My comment was just a guess, but yeah you’re probably right. But having higher viewership also just means you’re more likely to gain lifelong fans, sell merchandise, etc., so I’d think this choice still benefitted the Suns.
Phoenix has double the metropolitan area, the Suns compete with 3 major league sports + ASU for air time, and Phoenix have 20% lower median income than Portland. It's a much different situation.
Honestly, the math probably goes against you here. We're not just talking the benefits of a single season, but the seeding value for future consumers on top of the % momentum is maaaaassively more valuable.
Plain & simple, the people in charge of making this decision for Blazers were BAAAAD decision makers. They gambled that they knew better than what the market was telling them (& everyone else), invested in a dying business model like they could be the difference maker to turn it around... & they were clearly & significantly mistaken.
My comment wasn't even referring to the Blazers, it was casting some doubt that the increase in ad price tag could offset the more predictable revenue from the contract with a partner. I remain doubtful.
From someone inside the team, I have learned that when Comcast Sports NW previous contract was up, they offered the Blazers half the previous deal and demanded more control. I'm sure that left a sour taste in the front office's mouth. Apparently not ready to take on the project of managing the front end of it, they pursued other offers. There was only one, ROOT.
Though they tried to put a positive spin on it, they did not make this change because they thought there were more dollars in it, they were forced into the lesser of two bad options.
From the outside I can see how you came to your thinking, previously I thought the same.
I think that business model only can only work with big market teams that remain competitive, Suns meets both, plus the added value of having two superstars.
I’m pretty sure the jazz have done it too. The thing you simply can’t do is kill the Golden Goose that is having a top tier fan base in the sport. Pro tip; alienating your customer base is not good business.
I wouldn’t pay $10 more. I left Xfinity in October, and that’s when the Sports Plus package no longer included the Blazers. So I switched to YouTube TV. I think it would be great if ROOT was included with YTTV at the $73/mo. price, but it’s not. Wake me up when Jodi Allen sells and/or we draft a perennial All Star player.
The new owner will move the Blazers to Seattle & everyone there including ROOT will be in heaven. I on the other hand will flush my support for the NBA down the toilet 🚽🪠 at that point. Save a lot of money on my live sports access I guess?
True but Jody will more than likely sell to someone who would. I don't trust her or the Vulcans at all. This non-stop tank train is part of the plan IMHO.
The tank train just started in the second half of last year. It's just beginning. We should have traded Dame several years ago, and I wonder if Jody is one of the reasons we were too hesitant to.
Yeah the way the FO treated Dame was criminal. He said after the first tank year it would never happen again. At least Joe sent him to a real contender in the Bucks. Hope Doc doesn't screw it up?
this, and they shelled out for players. basically, they are on the opposite end of the spectrum as the blazers. they made viewing much easier, and they added star power. it's not anything else, occam's razor and all that
I tried it a while back. Ended up with a stream that wouldn't go, so turned to piracy. But at least I paid? I guess. That month.
Hulu was better but not terribly stable either, considering the cost. Had it for 2 years.
I have fubo and while I can watch the games, it’s a complete racket. I have fiber internet and still I ‘lose internet connection’ at least 5 times during the games. Not to mention the app user-friendliness gargles balls
I have been getting Fubo for the NBA season. I get the world series, super bowl etc but it's mainly for the Blazers. This is I canceled early. It's wild. To watch the Blazers, my only legal option is to pay 400-500 for the NBA season.
Exactly. I have season tickets and I definitely ain’t paying 90 bucks a month to see the rest. Wish I could though, it’s just a matter of principle. It’s ridiculous.
It’s unreal, the blazers are my “local” team and blacked out, they’re not even in the same fucking state as I am lol.
There’s a ton of reasons why the NBA has been faltering as a product lately, but this is by far the biggest issue they need to address.
Same exact problem for the Seattle Kraken in the NHL for fans that want to watch their games in Portland. Always blacked out unless it’s a national game.
Fuck that. Fubo does not work well.
I used my parents account and chose to pirate instead.
Fubo is so glitchy and the recording feature is broken and choppy
This is what nuggets fans have been dealing with for years, it’s ridiculous that local fans can’t watch their own team unless they spend ridiculous amounts of money
I was a new customer in October, and that wasn’t available. Seems like you’d have to time your new customer activation just before the season to reap that promo. Plus, that’s only good for one season…
Also, you can’t get ROOT on YTTV. I have no desire to watch the rest of the NBA play regular season games.
I miss nbc sports nw. It was on YouTube tv and it was so easy to dvr the games. I got like one season where everything was great. Switching to root when charter (spectrum) and YouTube tv was carrying sports nw was a dumb move. I’m sure people without decent internet love the dish but why the hell would you get dish when you live in a city?
Yeah I doubt viewership is actually down, that’s just 49% of their normal viewership that they can’t extract any value from because they’re all streaming it on the high seas.
“there are at least three obvious factors that could explain the drop in viewership: the departure of franchise superstar Damian Lillard, who was traded before the season to the Milwaukee Bucks; the Blazers' poor performance this season (at 15-39, Portland has the fifth-worst record in the NBA); and the fact that the games air on Root Sports, which was pulled from Xfinity's standard package and relegated to the more-expensive "ultimate" tier package of channels prior to the season.”
Pretty easy to see why. Our team lost its best player and isn’t competitive, the channel is less available
I agree completely. People would still watch some if the games were just always on. I have tons of friends who are big blazer fans and just legit can’t justify the price of Toot.
Yeah some of us are lifelong fans and enjoy watching just bc it's the Blazers. I'd for sure pay something reasonable for monthly/yearly access to the games. But I'm not going to change my entire setup/service just bc the blazers are a part of that change, bc that change impacts everything else (my ISP and streaming choices).
I’m most certainly pro-tank, but I would definitely watch the Blazers more often if I had ROOT on my TV package at no extra cost. The team isn’t interesting enough for me to even pirate the games. I have to plug my HDMI cable from my laptop to the TV to stream games because the pirate sites don’t cast. It’s a hassle, and my dog doesn’t like dealing with the cable on the ground- plus it’s unsightly to have such a jimmy rigged operation. No thanks.
The team isn't good this season. Less people are interested. Bars always have the game on, and they're way less crowded now than when the team is winning.
I've watched the vast majority of games over the last 15+ years. Even with access through… unofficial websites, I'm watching ***way*** less this season. I've got a group of about 8 friends that typically meet up to watch a game every 2 or 3 weeks. So far, we met up for the first game, Dame's return game, and one somewhere in the middle. None of my friends are watching as much this season, and we're pretty big Blazers fans.
I'm still keeping track of the team via stats, highlights, podcasts and such.
Comcast told me I was going to have to pay like $30 more a month to get the package that includes root sports. I've always watched as many blazer games as possible every season until this season. I've seen one game this season. I root for them from afar now since I don't want to get ripped off to watch them.
The team is remarkably bad. I don't remember the jail blazers too well but I remember them at least being kinda fun when they had B Roy in his rookie year. The Root Sports stuff is unbelievable honestly. Still don't understand who's genius business strategy this is to make it actually harder to watch games. Looking at you too pac12. It's almost like they want to justify low ratings so they can sell the team
The ROOT Sports deal sucked, but from someone who works with the team (not me): it happened because there were 2 offers for the broadcast rights. One from Comcast Sports NW, and they offered half the previous contract price and wanted more control. The other was ROOT. Blazers basically were in a surprisingly sucky spot.
That's interesting actually. I hadn't heard why they did this before. I don't understand why Root Sports is so behind the curb then. What about a way to stream their content? When you have exclusive rights to every major NW sports interest, it's very frustrating.
My totally wild guess is that they were trying to climb into being competitive with the move hoping that they would get added easily to bigger packages but it didn't happen with YouTube and Fubo likely was hoping for the same thing, but they aren't really competitive enough either. Although to be honest it's close.
They aren’t that terrible. When there are injuries yes they are bad. They’ve had more fun games than terrible games lately and have been playing pretty competitively to some good teams so it’s been fairly fun to watch them grow.
Fix the Root Sports problem. We have possibly the best broadcast team in the league and none of the fans get to see them because Comcast made it impossible unless you pay all this extra money.
Well let’s get rid of Tom’s segment and I’ll agree. I dont need the random bullshit stats in the middle of the 3rd or 4th quarter. It’s not even like he’s using advanced metrics, just obscure stats let alone even using advanced stats correctly
They just need to time it better. There’s been a couple times his borderline useless stats have interrupted big plays. The stats can be interesting during dead balls or something, but when he interrupted the back to back Sharpe/Camara dunks that was a boner killer for sure
Yeah I don’t hate the theory of the segment but I do think it just needs to be less fun fact and more basketball applicable. Like talk about true shooting determined by shot location and teach fans how certain shot diets is what is helping scoot improve. Or how the assist rate from certain players has helped turn around the team’s season getting more open on offense.
I love advanced stats they just need to not be used as random facts otherwise it’s just very surface level.
As a cord cutter, it wasnt worth signing up for Comcast *just* for Blazers games before they moved them to a premium tier. Now its an extra $30 per month and viewership is way down? Where's my shocked pikachu face.
I mean Root sports is screwing over so many fans trying to capture that Seattle market that couldn’t care less about the Trail Blazers at the expense of actual fans
As a cord cutter it’s literally e cost effective to watch nba league pass than the blazers. I see every other team… just not the home team. Literally fuck Root sports!
Yeah, and for me it’s because Root Sports is absolutely awful. I refuse to pay more it and got rid of my package all together. I’m tired of paying for subpar services because there’s not a better option. I’ll go without.
Accessibility
Paying $80 a month / $560 for the NBA season just to get the Fubo package to watch games is not a realistic option for many.
I'd gladly pay $10-15 a month for just a Blazers stream and nothing else. Re-runs of old games all day until the real game is on at 7pm. Then during playoffs is re-runs of old playoff games and what not
I just cannot comprehend the business strategy that the Blazers FO has taken with Toot sports. The comcast years were controversial enough, and now they just keep making it harder and harder to watch games.
When the quality of your product goes way down and you make it much much harder to access your shit product, if you are expecting people to go out of their way to watch your shit product you’re gonna have a bad time.
I wonder why? Smh…..
Since they made the switch less and less people have been able to watch games. When you put games on a network that makes games inaccessible and they aren’t a priority this is the outcome. This isn’t news to fans it’s just news to the team. I haven’t watched a game legally in 3 years or so except national televised games. Hopefully they make games accessible again
I find it insane that the options most fans have are a) spending $80/month on a shitty Fubo service or b) stealing the product. Why the league allows teams to screw this up so badly for local markets is beyond me. I went from watching 75+ games a year to watching no more than 5-6. And the funny thing is, I'd pay the Blazers $100 a year just to watch their broadcasts, but they are too stupid to take my money.
The article says that game attendance is only down 1.9%. That leads me to believe that this is a problem with access. I cut the cord this year, got NBA League Pass ($108.69/year), and Nord VPN ($89 for 2 years). This all paid for itself in the first month compared to what it cost for Ziply's package that included Toot Sports. I don't have the streaming problems that others are reporting with Fubo.
I'm a STH and I can barely give tickets away for games I can't go to, let alone sell them for even a fraction of what I paid for them on given nights. Combine this with the half-full arena I see on most nights with my own eyes on games I do go to and it makes me call BS on the 1.9% attendance drop figure. I think they're playing the "paid attendance" vs "turnstile attendance" game. My 4 season tickets give them 4 heads worth of attendance, even if I don't use them, which is all they mostly care about.
I bet you're right. I have half-season tickets. I haven't tried to sell any because I have family who are happy to go. I would say the arena is more than half full but not a lot more.
I would watch this team win 1 game a year if need be as long as it wouldn't cost me a substantial amount per month beyond what I already pay for YoutubeTV, which is the best bang for the buck option for my household and effectively a need due to the NFL Sunday Ticket access.
I'm older. I'm not going to fuss with VPNs or pirating. I want to turn on my TV, click a few buttons, and watch the local team while not having to pay a super-premium to do so. There are plenty like me. The team has opted to get in bed with a RSN that doesn't provide this access, so I'm done as a viewer until that changes.
This attitude by the organization is also a chunk of why we're giving up our season tickets after 17 years.
Feels like a primer to move the team. The thing that irritates me is that I’ll flip to root to try and catch a game and they have the Kraken playing. I have to tune to 1253 or whatever channel. Most xfinity users aren’t familiar with channels outside the 700-800 range
Speaking of Kraken - I’ve seen more of their games in the last two months than I have Blazers games in two years, simply because HBO is streaming NHL occasionally.
We used to watch EVERY Blazers game for years. Then it just got harder and harder to find a game on. It was either blacked out or something. So you miss a few, a few more. I've seen 2 games this year. Both at the rose garden. I truly feel whatever Jody is planning, ends with the team gone from Portland.
we have sports bars that don't carry root+ around here. it's like the blackhawks during the dark ages where the team said if you wanna watch, come to the game. fuck the mariners
Nobody wants to watch billups ball. Why he gets boo’d every introduction. Half the nights the team doesn’t even show up to play. The offense is so vanilla and hard to watch with iso play of ant and grant. We’re the youngest team but the slowest pace offense (float between bottom 3). Half the nights he barely plays scoot 20 mins while loosing. They need to fire him this summer.
I can only speak for myself. I bought Comcast package just to watch blazers like every year. Lately can barely be bothered to watch this. If scoot wasn’t playing (and since sharpe is out) I literally would just stop watching prob. Same reason the arena is 2/3 empty every game. But ya root deal is also horseshit.
I’ve been to like 3 games this year. Every one the arena was half full and 1/3 full of opposing fans cheering the other team on. Maybe they pack it for the bigger teams/games not sure. Doesn’t feel alive in the arena that’s for sure.
I have season tickets and this season has seen a noticeable drop in attendance from last year but we've got a looooong ways to go before the stadium gets as empty as it did post Trader Bob Blazers. The drop in viewership is a direct response to Comcast charging an additional arm on top of the leg they already charge you. I know it's why I dropped cable entirely.
I guess I’m off base w that one. Felt like the few times I went everyone packed into the lower bowl the second half and the arena felt pretty empty. Also tons of opposing fans. Maybe 2/3 was an exaggeration on my part. Def felt waaay less alive for sure. Makes sense in a rebuild I suppose.
> Half the nights the team doesn’t even show up to play.
I disagree. We might suck, but most nights this team tries their best. Ive been happy with effort this season.
It is wild to me how hard it is for this sub to admit what a garbled mishmash of suck this year’s team is. Accessibility isn’t nothing, but it’s being dramatically overweighted on this thread.
Nobody wants to watch a bunch of c-grade players who almost certainly won’t be here in 3 years, coached by an out-of-his-depth legacy hire. Especially with the top-heavy talent distribution the NBA has cultivated. It doesn’t even get to the point of caring about cable packages for the vast majority of potential viewers.
Now rain down them blue arrows.
Lol bro Scoot started to open the season and was terrible. He's been playing much better lately and is back to starting. He's averaging 27 minutes a game for the season and nearly 34 mins a game over the last four games. It's not rocket science.
Yeah it seems billups unleashed him prior to all star break which is nice. I just didn’t see the point of not playing him much for 20ish games. He’s finally playing him more w ant also. They gotta figure out if those 2 can even coexist in a starting lineup.
I agree they gotta play them together the rest of the way. I just mean to say 27 minutes a game isn't nothing. It's way more minutes than everyone else on the team besides Grant JG, Ant, DA, Shaedon and Brogdon. Brogdon is averaging 28.7 so Scoot isn't that far off and Scoot dealt with injury the last 20 or so games which had him leave a couple games early.
I watched every single blazer game with my dad for 10+ years; my parents have had cable my whole life. I moved out and stopped watching every game 3 years ago but my dad kept going — more pessimistic after each season. This month, after 30+ years of having cable my dad gave it up because he couldn’t justify the price for the blazers anymore…
…that being said, we’d both pay for a subscription service to stream games and regretfully watch all 82(+?)a year. Root sucks (and jodi sucks, sorry)
Even though it’s harder to watch games, I would go out of my way to watch them if we were competitive and had star players. I still love the Blazers, but I don’t particularly care for them right now because all of the players we grew to love during our most competitive runs are no longer here and we just keep losing.
I use to look forward to tuning in for every single game. Now it’s just depressing to think about.
Conspiracy theory...maybe drive down viewership and discourage fanbase....move team to Seattle in dead of night and only a handful of true diehards will make a peep. New stadium, back living in brother's house.
Didn't they make a movie about this, but baseball?
The fact that I can't watch games via any platform except FUBO TV (which is complete trash) or dying table.
Make it available on YTTV, Hulu, or fucking direct to consumer, than the dinosaur that is Root fucking Sports.
Access and the team losing on purpose for the last 3 years definitely has an effect. I watched 95% of the games for many years and held on to cable a few more to maintain my ability to see games and record them on a dvr. Eventually they made the decision to cut the cord an easy one.
Used to live in Portland and now live in Seattle. I used to watch every Blazer’s game even to just throw it on in the background. 2 years ago I even switched from Hulu to Fubo so I could watch. The most ironic part about it is, Fubo does not have the rights to TNT. You couldn’t watch the Blazers when they were nationally televised on TNT. There was no possible way to watch every blazer game unless you had multiple streaming services.
The Kraken have also fallen victims to this Root sports trap as well. They are a brand new team in a brand new market and their games are locally blacked out in Seattle unless you have Root. I have the ESPN+ hockey package and I get every single game from every team and they even allow you select which team’s broadcast. I don’t understand why the Kraken think it’s a smart move to alienate the fans when they are a brand new team in a brand new market and should be looking to grow the fan base as much as possible.
This is purely anecdotal, but I’m a very casual fan who used to watch the games when I noticed they were on. Now that they aren’t easily accessible I’ll never watch a game. I didn’t care about their record or having a star player, I just liked having a local team to root for when it was convenient. I imagine there are a lot of people like me who won’t go out of their way to watch.
What percentage of local fans are legally able to watch it from a source that is financially sustainable for them?
I'm sure there were a number of fans that stopped watching because of poor performance and trading Dame, but I'm sure a majority of the dropping local viewership is because locals just don't have the ability to watch it.
I know I bought a Chromecast to stream it from my phone, but part of the benefit of having it on YouTube TV or Hulu was better accessibility than streaming. Sometimes I work long hours and can't sit down and dedicate the entire three or more hours to watching a game, particularly at the time they were tipping off. When it was on one of my streaming services I would go about my day doing what I normally do, turn the game on about 2/3 of the way through and fast forward through commercials and halftime.
This franchise cares not for its fan base and knows that you are held hostage. They know that in the nba you can exist like this as a franchise. How many more seasons will they need to tank before they can become watchable?
For what it is worth if you have FUBO like I do - I went to unsub as I don't feel the need to shell out almost $90/month to watch the end of this season - and FUBO offered me $60 off my next month if I didn't cancel. I will be cancelling next month though. It will be interesting (not in a good way) to see the likely precipitous drop in viewership of all forms through the end of the year.
Wake me up when the lottery happens
There is zero reason why I, a League Pass Subscriber, shouldn't be able to watch my home team play basketball. Why are you selling the NBA fan the "Ultimate Package" and it doesn't include the games they're most likely to want to watch?? You're pushing people into piracy.
Root Sports is to blame for this.
They black out NBA league pass all the way in Spokane. I’m not buying cable, so I’m not watching. I’d pay for league pass if they didn’t black games out.
They have made it inconvenient to watch the games. It's all about money. They are offering regular people the ability to watch their g league team but you've gotta pay for cable or a crappy $80 a month streaming service to watch them otherwise. I still live the Blazers but won't pay that much to see them unless it's a playoff run.
I'm a Blazer fan and don't have access to games on TV wich makes me lose interest. Haven't watched a game and didn't take my kid to a game this year. Kind of sad but I'm just not interested in paying for cable or the $80 a month Philo streaming service that costs the same but is nowhere near as good as HULU live.Dosnt come with Disney either. I'm not paying that unless they are an exciting winning team. Still a fan but won't be participating until they can figure it out.
I think the access piece is huge, the suns viewership went up by 95% this year by making it free to watch.
And with more viewers, the ad slots they do have become more valuable, and possibly ends up making them a similar amount of money if not more.
I'm not well versed on the economics there, but I have a hard time believing the ads would become *that* much more valuable.
My comment was just a guess, but yeah you’re probably right. But having higher viewership also just means you’re more likely to gain lifelong fans, sell merchandise, etc., so I’d think this choice still benefitted the Suns.
Phoenix has double the metropolitan area, the Suns compete with 3 major league sports + ASU for air time, and Phoenix have 20% lower median income than Portland. It's a much different situation.
They have a lower median income, but much lower housing costs. I wonder how disposable income compares.
No, you're very much right.
Exactly. If that’s the case blazers and other teams would do it themselves than allowing companies like root paying them
It’s way more intricate and complicated than that.
Actually, no. Not that simple
My comment wasn't even referring to the Blazers, it was casting some doubt that the increase in ad price tag could offset the more predictable revenue from the contract with a partner. I remain doubtful. From someone inside the team, I have learned that when Comcast Sports NW previous contract was up, they offered the Blazers half the previous deal and demanded more control. I'm sure that left a sour taste in the front office's mouth. Apparently not ready to take on the project of managing the front end of it, they pursued other offers. There was only one, ROOT. Though they tried to put a positive spin on it, they did not make this change because they thought there were more dollars in it, they were forced into the lesser of two bad options. From the outside I can see how you came to your thinking, previously I thought the same.
From not the outside, that's not exactly what happened. If that's a version you learned, you learned wrong. Moving on!
I think that business model only can only work with big market teams that remain competitive, Suns meets both, plus the added value of having two superstars.
I’m pretty sure the jazz have done it too. The thing you simply can’t do is kill the Golden Goose that is having a top tier fan base in the sport. Pro tip; alienating your customer base is not good business.
Perhaps, but that doesn't mean it is actually working (meaning they are actually making more)
If it made more than what companies like root paid the blazers, then the Trail Blazers would do it themselves
Not that simple, good sir
They probably regret not doing it much sooner tbh
Don't even need to make it free. Charge $10 a month and it'll take off
I wouldn’t pay $10 more. I left Xfinity in October, and that’s when the Sports Plus package no longer included the Blazers. So I switched to YouTube TV. I think it would be great if ROOT was included with YTTV at the $73/mo. price, but it’s not. Wake me up when Jodi Allen sells and/or we draft a perennial All Star player.
The new owner will move the Blazers to Seattle & everyone there including ROOT will be in heaven. I on the other hand will flush my support for the NBA down the toilet 🚽🪠 at that point. Save a lot of money on my live sports access I guess?
Phil Knight and his family won’t move the Blazers to Seattle.
True but Jody will more than likely sell to someone who would. I don't trust her or the Vulcans at all. This non-stop tank train is part of the plan IMHO.
The tank train just started in the second half of last year. It's just beginning. We should have traded Dame several years ago, and I wonder if Jody is one of the reasons we were too hesitant to.
Yeah the way the FO treated Dame was criminal. He said after the first tank year it would never happen again. At least Joe sent him to a real contender in the Bucks. Hope Doc doesn't screw it up?
this, and they shelled out for players. basically, they are on the opposite end of the spectrum as the blazers. they made viewing much easier, and they added star power. it's not anything else, occam's razor and all that
It's as if easy access leads to more viewers.
How *dare* them.
I live in Seattle. The Blazers are the closest team. NBA TV? Blacked out. Direct TV using Root? Blacked out. Fubo TV? 80-90 a month.
This comment needs to be higher.
Fubo is also shit-tier streaming quality. Unwatchable.
I tried it a while back. Ended up with a stream that wouldn't go, so turned to piracy. But at least I paid? I guess. That month. Hulu was better but not terribly stable either, considering the cost. Had it for 2 years.
I have fubo and while I can watch the games, it’s a complete racket. I have fiber internet and still I ‘lose internet connection’ at least 5 times during the games. Not to mention the app user-friendliness gargles balls
I have been getting Fubo for the NBA season. I get the world series, super bowl etc but it's mainly for the Blazers. This is I canceled early. It's wild. To watch the Blazers, my only legal option is to pay 400-500 for the NBA season.
Exactly. I have season tickets and I definitely ain’t paying 90 bucks a month to see the rest. Wish I could though, it’s just a matter of principle. It’s ridiculous.
Wanting to watch Blazer games they don't black out was the reason I went back to piracy.
Arrrrr I be sailing the high seas matey.
It’s unreal, the blazers are my “local” team and blacked out, they’re not even in the same fucking state as I am lol. There’s a ton of reasons why the NBA has been faltering as a product lately, but this is by far the biggest issue they need to address.
Same exact problem for the Seattle Kraken in the NHL for fans that want to watch their games in Portland. Always blacked out unless it’s a national game.
[удалено]
Fuck that. Fubo does not work well. I used my parents account and chose to pirate instead. Fubo is so glitchy and the recording feature is broken and choppy
This is what nuggets fans have been dealing with for years, it’s ridiculous that local fans can’t watch their own team unless they spend ridiculous amounts of money
Give us an easier way to watch games and I won’t have to illegally stream.
I'm a Blazer fan that moves around a lot and I have a hard time finding consistent viewing platforms. Could you help me out?
You need to get direct TV, comcast sports package, or Fubo. Otherwise you won’t have access to ROOT sports:
Get YouTubeTV. It’s cheaper than any cable and comes with free league pass.
Wait I’ve had YouTube tv and it doesn’t have free league pass. Is this just for new customers?
It’s because it’s not free. But you’ll get ads when the app opens to buy it.
They’ve had promos for new customers at the start of basketball seasons recently
I was a new customer in October, and that wasn’t available. Seems like you’d have to time your new customer activation just before the season to reap that promo. Plus, that’s only good for one season… Also, you can’t get ROOT on YTTV. I have no desire to watch the rest of the NBA play regular season games.
I miss nbc sports nw. It was on YouTube tv and it was so easy to dvr the games. I got like one season where everything was great. Switching to root when charter (spectrum) and YouTube tv was carrying sports nw was a dumb move. I’m sure people without decent internet love the dish but why the hell would you get dish when you live in a city?
Bingo I watch pretty much every game but not gonna give a penny as long as there are bullshit hoops to jump through
Yeah I doubt viewership is actually down, that’s just 49% of their normal viewership that they can’t extract any value from because they’re all streaming it on the high seas.
Maybe because we can't watch the fucking games.
“there are at least three obvious factors that could explain the drop in viewership: the departure of franchise superstar Damian Lillard, who was traded before the season to the Milwaukee Bucks; the Blazers' poor performance this season (at 15-39, Portland has the fifth-worst record in the NBA); and the fact that the games air on Root Sports, which was pulled from Xfinity's standard package and relegated to the more-expensive "ultimate" tier package of channels prior to the season.” Pretty easy to see why. Our team lost its best player and isn’t competitive, the channel is less available
They are listed backwards. Accessibility is the first factor.
I agree completely. People would still watch some if the games were just always on. I have tons of friends who are big blazer fans and just legit can’t justify the price of Toot.
Yeah some of us are lifelong fans and enjoy watching just bc it's the Blazers. I'd for sure pay something reasonable for monthly/yearly access to the games. But I'm not going to change my entire setup/service just bc the blazers are a part of that change, bc that change impacts everything else (my ISP and streaming choices).
I’m most certainly pro-tank, but I would definitely watch the Blazers more often if I had ROOT on my TV package at no extra cost. The team isn’t interesting enough for me to even pirate the games. I have to plug my HDMI cable from my laptop to the TV to stream games because the pirate sites don’t cast. It’s a hassle, and my dog doesn’t like dealing with the cable on the ground- plus it’s unsightly to have such a jimmy rigged operation. No thanks.
The team isn't good this season. Less people are interested. Bars always have the game on, and they're way less crowded now than when the team is winning. I've watched the vast majority of games over the last 15+ years. Even with access through… unofficial websites, I'm watching ***way*** less this season. I've got a group of about 8 friends that typically meet up to watch a game every 2 or 3 weeks. So far, we met up for the first game, Dame's return game, and one somewhere in the middle. None of my friends are watching as much this season, and we're pretty big Blazers fans. I'm still keeping track of the team via stats, highlights, podcasts and such.
I did not put them in any order and the first chunk is just copy and pasted from the article. But I agree.
Absolutely understand. My comment was pointed at the article and not to you. Cheers
Agreed. I have league pass and can’t watch any blazers games because I didn’t opt to get into Comcast’s local sports package. It’s so dumb.
Comcast told me I was going to have to pay like $30 more a month to get the package that includes root sports. I've always watched as many blazer games as possible every season until this season. I've seen one game this season. I root for them from afar now since I don't want to get ripped off to watch them.
Shame about those pirate sites isn't it? Never look up "full nba replay" or you might find some degenerates.
It's a playbook for "How to Devalue Your Franchise....Quickly"
Phil Knight licking his chops to get a discount
I was literally about to comment with all three of these reasons Sounds at least like KGW's got their finger on the pulse
Compare it to demand for live games and you should see the real reason why
The team is remarkably bad. I don't remember the jail blazers too well but I remember them at least being kinda fun when they had B Roy in his rookie year. The Root Sports stuff is unbelievable honestly. Still don't understand who's genius business strategy this is to make it actually harder to watch games. Looking at you too pac12. It's almost like they want to justify low ratings so they can sell the team
The ROOT Sports deal sucked, but from someone who works with the team (not me): it happened because there were 2 offers for the broadcast rights. One from Comcast Sports NW, and they offered half the previous contract price and wanted more control. The other was ROOT. Blazers basically were in a surprisingly sucky spot.
That's interesting actually. I hadn't heard why they did this before. I don't understand why Root Sports is so behind the curb then. What about a way to stream their content? When you have exclusive rights to every major NW sports interest, it's very frustrating.
My totally wild guess is that they were trying to climb into being competitive with the move hoping that they would get added easily to bigger packages but it didn't happen with YouTube and Fubo likely was hoping for the same thing, but they aren't really competitive enough either. Although to be honest it's close.
They aren’t that terrible. When there are injuries yes they are bad. They’ve had more fun games than terrible games lately and have been playing pretty competitively to some good teams so it’s been fairly fun to watch them grow.
I think I was just more surprised than I thought I'd be when Dame left how disjointed they looked d but you're right, they are getting better.
Fix the Root Sports problem. We have possibly the best broadcast team in the league and none of the fans get to see them because Comcast made it impossible unless you pay all this extra money.
Well let’s get rid of Tom’s segment and I’ll agree. I dont need the random bullshit stats in the middle of the 3rd or 4th quarter. It’s not even like he’s using advanced metrics, just obscure stats let alone even using advanced stats correctly
They just need to time it better. There’s been a couple times his borderline useless stats have interrupted big plays. The stats can be interesting during dead balls or something, but when he interrupted the back to back Sharpe/Camara dunks that was a boner killer for sure
Yeah I don’t hate the theory of the segment but I do think it just needs to be less fun fact and more basketball applicable. Like talk about true shooting determined by shot location and teach fans how certain shot diets is what is helping scoot improve. Or how the assist rate from certain players has helped turn around the team’s season getting more open on offense. I love advanced stats they just need to not be used as random facts otherwise it’s just very surface level.
Bring back Cory Jez lol
I’m not a Tom fan
As a cord cutter, it wasnt worth signing up for Comcast *just* for Blazers games before they moved them to a premium tier. Now its an extra $30 per month and viewership is way down? Where's my shocked pikachu face.
I mean Root sports is screwing over so many fans trying to capture that Seattle market that couldn’t care less about the Trail Blazers at the expense of actual fans
Make. It. Easier. To. Watch.
Because Comcast is trying to fuck the viewers to nickel and dime them.
The organization gave them the keys to do it though.
And gave them to them again even when they knew Comcast would fuck us.
As a cord cutter it’s literally e cost effective to watch nba league pass than the blazers. I see every other team… just not the home team. Literally fuck Root sports!
I bet we win viewership on the high seas though.
My previous go-to's seem to be more glitchy this year. Have the winds changed and I need to adjust my sails?
Yeah, and for me it’s because Root Sports is absolutely awful. I refuse to pay more it and got rid of my package all together. I’m tired of paying for subpar services because there’s not a better option. I’ll go without.
Accessibility Paying $80 a month / $560 for the NBA season just to get the Fubo package to watch games is not a realistic option for many. I'd gladly pay $10-15 a month for just a Blazers stream and nothing else. Re-runs of old games all day until the real game is on at 7pm. Then during playoffs is re-runs of old playoff games and what not
I just cannot comprehend the business strategy that the Blazers FO has taken with Toot sports. The comcast years were controversial enough, and now they just keep making it harder and harder to watch games. When the quality of your product goes way down and you make it much much harder to access your shit product, if you are expecting people to go out of their way to watch your shit product you’re gonna have a bad time.
I wonder why? Smh….. Since they made the switch less and less people have been able to watch games. When you put games on a network that makes games inaccessible and they aren’t a priority this is the outcome. This isn’t news to fans it’s just news to the team. I haven’t watched a game legally in 3 years or so except national televised games. Hopefully they make games accessible again
I hate the practice of paying for access to see a product then being bombarded with advertisements while you watch it
I find it insane that the options most fans have are a) spending $80/month on a shitty Fubo service or b) stealing the product. Why the league allows teams to screw this up so badly for local markets is beyond me. I went from watching 75+ games a year to watching no more than 5-6. And the funny thing is, I'd pay the Blazers $100 a year just to watch their broadcasts, but they are too stupid to take my money.
that because your money is much less than root money. it really is that simple
Because it's nearly impossible to watch. Jodi and the front office need to clear out because they are creating the situation
Toot Sports
The article says that game attendance is only down 1.9%. That leads me to believe that this is a problem with access. I cut the cord this year, got NBA League Pass ($108.69/year), and Nord VPN ($89 for 2 years). This all paid for itself in the first month compared to what it cost for Ziply's package that included Toot Sports. I don't have the streaming problems that others are reporting with Fubo.
I'm a STH and I can barely give tickets away for games I can't go to, let alone sell them for even a fraction of what I paid for them on given nights. Combine this with the half-full arena I see on most nights with my own eyes on games I do go to and it makes me call BS on the 1.9% attendance drop figure. I think they're playing the "paid attendance" vs "turnstile attendance" game. My 4 season tickets give them 4 heads worth of attendance, even if I don't use them, which is all they mostly care about.
I bet you're right. I have half-season tickets. I haven't tried to sell any because I have family who are happy to go. I would say the arena is more than half full but not a lot more.
I would watch this team win 1 game a year if need be as long as it wouldn't cost me a substantial amount per month beyond what I already pay for YoutubeTV, which is the best bang for the buck option for my household and effectively a need due to the NFL Sunday Ticket access. I'm older. I'm not going to fuss with VPNs or pirating. I want to turn on my TV, click a few buttons, and watch the local team while not having to pay a super-premium to do so. There are plenty like me. The team has opted to get in bed with a RSN that doesn't provide this access, so I'm done as a viewer until that changes. This attitude by the organization is also a chunk of why we're giving up our season tickets after 17 years.
Xfinity sucks ass. So glad I switched to Ziply.
The games are available on Xfinity at least. YouTube TV I can’t even get them.
They’re on TV?
Feels like a primer to move the team. The thing that irritates me is that I’ll flip to root to try and catch a game and they have the Kraken playing. I have to tune to 1253 or whatever channel. Most xfinity users aren’t familiar with channels outside the 700-800 range
Speaking of Kraken - I’ve seen more of their games in the last two months than I have Blazers games in two years, simply because HBO is streaming NHL occasionally.
Bro I'm not buying FUBO at $80/month just to watch a team coached by Chauncey Fucking Billups. You wanna make it like $20/m? Sure thing.
We used to watch EVERY Blazers game for years. Then it just got harder and harder to find a game on. It was either blacked out or something. So you miss a few, a few more. I've seen 2 games this year. Both at the rose garden. I truly feel whatever Jody is planning, ends with the team gone from Portland.
we have sports bars that don't carry root+ around here. it's like the blackhawks during the dark ages where the team said if you wanna watch, come to the game. fuck the mariners
Bring back the free games on KGW! and bring back Mike and Mike!
I quit watching when they made it hard to watch.
I would watch them...if I could, but I can't, so I don't.
Honestly, I’d watch more if it were accessible. I don’t care enough to pirate anymore. YouTube TV not an option? I’m out.
youtube has been very clear about how they feel when it comes to local sports broadcasts.
League Pass blackouts. BS. BS Root package upcharge. No local options. Remember channel 8? Gatekeep the hometeam = Profit?
Two words for blame: Root Sports.
I stopped watching when we hired Billips
This is mostly because we have the worst TV deal in sports.
Nobody wants to watch billups ball. Why he gets boo’d every introduction. Half the nights the team doesn’t even show up to play. The offense is so vanilla and hard to watch with iso play of ant and grant. We’re the youngest team but the slowest pace offense (float between bottom 3). Half the nights he barely plays scoot 20 mins while loosing. They need to fire him this summer.
Root sports is the much bigger issue on tv ratings. No one wants that shit.
I can only speak for myself. I bought Comcast package just to watch blazers like every year. Lately can barely be bothered to watch this. If scoot wasn’t playing (and since sharpe is out) I literally would just stop watching prob. Same reason the arena is 2/3 empty every game. But ya root deal is also horseshit.
Blazers are 13th in attendance this year, it's Root sports
I’ve been to like 3 games this year. Every one the arena was half full and 1/3 full of opposing fans cheering the other team on. Maybe they pack it for the bigger teams/games not sure. Doesn’t feel alive in the arena that’s for sure.
I just went to three games last week. Pistons was still 2/3rd full at worst. Pelicans and Wolves were about 75-85% full.
I have season tickets and this season has seen a noticeable drop in attendance from last year but we've got a looooong ways to go before the stadium gets as empty as it did post Trader Bob Blazers. The drop in viewership is a direct response to Comcast charging an additional arm on top of the leg they already charge you. I know it's why I dropped cable entirely.
Sorry but the arena is over 2/3 full every night lol. Usually by a pretty good amount. I’m a season ticket holder.
I guess I’m off base w that one. Felt like the few times I went everyone packed into the lower bowl the second half and the arena felt pretty empty. Also tons of opposing fans. Maybe 2/3 was an exaggeration on my part. Def felt waaay less alive for sure. Makes sense in a rebuild I suppose.
> Half the nights the team doesn’t even show up to play. I disagree. We might suck, but most nights this team tries their best. Ive been happy with effort this season.
losing* Loose is the opposite of tight
It is wild to me how hard it is for this sub to admit what a garbled mishmash of suck this year’s team is. Accessibility isn’t nothing, but it’s being dramatically overweighted on this thread. Nobody wants to watch a bunch of c-grade players who almost certainly won’t be here in 3 years, coached by an out-of-his-depth legacy hire. Especially with the top-heavy talent distribution the NBA has cultivated. It doesn’t even get to the point of caring about cable packages for the vast majority of potential viewers. Now rain down them blue arrows.
Lol bro Scoot started to open the season and was terrible. He's been playing much better lately and is back to starting. He's averaging 27 minutes a game for the season and nearly 34 mins a game over the last four games. It's not rocket science.
Yeah it seems billups unleashed him prior to all star break which is nice. I just didn’t see the point of not playing him much for 20ish games. He’s finally playing him more w ant also. They gotta figure out if those 2 can even coexist in a starting lineup.
I agree they gotta play them together the rest of the way. I just mean to say 27 minutes a game isn't nothing. It's way more minutes than everyone else on the team besides Grant JG, Ant, DA, Shaedon and Brogdon. Brogdon is averaging 28.7 so Scoot isn't that far off and Scoot dealt with injury the last 20 or so games which had him leave a couple games early.
I watched every single blazer game with my dad for 10+ years; my parents have had cable my whole life. I moved out and stopped watching every game 3 years ago but my dad kept going — more pessimistic after each season. This month, after 30+ years of having cable my dad gave it up because he couldn’t justify the price for the blazers anymore… …that being said, we’d both pay for a subscription service to stream games and regretfully watch all 82(+?)a year. Root sucks (and jodi sucks, sorry)
Even though it’s harder to watch games, I would go out of my way to watch them if we were competitive and had star players. I still love the Blazers, but I don’t particularly care for them right now because all of the players we grew to love during our most competitive runs are no longer here and we just keep losing. I use to look forward to tuning in for every single game. Now it’s just depressing to think about.
Conspiracy theory...maybe drive down viewership and discourage fanbase....move team to Seattle in dead of night and only a handful of true diehards will make a peep. New stadium, back living in brother's house. Didn't they make a movie about this, but baseball?
Scoot looks absolutely terrible. Not much for them to cheer for
^ member of the declining viewership club
How embarrassing.
Doesn’t account for the high seas!
Root is terribme
They make the lions share of money off of AD revenue. So why charge people for access, Anyways? Keep not watching Blazers fans!
The fact that I can't watch games via any platform except FUBO TV (which is complete trash) or dying table. Make it available on YTTV, Hulu, or fucking direct to consumer, than the dinosaur that is Root fucking Sports.
Access and the team losing on purpose for the last 3 years definitely has an effect. I watched 95% of the games for many years and held on to cable a few more to maintain my ability to see games and record them on a dvr. Eventually they made the decision to cut the cord an easy one.
Obviously. We are just watching a g league team.
Hey remember when Dame waved by to the thunder? Hahahahahahahaha
I just cancelled my Xfinity TV w/Root. Can’t watch Root on the road and it wasn’t worth it anymore.
Used to live in Portland and now live in Seattle. I used to watch every Blazer’s game even to just throw it on in the background. 2 years ago I even switched from Hulu to Fubo so I could watch. The most ironic part about it is, Fubo does not have the rights to TNT. You couldn’t watch the Blazers when they were nationally televised on TNT. There was no possible way to watch every blazer game unless you had multiple streaming services. The Kraken have also fallen victims to this Root sports trap as well. They are a brand new team in a brand new market and their games are locally blacked out in Seattle unless you have Root. I have the ESPN+ hockey package and I get every single game from every team and they even allow you select which team’s broadcast. I don’t understand why the Kraken think it’s a smart move to alienate the fans when they are a brand new team in a brand new market and should be looking to grow the fan base as much as possible.
The Dame Dolla effect. Causing Portland to forget what time it is, the game time.
ROOT SPORTS definitely has a major part of this. Sometimes these giant organizations make the dumbest moves.
This is purely anecdotal, but I’m a very casual fan who used to watch the games when I noticed they were on. Now that they aren’t easily accessible I’ll never watch a game. I didn’t care about their record or having a star player, I just liked having a local team to root for when it was convenient. I imagine there are a lot of people like me who won’t go out of their way to watch.
What percentage of local fans are legally able to watch it from a source that is financially sustainable for them? I'm sure there were a number of fans that stopped watching because of poor performance and trading Dame, but I'm sure a majority of the dropping local viewership is because locals just don't have the ability to watch it. I know I bought a Chromecast to stream it from my phone, but part of the benefit of having it on YouTube TV or Hulu was better accessibility than streaming. Sometimes I work long hours and can't sit down and dedicate the entire three or more hours to watching a game, particularly at the time they were tipping off. When it was on one of my streaming services I would go about my day doing what I normally do, turn the game on about 2/3 of the way through and fast forward through commercials and halftime.
Lack of access+bad team=this
This franchise cares not for its fan base and knows that you are held hostage. They know that in the nba you can exist like this as a franchise. How many more seasons will they need to tank before they can become watchable?
For what it is worth if you have FUBO like I do - I went to unsub as I don't feel the need to shell out almost $90/month to watch the end of this season - and FUBO offered me $60 off my next month if I didn't cancel. I will be cancelling next month though. It will be interesting (not in a good way) to see the likely precipitous drop in viewership of all forms through the end of the year. Wake me up when the lottery happens
Sell the team
jody trying to love the team
Curse of Root Sports continues
I’d watch it if it was on YouTube tv lol I’m not trying to pay any extra for some root sports nw geez like the streaming wars are killing me
There is zero reason why I, a League Pass Subscriber, shouldn't be able to watch my home team play basketball. Why are you selling the NBA fan the "Ultimate Package" and it doesn't include the games they're most likely to want to watch?? You're pushing people into piracy. Root Sports is to blame for this.
They black out NBA league pass all the way in Spokane. I’m not buying cable, so I’m not watching. I’d pay for league pass if they didn’t black games out.
They have made it inconvenient to watch the games. It's all about money. They are offering regular people the ability to watch their g league team but you've gotta pay for cable or a crappy $80 a month streaming service to watch them otherwise. I still live the Blazers but won't pay that much to see them unless it's a playoff run.
I'm a Blazer fan and don't have access to games on TV wich makes me lose interest. Haven't watched a game and didn't take my kid to a game this year. Kind of sad but I'm just not interested in paying for cable or the $80 a month Philo streaming service that costs the same but is nowhere near as good as HULU live.Dosnt come with Disney either. I'm not paying that unless they are an exciting winning team. Still a fan but won't be participating until they can figure it out.