How would you compete against sportscenter?

[OpenWheel]

Well, I guess I disagree. The posts talking about ideas for Sportscenter may be some of the keys to a new network succeeding.

I've never been a big hockey fan. But I like it some. And ESPN's segments with Barry Melrose on hockey is one fo the parts of ESPN that I DO like a lot. Not tons of funny quips just interesting plays and good analysis. Sort of like Peter Gammons and some of their baseball stuff.

I hated Steven A. Smith but he does get some interesting guests.

I don't think a new network could compete unless they did it on the cheap. Which fits some of the requests here because intead of paying hundreds of millions for the rights to events you would instead just need lots of talking heads and expert analysis.

Oh, and cover hockey before soccer.

I don't watch Sportscenter much anymore becuase of t aht incredibly irritating manner of covering one highlight from a sport and then a different sport, instead of lumping all the coverage of a sport into one segment.

[Jack of Arcades]

if you want to overthrow sportscenter you're gonna have to pretty much overthrow espn. people watch sportscenter because they watch espn. they get a lot of their audience from people who were watching espn already.

if you want to compete and establish yourself as a solid sports show and eventually grow, you're gonna have to be unique but accessible. yeah, your ratings will suck at first, but as you settle into your niche your fan base will grow through word of mouth.

[sam h]

I like the idea of going after the hardcore fan segment with more nuts and bolts analysis and less extraneous BS.

Here's the show that could put you on the map: A very well done, somewhat humorous, bi or tri-weekly show that focused on sports gambling with a couple good anchors. There's nothing like it right now to my knowledge, the sports betting market is huge, the number of people who don't bet sports but think sports betting is cool and would be attracted to certain special segments is even larger, and you would get so much publicity in the first couple weeks because of the bs "outrage" (which would eventually die down) that you would be on the map instantaneously.

[Dane S]

How about an HBO all sports channel? They already have some great, smart analysts in Costas, Gumbel, etc. and tons of money to spend hiring more and purchasing rights to games/events. Their no frills approach and the lack of advertising would carry great appeal for hardcore fans and sports intellectuals who feel abandoned by ESPN. This is also the type of audience who won't be deterred by subscription costs. A strong daily headlines show a la SportsCenter would of course be at the heart of such an undertaking.

Now that I think about this I'm really suprised HBO hasn't gone for it yet. Perhaps it's already in the works? They have certainly shown plenty of willingness to expand their channel lineup in the past when they sense a demand exists.

Thoughts?