking forward to
(25:38):
on on that situation. But that'sa good question. Uh, Okay,
let me see good time for acouple more Billy What do you got for
me? How will the NFL dealwith the Jets now that Aaron Rodgers you
(26:00):
is not playing? They were scheduledfor six games, Well, Jeff,
they'll still be scheduled for six games. The schedule is set, you know.
I can't see the Jets being bouncedout of those those time slots.
They do have a Sunday night game, so theoretically they could be fletched out
(26:22):
the Thursday game, which I well, actually it's the Friday game, the
Black Friday game, which I referencedearlier. This is the first year that
the NFL has the ability to flexThursday. I don't think that's gonna happen.
I just don't think that they're gonnaflex. I don't think they want
(26:45):
to. And they that was somethingthey were they were giving out to,
you know, was a concession thatthey were giving to Amazon. But I
don't think that they're going to actuallyexercise that now. You know, again
the Sunday night game which comes laterin the year, if it is not
(27:06):
compelling and there are other compelling gamesthat that would warrant taking that slot,
well then yeah, maybe, butat least five of those prime games that
you know, the league thought AaronRodgers are going to play in, and
they're definitely going to still be there. So don't look for the NFL to
change the schedule too much in thatregard. Once it's in there, it's
(27:32):
in there. They can't really domuch with it. Okay, all right,
Tommy, which you have for me, Tommy's wondering, you know,
the NBA season and the NHL seasonare coming up soon. What's to deal
with the regional sports networks. Well, the deal of the real regional sports
networks is that we know the UtahJazz, We know that the the Clippers
(27:57):
in Los Angeles, we know thatthe Phoenix Suns are all making plans to
do what in essence is going backto the future, which is airing games
on you know, local broadcast televisionsome of them and then putting the other
(28:19):
a streaming package which they will beable to market direct to consumers. So
we'll give you far more information asthat comes on, and frankly to find
out, you know, how someof the others are going to you know,
be handled, because there's also situationsin Pittsburgh, their situations in Cleveland,
(28:41):
their situations in Houston that are notquite settled yet, and we'll get
to those when, you know,when it comes the Rockies obviously in Colorado,
that whole situation has got to beput together as well. Uh,
we do know that the Rockies willbe the next team after once the season
(29:03):
is over, they're going to shutterat and t Sports Rocky Mountain. So
that will mean that the Rockies willneed a place to play, and you
know, Major League Baseball as wellas the NBA and the NHL have said,
you know, they're going to stepup and take over the broadcast.
Will obviously there's no need for thatat the moment because the Rocky is going
(29:26):
to finish off the season, butonce the season is over, where Rockies
broadcast will be going forward. Yesterdaythere was some talk that perhaps Major League
Baseball would do a deal with StanCronky's Altitude Group, which you know is
(29:47):
the dominant sports regional network in youknow, in the Rocky Mountain States in
Denver, Colorado. So it's quitepossible that they would end up on altitude.
It's quite possible that Major League Baseballwe want to keep them separate and
and let that fly. So wedon't know what's going on with the Rockies.
We know obviously, if you're aSanto Padre's fan or if you're a
(30:08):
here's a Diamond batsman, you've seenthe Major League Baseball kind of did you
know when they when the teams weren'tpaid by Diamond, who's in bankruptcy at
this moment, that they seamlessly putthem back on the air and nobody missed
anything. So you know, withsome time to put something together, I
think that's going to handle that.As far as the Pens are concerned,
(30:32):
the Pens are owned by the FenwayGroup, which of course is you know,
their owns nesson in New England Sportsnetwork, which is a very successful
one, and they've already said thatthey will basically take on the Pens and
so there will be in Ness inPittsburgh. So for the there is a
potential. I would think John Henryand Tommy Warner to discuss with the Pirates
(30:57):
that maybe the best course forward wouldbe if they joined the Pens on essence,
so we'll keep you we'll keep youposted on that as well. Okay,
all right, gang, look,plenty of stuff to talk about tomorrow.
We'll get ready. We'll get readyas we always do on Friday for
a big college and you know,NFL weekend. We've got plenty of baseball,
(31:19):
and certainly as the Pennant races heatup and and NASCAR starts to wind
down as they get into the realmeat of the chase. So all right,
so tomorrow, plenty of stuff.Let's recap real quick what we got
for today, and that is ofcourse baseball. Tonight, big four game
(31:42):
series between the Rays and the Oriolesat Camden Yard. That's a seven o'clock
game nationally and Fox okay Vikings Eaglesnational streaming on Prime Okay, seven o'clock
pre game, eight o'clock kick.We got college football, which I poemish
forgot their college football tonight on ESPN. It is Memphis hosting Navy. And
(32:12):
that's about it for tonight. Okay, we will have more tomorrow, but
that's about it. Locally, obviouslyif you are a baseball fan, you
can follow regionally what's going on fromthat standpoint. Quick note, just another
thing just came across the wires justa few minutes ago. Max Scherzer will
be out. That's Max Scherzer forthe Texas Rangers will be out for the
remainder of the season. He injuredhis arm, which she did the other
(32:36):
day, and so not good newsfor the Rangers who were hoping that Max
could could help them in that Pennantdrive. So that's one last news bit
for you all. But you know, I really appreciate you dropping by today,
guys. And you know, asit scrolls past there and you're reading
(32:57):
it, it says please subscribe atthe bell and like us, and we
greatly would appreciate if you would dothat. Okay, all right, folks.
For everybody here at stream on,I'm Jim Williams saying good afternoon.
We'll see you tomorrow and by allmeans, have a lovely day. Take care,
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