WGN TV is interested in transporting local sports again and believes that there is a path to the programs of the Air Chicago sports network of White Sox, Bulls and Blackhawks that Comcast has not yet worn, the Sun-Totes has learned.
The sides should pay a lot of details, such as the number of games that would be included and that would sell them advertising. Although WGN is not positioned to pay substantial rights fees – teams should treat it as a marketing expenditure – this could offer teams their most public of television since its launch of the CHSN in October.
WGN is available mainly everywhere locally, including on the COMCAST XFINITY cable system, which has around 1 million subscribers on the market. In addition, with up to 15 hours of daily programming live, WGN can promote programs all day.
By undergoing the main cable cable in the region, the CHSN would risk more affecting its relationship with Comcast. But it may be out of words at this stage. During a Trade Event of Crain’s Chicago on April 3, President of Bulls Michael Reinsdorf accused Comcast of having acted in “bad faith” during carriage talks and qualified his behavior as “discriminatory”.
The CHSN is available above the air on the WJYS 62.2 and 62.3 sub-careals, amazing cable and U-Verse and Satellite Directv. It can also be broadcast via Directv Stream, Fubo, the Direct Service to Consumer of CHSN and other platforms.
WGN is convinced that he could tinker with a limited game calendar for the three teams, despite commitments with CW Sports which include the Nascar Xfinity series and football and ACC basketball. A schedule may include 10 or 15 Taurus and Hawks games and 25 SOX games.
It would not be the first time that WGN will find a way to welcome a team. In 2008, Hawks fire president Rocky Wirtz worked with WGN to broadcast 20 games a year starting with the 2008-09 season, while the channel still transported bulls, cubs and Sox games.
If WGN had to transport these games, the emissions would probably be simulances from the CHSN flow. Since the loss of his share of the rights of the teams, as well as those of the Cubs, in the fall of 2019, WGN has dismantled its game production operation. WGN could produce its own pre-match and post-match emissions and sell them advertising.
Since its creation in 1948, WGN has transported Chicago sports at all levels, making it a programming objective. This changed when the Cubs, which had appeared on the channel from the start, left to launch Marquee Sports Network and the SOX, Bulls and Hawks made NBC Sports Chicago their exclusive house. WGN briefly won the fire before landing on Apple TV.
Although its audience has decreased, like so many other channels at the age of streaming, WGN remains a pillar on the market. He kept his place on the local sports scene with the “GN Sports” show of half an hour-night hour, and he has five anchors / sports reporters on the staff, which is more than the four affiliates of the local network.
Frankly, the Sox, the Bulls and the Hawks owe their fans to do this work because it does not seem that Comcast will take the CHSN anytime soon. They have a voluntary partner in WGN, including the new managing director, Ric Harris, is impatient to bring sports back to Chicago. It just can’t happen to the old -fashioned. If the teams are pleasant, there is an agreement to be concluded.