Early maybe. But where do you see La Liga ending up after 2020? I say Turner for English and ...... ioono for spanish but it would be a big prize if they get enough time slots. Fox unloaded Bundesliga to ESPN+ (bad ratings). Fox would love la liga and could make money but late broadcast times during pigskin games are a no go. Espn and NBC are swamped. What do you guys think?
ESPN seems to be scooping everything else up lately so I'd guess them. It seems to be the trend that leagues are not cool with going to the highest bidder w/no carriage anymore so I doubt we see more beIN/gol type of wins. Maybe Turner would dip their toe in again? Can't see many conventional bidders against ESPN unless it's them.
With Fox losing the Bundesliga, they may want to step in although their trend has been to shed soccer properties over the last few years.
Where La Liga ends up in Spanish is really the driver. If Univision and Telemundo can grab it then that's big. And the powers that be atop La Liga should be doing whatever they can to make that happen.
This coming season, still on beIN Next season - may be moving to another network. Just speculating on how that may go.
I like that the Premier League games other than the last one on Saturday and Sunday are over before sports start here. The same is true for the Bundesliga. Serie A used to have a bunch of games on Sunday at 9:00 A.M. and decided to spread it out more. Now there are games at 12:00 P.M. and 2:45 P.M. on Saturday and Sunday for four of the ten games. La Liga plays one game at a time on weekends with occasionally two at the same time. They use four times each on Saturday and Sunday. The start times are earlier than they were a few years ago, but they still have half of the weekend games at 12:30 P.M. or 2:45 P.M. Showing Barcelona or Real Madrid at 2:45 P.M. would stop a channel from showing NCAA Football games at 12:00 P.M. and 3:30 P.M. Some games don't follow those time spots, and if Fox got La Liga maybe they would convince the Big Ten or Big XII to have a game at 5:00 P.M. right after La Liga.
I could see the Spanish rights going to Univision, but that leaves where the English rights would go. If the English rights go to Turner, it probably all goes onto BR Live since I don't see El Clasico breaking into an all-day marathon of movies on TNT on a Saturday or Sunday in November. If it goes to ESPN, Serie A gets pushed all the way behind the paywall since there's no way ESPN is broadcasting that much soccer on a Saturday and Sunday morning, and if they broadcast one match per round that means one of Barca or Real Madrid spend time behind a paywall. Plus, we don't know how the Bundesliga will shake out. If that's going to be all matches streaming or one match shown on TV each round. I think Fox is getting out of soccer except for MLS and USMNT/FIFA properties. As strange as it may seem given their distribution, I think they'll wind up back on bein. It really does make the most sense.
I wonder if Univision would balk with a lot of money and concentration spent on Liga MX - and they already get some choice Barca/Madrid matches in the Champs League. Telemundo could build on their winter PL schedule with La Liga
I would think TUDN would want more live programming unless they're happy with the Liga MX in 60 matches they show in the mornings. I think having La Liga would be a nice compliment to both Liga MX and their Champions League coverage. TUDN can say that they are the preeminent destination for Spanish speakers to get the best soccer from both the region and Europe. Plus, it would bolster their online platforms. I think they would be very interested in the Spanish rights to La Liga for the right price.
Nothing is going to convince ANY broadcaster to move pigskin games, EvanJ. To Kensingtons point, I say otherwise about movie marathons. Super special events aside I doubt the ratings would be much different than a game featuring Real, Barca or Athleti. Great points on Univision tho.
For an English speaking audience, showing Shawshank Redemption for the 6 millionth time is probably going to get the same ratings as a Real or Barca match (definitely not Atletico from an English-speaking perspective), but they can sell more commercial space during that than they could a soccer game. Plus, it's much more expensive to show a soccer game than to just let the tape roll on Shawshank.
My fear is that he goes to ESPN if bein tanks. The last thing I want is him ruining Serie A again. It's bad enough Bonnetti is doing one game a week on TV, although he's not as bad being paired with Donaldson as he was when was paired with Cordero, who is just awful.
La Liga might be scrapping Friday and Monday matches, which would probably mean more conflicts with Yank sports.
Other than the 12 college football Saturdays, I wonder what FS1 and FS2 will air in the late mornings after the Bundesliga leaves. Bundesliga clubs as a whole could do a lot more as far as outreach to the Anglosphere.
AT&T is setting up its own OTT service using its Warner Media properties. It will be interesting to see if they merge B/R live into it. Might be a landing spot for La Liga, as well.
Just to follow up on the Friday/Monday thing, LaLiga is fighting in court to KEEP the friday/monday matches, while the Spanish FA is trying to get rid of it (saying that they have the legal rights to block matches from being played on those days). This is a SIGNIFICANT revenue question for La Liga, as they are claiming that without those dates, they could see a 30% decrease in TV rights. Something to think about as we get ready for the change over.
Update: We will have Friday games this season, but not Monday. https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/49300149
The fans don't like it. They had an agreement that expired in June, so the RFEF claimed that La Liga only had rights to assign games to those days. Note: This judgement only officially covers the first three weeks of the fixture schedule (which is all that's been officially announced as to exact time/dates).. so it may not be over yet.