Midweek Fixture: If the Sky falls, what sports go with them?

Name: Focus: Is Sky an endangered species?
Uploaded: 2017-09-04T17:33:19+12:00
Description: With dominant internet giants encroaching on existing TV networks, are players like Sky in danger of dying out?

By Dylan Cleaver

Sports Editor at Large·NZ Herald·

6 Sep, 2017 02:44 AM6 mins to read

With dominant internet giants encroaching on existing TV networks, are players like Sky in danger of dying out?

As a bidding war looms for the only jewel in New Zealand's sport broadcasting crown - rugby - it is worth looking beyond the oval ball and into a crystal one to determine what it might mean for sport here.

If global online retail giant Amazon, or another cash-rich party such as Spark, does challenge Sky's monopoly on rugby it will become a spectator sport in itself. Those watching from the edge of their seats should be every other national sporting organisation (NSO) in the country.

One analyst spoken to by the Weekend Herald described the contest for rugby rights as nothing less than existential for Sky. Premium sports was the one trick Sky had that cheaper, more user-friendly streaming services such as Netflix and Lightbox didn't and rugby was by far the "stickiest" content within that.

So it's a big deal. Sky have for years been unchallenged mainly for the fact they were the only company with outside broadcast capability and they screen rugby particularly well (compare and contrast Sky's production to the first Bledisloe Cup test in Sydney and, even more laughably, the two tests in Chicago). If one of the world's richest companies was given time - and it appears they are being given time - there is no reason it can't purchase the equipment and hire the expertise.

But forget the logistics and how a deal might look and focus on the one thing nobody is talking about - all the other sports apart from rugby.

One high-profile sports administrator who spoke on the condition of anonymity said: "If Sky starts going south quickly you can forget about 1st XV rugby being broadcast, you can forget about domestic cricket, you can forget about hockey, you can forget about the NPC. All the small sports, forget about them."

The big sports won't be immune to significant downstream effects.

Take cricket. By our standards New Zealand Cricket is a robust organisation who use a broker, Pitch International, to sell broadcasting rights but even they would feel the reverberations of Sky exiting the market.

The telecast has become part of the rules of international cricket. It is an embedded part of the game. You need a minimum number of cameras and the right technology to service the Decision Review System.

It is not just a matter of having some dudes and dudesses in a Moon TV truck turn up and film the game.

Cricket is big enough to cope with the disruption of Sky leaving the market, you'd imagine, but what about all the other sports - swimming, kayaking, rowing and triathlon to name a few - who have come to rely on Sky for coverage between Olympic cycles?

Sky's commitment to these sports is often painted as benevolent but the sports are essentially giving them content "churn" for free. Still, they're expected to feel grateful.

In an email to NSOs prior to last year's Olympic Games, New Zealand Olympic Committee secretary-general Kereyn Smith included the following paragraph in a long note explaining why Sky were right and NZME* and Fairfax (Stuff) were wrong in a dispute that saw the latter two organisations hand back their accreditations.

"Many of your coaches and athletes will have received Olympic Solidarity scholarships over the years, as well as well as subsidies via the NZOC to attend the Olympic Games," Smith wrote. "Some 95% of all broadcast revenue from the IOC is returned to sports and athletes via Olympic Solidarity globally."

The subtext was clear for all those it was sent to: "Sky, not the digital publishers, are funding you, so sit down and be quiet."

In a Sky doomsday scenario all this changes. Sure, somebody will pick up the rights to the Olympics, but will anybody make a commitment to producing NSO pinnacle events, or screening world cups and world championships for what is, essentially, niche sports?

The sports themselves might stream on their websites, but that severely reduces their ability to be seen by new audiences.

In the past I have been accused of being a Sky apologist so let me qualify the above by saying that the broadcaster has made obvious strategic errors** that have placed them in this predicament. They deserve opprobrium for the unstable roll-out of SkyGo and Fan Pass has clearly been a PR nightmare.

You have every right to look at your monthly Sky bill and compare it to Netflix and go, "WTF?"

To save time, Herald TV critic Karl Puschmann sums up many of the frustrations in this piece.

When companies go from nothing to something big very quickly, there is also an inevitable amount of schadenfreude when they start struggling. I understand this.

It's your right to stand by and dance while Amazon starts digging Sky's grave, if that is what is about to happen, but just remember: this story has the potential to be about much, much more than how and where you will watch the national game.

* NZME owns the NZ Herald and nzherald.co.nz and several reporters here were directly affected by the dispute.

** This may sound self-serving, but one of Sky's biggest mistakes was not investing in sports journalism and a sports site. With their rights and access, Sky had the opportunity to completely "own" the NZ sports media and make themselves relevant Monday-Thursday as well as the weekends. I've never heard a convincing argument as to why they chose not to. To use a poker analogy, while non-rights holders were trying to make a hand holding 10-8 off-suited, Sky folded pocket aces before the flop.

If you want the perfect symbol of this "lost" Warriors season it came well before kickoff with news that "star" halves Kieran Foran and Shaun Johnson wouldn't suit up for their finale against the Tigers.

In the annals of disastrous league acquisitions, Foran to the Warriors would have to rank up there. The optics of the signing were never great and the move back to Sydney was predictable enough, but the absolute lack of production exceeded even the worst nightmares.

Happened to chance upon the final 10 minutes of the Fox Memorial final on Saturday, the culmination of the Auckland league season. There were appalling scenes with players from Glenora Bears and Pt Chev Pirates clearly having little on their minds except malice.

Having not seen the previous 70 minutes it is difficult to accurately apportion blame but it appeared Pt Chev were taking a serious beating on the scoreboard and tried to even things up on the macho stakes.

It was one of the worst advertisements for the code you can imagine and with the Warriors' woes unabating, it only added to the sense that the 13-man game is in a low place in this city at the moment.