matt hermann @MrMattHermann 13m13 minutes ago Great news for US Bundesliga fans - FOX Sports has come through with a schedule that puts 58 league games on FS1, and all 306 online.
http://www.philly.com/philly/blogs/...s-2015-16-Bundesliga-television-schedule.html Most is on FS2 and Fox Soccer Plus. Fox Soccer 2 Go will carry a lot but I'm not paying for that.
Does fox soccer 2go work worth a damn? I've heard bad things about it last time I was going to purchase.
Similar thing happened in Canada. Sportsnet got the rights but like 80% of the games are on the subscription channel that no one has because it's stupid expensive for limited games. It's better than nothing though.
I get FS2 on part of my cable package thankfully because I wanted to make sure I got soccer packages so I get the Fox Sports channels, beIN, NBC Sports and this stupid local Time Warner Sports which is the only way to watch the Columbus Crew away matches No HD though and they're putting most on Fox Soccer 2go which is expensive
Fox getting EPL rights next go around scares me more than anything. Their inability to understand how to properly broadcast is incredible. NBC showed them exactly how it's done. Why not replicate that with bundlesliga?
I get FS2 but not in HD, but get Fox Soccer Plus in HD. One thing I won't complain about Time Warner is that they group FSP in with beIN, FS2, spanish language sports networks, etc. I know other carriers just offer FSP a la carte for like $15. Although I'll rarely be up for 90% of the games. I believe Fox is just going to use the Sky feed.
It works but there are tons of flaws, IMO. Bought it for half a year a few years ago and they didn't even have the time and score overlapped on their feed. Group Stage Champions League.
I think it's silly to expect that any U.S. network would give the Bundesliga the same coverage a competitor network gives to the Premier League. There isn't nearly the same demand. Beyond that, FS1 has a lot more non-soccer content to offer that would get in the way of showing more than two games a weekend, whereas NBC is pushing rodeo reruns and obscure auto races off air to cover the Premier League like it does.
While there may not be near the same demand, they did the EPL coverage similar to their plan for Bundesliga and NBC is doing it much better so they don't really deserve benefit of doubt that they'd handle it better next time around
Oh, I definitely wouldn't want Fox to win the rights for the Premier League (or even ESPN, who could produce it perfectly fine, but much more so than Fox, doesn't have the bandwidth to give the EPL the same coverage that NBC can). But I also think Fox's coverage of the Bundesliga is really as much as we can ask for at this point - I don't think there is a reasonable business case to broadcast much more of the Bundesliga than Fox is planning on.
Nbc streams every game online for free in good quality. Bundesliga will have 30 something games on fs1 and another 100 or so in standard def TV far below the nbc stream in quality. On top of that, they will charge 20/month for a premium stream service for other games that is far worse quality than the nbc free one. They use the same shitty business model for the champions league. Half the Chelsea games are on fs2 with such bad quality that I can't even tell what player is on the ball I get your point that bundesliga is nowhere near the premier league but fox's pathetic soccer coverage has nothing to do with that
58 games on FS1 - that's a lot considering that the league has 1 team that would fall within the top 10 U.S. fanbases (and I'm not even sure that Bayern does). Streaming rights cost money and it's just not a good investment for Fox to offer it for free; the few thousand or so who care will pay for it or go to a bar like EPL fans had to 7-8 years ago. It's a considerable uptick in access from last year, and yet people are complaining why?
Fox just uses Sky Sports feeds. Outside of the crappy Gus Johnson experiment, and whether you like/dislike their studio analysts (I for the most part don't pay much attention to studio shows in any sport), what exactly is so horrible about Fox? They are a very large reason for the growth of the sport (specifically the EPL) in this country. 50+ BL games on a channel that's in 80+ million homes, FS2 is in more homes than Fox Soccer was, albeit not in HD with some providers is pretty damn awesome coming from the GolTV abyss. And I do agree in hoping that NBC retains the EPL.
NBC makes literally every EPL match of the entire season available for free This was never the case when Fox had the rights, it isn't the case in Champions League where right now it's going on and they don't offer any option to watch it (I have Fox Soccer Plus and Fox Soccer 2go and can't watch the matches tomorrow) and have group stage matches unavailable to watch and others on FS2 which most providers don't have in HD I appreciate what they did to help grow the EPL in America but NBC has taken the coverage to a new level and I can't fathom anyone wanting them to get coverage back
NBC does an incredible job, but they wouldn't have given two shits about the EPL had Fox never created a soccer channel to showcase the sport and specifically that league. I guarantee as part of the next negotiations, Fox will have every match available in their offer like NBC does, or the EPL will just laugh that offer away. ESPN to me stands no chance because they just don't have the space, unless they completely revamp ESPNEWS into a new channel. I mean shit, NBC and ESPN didn't even bid on the last round of Champions League TV rights. But I say this in hoping NBC retains the rights.
You forgot to say Erik Wynalda when discussing what it is that sucks about FOX and their soccer coverage.