People commenting on that survey fail to understand that MLS produces and directs the games not Apple.
Reading the comments I believe the one comment that everyone seems to agree with is that live scores shouldn't be the default but just the opposite of turning them on it you choose to see them.
I couldn't agree more! I really don't know what they were thinking with those scores. Who actually likes them there? Does anyone pick games with good scores to watch or something?
It finally did for me too. They fixed webserver I guess. So I did the entire survey. I did not see an opportunity to give the main feedback I would've liked about how they could improve their pre/during/post-match coverage of my team, so that it could maybe begin to approach what I've had for many years on linear TV. Was there a general comments question I missed?? And I saw no question about scores. I'd have loved to give feedback about anti-spoilers as well!
After submitting the survey it reverted back to the article and every article on the Athletic has a comment section at the end.
That number for MLS is conservative another source estimated this years sponsorship revenues for teams and league at $812.7m.
I think overall the #MLSSeasonPass product is very good but there are still way too many commentators just collecting paychecks and getting basic stuff wrong.— Jeremiah Oshan (@JeremiahOshan) September 21, 2023
Front Office Sports reported that the million mark was hit before Messi arrived. Antenna’s data says that in the US alone excluding a few spikes MLSSP was adding 5-6,000 a day before Messi arrived. There were a 171 days prior to Messi’s arrival. That means 855k to 1m US subscriptions prior to Messi’s arrival. But after Messi’s arrival to the beginning of September Jorge Mas reported that subscriptions doubled since Messi’s arrival. This was corroborated by Antenna’s data. That means 1.7m-2m subscribers in the US alone. Given Argentina’s interest in MLS since Messi arrived and the fact MLSSP has subscribers in 100 countries, there are easily 3m global subscribers now. To emphasize this point: MLSSP was already a 1st year success before Messi came ALL advertising slots were sold out early in the season. Even World Soccer Talk had to begrudgingly acknowledge that MLSSP is a success even as they tried to ridiculously qualify it.
One thing that I should add, unlike every other media MLS had, Apple has really pushed and promoted MLS. Just what MLS have said for nearly thirty years: MLS would grow significantly if MLS’ media partners would promote the product. Apple has, and they are getting fantastic results.
I'm guessing Oshan is reacting to last night's Colorado-Seattle match, which once again had announcers who couldn't tell players apart multiple times. (Harris and Navarro were mixed up) Again, I think the best commentators, who generally do a good job, get put on the bigger games. That's understandable. But the lesser teams are lesser for a reason and when you hear them make mistakes game after game you have to wonder how they got a job and, say, Richard Fleming didn't.
You'd think that this evolves both to have announcers that are just better than what there currently is, and also regresses back to having specific announcers for individual teams. I've no idea how Apple goes about assigning announcers but I can only assume that quality improves with familiarity. The only Chicago games I've watched in English after the first couple of weeks have been the ones with Tyler Terens on the call, because he was the play-by-play guy here for a bit before the Apple deal was signed. Otherwise, I'll go to the Spanish feed, which is usually better anyway but at least with Terens there's some familiarity with one of the sides on the field, which helps limits embarrassing mistakes like mixing up players.
Really good article about how MLS and Apple came about and an interesting quote from Eddie Cue how people are watching longer and that's good. https://www.gq.com/story/apple-sports-streaming-mls-eddy-cue
This is impressive. Before Messi MLSSP was averaging the same or better viewership as their TV. But instead of 105 games it’s 493 of them. And now with Messi? “‘So far, things are going well enough. ‘We've been right at the TV numbers or slightly above, so we're pretty happy about that,’Cue told me in July, just before Messi’s debut. ‘People are tuning in and watching way longer than they were on TV. We still have huge opportunities to grow.’”
That's unlikely to happen. The costs alone would make it a non-starter. There are usually 14 games a week (soon 15 when San Diego enters the league). It's doubtful that MLS will hire 29 (30) different announcing teams for English language broadcasts. :Let alone then pay to have all of them flown into each teams games to be onsite. Agree. It's almost as if MLS itself wasn't watching any of its' local coverage from the past.... nearly 30 years. They didn't bring on a lot of the better announcers that were already doing games in the league. Now, none of us know if those not chosen were offered roles or not. Some may have turned down offers due to travel, etc. We simply don't know. At the end of the day, this is one aspect that has huge room for improvement. It's nearly October, and we still have key players and players to watch being picked who aren't even in the matchday lineups during pre and in game segments. Maybe the league should recruit the local reporters who cover the teams to write up the talkling points for the matchups every week? Or, have a round table discussion/preview show one to two times a week that goes around the league and has the local beat reporters/writers contributing?
Think about this. Last year MLS averaged about 320k per game last year over 105 games. That equates to 33.6m gross audience. But if you are matching that then MLSSP was on a pace to get about 160m gross viewers. As impressive as that would be, that estimate is before Messi showed up on the scene. Those viewership numbers have soared, and even better MLSSP viewers are staying tuned in longer on MLSSP than on TV. This is advertising gold. Because of Messi, MLSSP may have a gross audience above 230m by years end. That’s fantastic!
It’s probably been mentioned, but the impact is big enough that Tim Cook talked about MLS Season Pass on the latest earnings call.
And promoted it at this last Apple event. Unlike every other media partner MLS has Apple really seems to care and wants it to succeed. Public but cryptic comments have been made by the likes of Taylor Twellman, even before Messi that Apple was bringing MLS to new audiences. He said that at El Trafico at the Rose Bowl. Read between the lines: Twellman was talking about international audiences. ‘Thus, even before Messi, MLS had a significant international presence. Afterwords, MLSSP’s subscription base doubled and Jorge Mas said that 50% of MLSSP viewers were using the Spanish language feeds. He then reaffirmed that MLSSP was a true global product. ‘Make no mistake about it. This is a successful venture and poised to only get bigger.