I hope the will is there. Considering how awesome EPL coverage is on NBC, you'd hope Fox would take some notes. Their EPL coverage was amateur our garbage in comparison.
I am very far from being a sports broadcasting or TV expert, so take this for what it is worth. Locally, the programming on our FOX affiliate in the a.m. on weekends is typically syndicated stuff or infomercials, which suggests to me that the programming is selected by the affiliate. My guess is that FOX couldn't force the affiliate to broadcast the college football pregame at 11:00 a.m., and therefore, would keep it on FS1 (for fear that affiliates just won't show the pregame show, and the pregame show is "signature" programming for FOX).
I have a feeling that even fox doesn't know what to do with the BL.. We haven't heard anything concrete or set schedule.. The BL opener is a month away and we haven't seen a single promo on any fox network.. I have a feeling they're going to half ass this.... I pray I'm wrong :/
True they don't have the rights technically until August 1st. However, I feel they missed a huge advertising opportunity with record numbers watching the Women's World Cup on Fox channels and now the Gold Cup being on their networks they had the opportunity to alert a lot of people to the upcoming season on their stations. Especially for fans of the men's team, who don't have a particular team/league they follow. Fox could have really played up the idea that after the Gold Cup is over watch your US players club season, etc. With multiple first team players and many young US prospects associated with the Bundesliga.
Looking at it from a legal perspective, which is my bag, my sense is that if you do not have the rights, you cannot advertise for it. Pretty straight forward.
It's showing up as on Fox Soccer Plus and Fox Soccer 2 Go on the soccer tv website. http://www.livesoccertv.com/channels/fox-soccer-plus/ Not good....
Looks like all games will be broadcast if you are willing to pay. Online and foxsoccer plus Only select games will be on fox sports 2. What a letdown.
This is better than Gol TV how?? I thought the BL wanted to promote their brand here--it will be hard to compete with NBC and the EPL. And I've not seen any schedule for FS 2 at this point (tho I expect it will be all Bayern all the time).
FOX will show Bundesliga games on FOX Sports 2, FOX Soccer Plus & FOX Soccer 2Go [July 22, 2015] http://worldsoccertalk.com/2015/07/...-fox-sports-2-fox-soccer-plus-fox-soccer-2go/ The excerpt: As of press time, here’s what World Soccer Talk can reveal so far: about the first season of a five-year deal that FOX Sports has with the Bundesliga: • Every single game of the 2015/16 Bundesliga season will be shown live and on-demand on FOX Soccer 2GO via the web, mobile and tablet apps (US residents only), • Select Bundesliga games will be shown live on FOX Sports 2 (see Bundesliga TV schedule for full details), • There remains the possibility that select games may be shown on FOX Sports 1. However, there are currently no Bundesliga games scheduled on FOX Sports 1 for the first three weeks of the season, • Reruns of the Bundesliga games on FOX Sports 2 will be limited. In the first 3 weeks of programming, there’s an average of 1 game a week shown on rerun. As an indicator of what soccer fans can expect from FOX Sports’ coverage of the Bundesliga, the first game of Bayern Munich’s season will be shown live on FOX Soccer Plus, while their next two games are scheduled for FOX Sports 2. In the leaked documents we’ve seen thus far, there are no games scheduled to appear on FOX Sports 1. Of course, schedules are subject to change. What the schedules do indicate, however, is that FOX Sports will often feature two Bundesliga games with Saturday morning kickoffs on FOX Sports 2.
Incredibly depressing. This is worse than GolTV. Let's start with the fact that many providers do not have FS2 (it's in roughly 1/2 as many homes as FS1). If you do have FS2 (and I do), it is HIGHLY likely that it is in SD. The picture quality I have for FS is poor, poor, and more poor. In fact, I think GolTV, which was poor, might be a little bit better. And they are going to show fewer games on FS2 than they did on GolTV. So, I am going to have fewer opportunities to watch the games, and the picture quality will be the same or maybe even worse. That's fantastic. Or I could pay extra to get FS+ and have access to more games - in the same crappy SD. Or I could pay extra to get 2go, which is simply not how I consume sports. End result: I will watch MLS on ESPN, Premier League on NBCSN and Serie A on beinSport, and the BL will continue to be a 4th choice (even though it would be my preference to make it first choice). As a practical matter, it means that I will watch bits and pieces of a game once or twice a month. Add it all up and it means I'll watch the equivalent of 3 or 4 games max during the course of a season. Well done, FOX. And let's not allow the BL off the hook. They made the deal, and prioritized $ now over exposure (and more money later). Well done, BL. P.S. I just saw over the weekend that: (a) there is/was an NFL pregame show on FS1 that started at 11:00 a.m. ET; and (b) it is being moved to big FOX. So the big impediment to broadcasting a BL "Game of the Week" on Sunday morning at 9:30 a.m. is gone. Not that it matters.
Just went to Fox Sports website: http://www.foxsports.com/soccer/schedule?competition=4 And also checked out Fox Soccer Plus' schedule: http://foxsoccerplus.com/schedule They have the first 3 weeks of games listed with TV coverage. Week 1: Friday: Bayern vs Hamburg 2:30 ET - FSP Saturday: Werder Bremen vs Scalke 9:30 ET - FSP Bayer Leverkusen vs Hoffenheim 9:30 ET - FS2 Borussia Dortmund vs Moenchengladbach 12:30 ET - FS2 Sunday: Stuttgart vs Koeln 11:30 ET - FSP Week 2: Friday: Hertha Berlin vs Werder Bremen 2:30 ET - FSP Saturday: Eintracht Frankfurt vs Augsburg 9:30 ET - FSP Hoffenheim vs Bayern 9:30 ET - FS2 Sunday: Moenchengladbach vs Mainz 11:30 ET - FS2 Week 3: Friday: NONE Saturday: Stuttgart vs Eintracht Frankfurt 9:30 ET - FS2 Mainz vs Hannover 9:30 ET - FSP Bayern vs Bayer Leverkusen 12:30 ET - FS2 Sunday: Borussia Dortmund vs Hertha Berlin 9:30 ET - FSP Weder Bremen vs Moenchengladbach 11:30 ET - FSP My thoughts/2 cents: Looks like 2 games on FS2 and 3 games on FSP every week. Also looks like one of the FS2 games will always be a early Saturday kickoff. Other than that I couldn't really find any trend in which games were picked. Based on this very small sample size the CL teams will have more games televised, except Wolfsburg got snubbed all together. From FSP's schedule it looks like there will be a highlight show(s) on FSP. On an overall exposure level this is terrible! I will be able to catch the FS2 games as I pay a little more for my cable, but I can't even get FSP with my provider and I know a lot of people don't even have FS2. It appears that they games are picked to try a get people to pay for FSP (if they can even get it). The season opener comes to mind, I don't see any reason that isn't on FS2 other than Fox trying to get people to sign up for FSP.
Fox Sports 2015-16 Bundesliga television schedule Philadelphia Inquirer Here are some stats on the Fox Sports Bundesliga TV Schedule - First 7 weeks, through the end of September - 63 total games ~20% of the season - FS1 has 16 games or ~25% - FS2 has 11 games or ~17%, ~42% for both - Only 3 clubs with no games on FS1: Bayer Leverkusen, Hannover 96 & 1 FC Köln - Hannover 96 is the only club with no games on FS1 or FS2 - Bayern München has 4 games on FS1 and 3 games on FS2
FOX Sports' Unprecedented Bundesliga Coverage Debuts in August Fox Sports FOX Sports 2015-2016 Bundesliga Schedule (PDF) Fox Sports
Well, this is really good news. Reasonably close to the best case scenario I outlined earlier. I thought, as I said in previous posts, that the Sunday @ 9:30 a.m. game was the best chance for a regular viewing opportunity on FS1, and at least based on the first seven weeks, there seems to be an effort to make that happen. Of the six weekend Spieltags, five have the 9:30 a.m. game on FS1. That time slot doesn't interfere with any important programming on FS1, especially now that the NFL "pre" pregame show is moving to big FOX. And what's even nicer is that there's a good variety of teams that play in that slot--the five games feature 9 different teams.
Even though I'm a Bayern fan, I'm also glad every Bayern game isn't the one being shown to people. The BL has much more to offer. In a perfect world, we could get a Konferenz broadcast, but that was asking for too much
Apparently Sportsnet is going to show all Bundesliga matches in Canada! I'm glad because I cant wait for it to start again. Marcel de Jong played for Augsburg until the beginning of this year and somehow I got hooked on Bundesliga. Check out this trailer:
Big news in an indirect way, NBC is retaining the EPL rights through the 2021-22 season. Had Fox won back the rights who knows what would have happened to the Bundesliga coverage. Wishfully thinking, maybe Fox puts more into the Bundesliga knowing now that it won't get the EPL back for a long time. It will be interesting to see the level/quality of coverage this weekend.