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The Sports Net That Fox Built

On a hot, sunny, September afternoon in L.A., tucked away in a warehouse-size studio on the second floor of Fox Sports Networks headquarters, it was business as usual on the set of Best Damn Sports Show Period. Hosts Chris Rose and John Salley joked with guest host Steve Harvey in between segments of the grueling two-and-a-half-hour taping, as the director buzzed around giving orders. A gaggle of baby-faced Marine recruits from Camp Pendleton sat on bleachers in the studio audience, the perfect foil as Miss USA and Miss Teen USA tripped into the studio, all giggles and smiles. In a nod to the fact that this is, after all, a show about sports, Salley kicked off questions to the young lovelies by asking them how much trash-talking really goes on backstage at those beauty pageants.

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Welcome to the world of sports entertainment, courtesy of Fox. In its two years on the air, in fact, Best Damn has grown to be Fox Sports Net's most recognizable national program as well as an incubator for ideas that can grow into shows in their own right.

"This show can be anything it wants every single day," says George Greenberg, the former executive producer of the show who in May was elevated to EVP of programming and production at Fox Sports Net. "That show is the most different thing out there."

In a way, Best Damn is a lot like FSN itself; both are still seeking their niche. The two-hour prime-time show will likely convert to a 90-minute format early next year. FSN, likewise, has experienced growing pains. With its seventh anniversary approaching this weekend, FSN's professional and college teams generate blockbuster local ratings. But the network has seen its share of hits and misses as it's tried to establish solid blocks of network-type programming - shows that advertisers and viewers would respond to - around its core of local games.

These days, the 20 Fox Sports Net regional networks reach over 82 million homes, own the local cable rights to 67 of the 80 MLB, NBA and NHL teams and command a license fee that's healthy enough to be placed alongside ESPN's as among the highest in the cable industry. It wasn't always so, although even in the mid-1990s some folks saw the potential. "I think everybody...knew they had something special," says FSN president Bob Thompson, who also oversees Fox Sports International. "In order for it to fulfill its true potential there had to be a joining of what was a loose affiliation of regional networks - as someone once called it, 'a ragtag group of misfits.' If you could somehow formalize that structure and create a true network affiliate group there was significant potential."

That sentiment was echoed in lengthy interviews with several of the network's senior executives. Virtually every facet of the regional networks' infrastructure, from production to advertising to affiliate relations, had to be revamped, polished, rebranded and brought up to true network and broadcast standards. While the bulk of that work is long done, running a network that is actually 20 different feeds, as opposed to one or possibly two, presents its own challenges.

Moreover, FSN, caught between distributors who are crying foul over high programming costs and a growing number of teams that either want to form their own networks or want more in the way of rights fees, is feeling pressure from all sides.

Cutting distribution deals with cable and satellite operators has always been complicated, says Lindsay Gardner, EVP of affiliate sales and marketing for the nets. But these days, consolidation among distributors, not to mention a growing number of sports networks, makes negotiations a little more arduous.

"There are very few deals that are simply sports deals," says Thompson. "We call them 'octopus' deals. We have a plethora of other channels we can use to close the gap between what the network asks for and what a distributor is willing to pay. The flip side is, cable operators and distributors, many of them own channels and they want things from us, whether it's Time Warner asking BSkyB in the U.K. or Star in Asia to clear CNN International, or HBO wanting to buy Twentieth Century Fox movie titles."

As for the teams that are exploring their own networks, FSN has proved its relevance with the number of renewal and new deals it has signed in the last year. And while Fox Sports Net has some vulnerability in a market such as Chicago, where the Cubs, White Sox, Blackhawks and Bulls informed FSN they would not renew their contracts next year, that situation is unusual. In most markets FSN is protected due to the staggered timing of its rights deals.

"By and large I think most teams think we are paying them a fair amount," Thompson says. "Most teams want to stick to what they know best, which is running their teams as opposed to running a network."

Adds COO Randy Freer, who notes that rights fees are stabilizing for certain sports, "We are willing and ready to pay reasonable rights fees. All we're looking for is long-term expense predictability."

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The Sports Net That Fox Built

Cable World, Oct 27, 2003

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