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The Wings win over Edmonton was unreal. Still going over some of the saves as Detroit was outshot more than 2 to 1.
If you missed the info on Bally sports take a quick look. Interesting goings on.
My hockey buddy and I have been doing the back and forth on what to do if Bally sinks. His take (and usually a really good one) was to shift everything to ESPN while you gather yourself. The problem is, Disney lost money. A lot of money. 3.5 billion in streaming, more than 100 billion overall. The investor calls are starting to leak out. I’ve already written this, but Disney is now a 3 part conglomerate: Parks, Entertainment, and ESPN. Ignore the “this way we can be more efficient in running our brands” bit. This is to see where money is being lost the quickest.
Indiana Jones 5 screenings have been a disaster. John Williams (Star Wars theme, Indiana Jones music) let it slip at a concert in Italy that they were shooting a new ending and he had to compose new music. Ant Man and the Wasp now needs to net over 800 million to break even because of reshoots and holdups. Disney may try and sell Marvel and even Star Wars because both were leaking money. ESPN is believed to be in the same boat. Games that are on ESPN+ only are not being as well received as hoped.
For now, my friend may have the band aid. Get with ESPN and make a deal that subs it into the Bally subscriptions. But what then? If Disney sells off companies, the new owners are going to look at the low performers and Hockey is down over 100k views per game (around 330k compared to 450K last year).
The thought of Illitch and the teams building their own network is a tough one. Amazon set the bar high by paying 1 billion per year for 16 Thursday night NFL games. That’s just the broadcasting rights. Not salaries or equipment etc. so, I’ve gotten creative with some ideas.
First - you need an experienced broadcast group. That control room is chaos (or van). Many may hate this idea, but just across the bridge is a team that does a really nice job broadcasting in 4K and HD etc. Maple Leaf Sports. In fact, they have experimented with so many ideas (the zip line camera, etc) that there’s good creativity. A partnership there could make sense.
Second - let fans buy stock or bonds in the team itself. There are some pitfalls there, but die hard fans “owning” a small part of the team (B shares only, non voting) would be very cool. Detroit Police and Fire are about to lose their money invested in WWE (used to be WWF) and could instead invest in a local entity.
Third - partner more with the local broadcasting colleges. Sports broadcasting/journalism could provide students with a much more hands on learning experience. Yes, there would be a lot of turn over because that’s college.
“The Rock” (Dwayne Johnson) bought the XFL. There are still celebrities who hang around. Jack White (white stripes, etc) has a business making vinyl records in Detroit. Kid Rock (yes I know many people don’t like him) has multiple ventures. Jeff Daniels is a big Wings fan. There are celebrities who may be interested in being part of a new Detroit Sports entity.
Lastly, monetize in new and creative ways. George Lucas got actors to sign away their own likeness in the 70s (the ones who didn’t read the whole contract). So Princess Leia lost out on all her merchandising. That was a nasty bit. The new version of this is much more important. Disney is one of the first to do this, but you can see even on instagram that you can put someone else’s face on a body in real time. They’re experimenting with AI written scripts using the likeness of actors that they own. You could create content (with the athlete’s permission) that they don’t have to be present for.
There is a lot that can be done, but a lot of companies that are cutting budgets. As long as the Illitch family maintains the controlling votes on their team (A stock) they can do a lot to bring in other revenues. Let me know your thoughts. I wouldn’t mind a partnership with Toronto. Even the parent company of the Rangers has several teams they broadcast for. Just don’t do a Ted Turner. When Time/Warner/AOL merged, he found out that he’d given up the controlling vote. Not good. That’s when WCW closed its doors because he was the only who like wrestling at the time.
Let me know your thoughts. Temporary or long term. There are answers and options, what is the best fit?
Detroit Red Wings Blogger • 
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