Blackhawks, Bulls, ChiSox on the move

[Big Rollo Smokes 260]

As per The Athletic, three Chicago major league teams who presently call NBC Sports Chicago home will be moving on later this year.

 

(The article is behind a pay wall.)

 

"Standard Media Group in partnership with the Chicago Blackhawks, Chicago Bulls and Chicago White Sox will be the new television broadcast home for all three teams beginning in October, according to an internal document obtained by The Athletic.

 

"The media group is expected to make the network, which is unnamed, available across 'multiple platforms,' including over-the-air and carriage agreements with cable and streaming providers.

 

"NBC Sports Chicago is the current broadcast home for the Blackhawks, Bulls and White Sox. The teams’ contract with NBC Sports expires in October.

 

"Standard Media Group, which is based in Nashville, Tenn., is a local broadcast and digital media company. According to its website, the group has television stations in Kentucky, Missouri, Nebraska and Rhode Island.

 

"The new network will not be associated with Stadium, a multi-platform network, which Bulls and White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf purchased majority control of in 2023."

[atlnews2 590]

Launching a new RSN in 2024 - this can only go poorly 

[nycnewsjunkie 1439]

20 hours ago, Big Rollo Smokes said:

As per The Athletic, three Chicago major league teams who presently call NBC Sports Chicago home will be moving on later this year.

 

(The article is behind a pay wall.)

 

"Standard Media Group in partnership with the Chicago Blackhawks, Chicago Bulls and Chicago White Sox will be the new television broadcast home for all three teams beginning in October, according to an internal document obtained by The Athletic.

 

"The media group is expected to make the network, which is unnamed, available across 'multiple platforms,' including over-the-air and carriage agreements with cable and streaming providers.

 

"NBC Sports Chicago is the current broadcast home for the Blackhawks, Bulls and White Sox. The teams’ contract with NBC Sports expires in October.

 

"Standard Media Group, which is based in Nashville, Tenn., is a local broadcast and digital media company. According to its website, the group has television stations in Kentucky, Missouri, Nebraska and Rhode Island.

 

"The new network will not be associated with Stadium, a multi-platform network, which Bulls and White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf purchased majority control of in 2023."

Standard? No pun intended, but that one came out of left field. You’d think Reinsdorf would just repurpose Stadium into the new RSN.

 

I’m not sure how Standard is going to be able to run a regional sports net when it seems like they can barely run their local TV affiliates.

[nathannah 2401]

52 minutes ago, nycnewsjunkie said:

Standard? No pun intended, but that one came out of left field. You’d think Reinsdorf would just repurpose Stadium into the new RSN.

 

I’m not sure how Standard is going to be able to run a regional sports net when it seems like they can barely run their local TV affiliates.

You would have thought they would've wound it down like Legacy did when Gray was able to end the charade with them and after the Tegcoxpollo deal died, but I guess someone needs to keep WLNE off life support until Sinclair finagles the ABC affiliation onto a WJAR sub; might as well be them. And they've had more deals die than actually go through.

 

And again, Chicago has another pointless sports channel move like when Fox wound down FSN Chicago, and with no full guarantee of carriage like NBCSN offered via Comcast, two teams in terminal struggle with an owner headed the same way, and the Sox threatening to move down 65 to Music City (just don't talk to me about the actual team). It's no wonder Chicago remains a strong sports radio town with all these changes.

[J.W. Rodriguez 14]

1 hour ago, mrschimpf said:

You would have thought they would've wound it down like Legacy did when Gray was able to end the charade with them and after the Tegcoxpollo deal died, but I guess someone needs to keep WLNE off life support until Sinclair finagles the ABC affiliation onto a WJAR sub; might as well be them. And they've had more deals die than actually go through.

 

And again, Chicago has another pointless sports channel move like when Fox wound down FSN Chicago, and with no full guarantee of carriage like NBCSN offered via Comcast, two teams in terminal struggle with an owner headed the same way, and the Sox threatening to move down 65 to Music City (just don't talk to me about the actual team). It's no wonder Chicago remains a strong sports radio town with all these changes.

FSN Chicago was actually part of Cablevision. Fox owned a minority stake in the channel, but Cablevision bought out the channel in full in '05 after Fox backed out. A year later, the channel was no more.

[Megatron81 256]

I thought that it be Stadium since Jerry owns Stadium that he bought the stake from Sinclair for White Sox, Bulls, & Blackhawks. I didn't think that Standard General would buy the rights for the White Sox, Bulls & Blackhawks guessing that is coming from Soo Kim.

[SDHIll1980 99]

The article above mentioned possible over-the-air coverage, as well as cable and streaming, although it doesn't get into specifics.  I wonder if that means either a package of games will be sublicensed to one of the local outlets, or the entire network itself operates as an over-the-air station?  Sounds like Reinsdorf, the Wirtz family, and Standard Media may be shopping around for a local outlet, although there aren't too many available other than maybe WJYS...everything else commercially in Chicagoland are either network O&Os (and I'm including WGN in that), the Weigel suite of stations, or a bunch of low-powers.

[Jase 1042]

On 5/6/2024 at 1:33 PM, Megatron81 said:

I thought that it be Stadium since Jerry owns Stadium that he bought the stake from Sinclair for White Sox, Bulls, & Blackhawks. I didn't think that Standard General would buy the rights for the White Sox, Bulls & Blackhawks guessing that is coming from Soo Kim.

The Sun-Times ran a story about this yesterday.
 

If I’m understanding correctly, Standard will invest (in the RSN) and help with distribution while Stadium will provide the content (and handle other operational matters).

 

That said, it ‘appears’ that Stadium will be converted into the aforementioned RSN that will air White Sox, Bulls & Blackhawk games. At least that’s how it sounds…