Atlanta has become more than just the home of the most popular, most successful soccer team in MLS during the past two years.
It also has become the home and lab for a new approach to broadcasting soccer on television, tablets, phones and through social media.
Funding the experiment is Turner Sports, which shocked the world when it outbid historic heavyweights to land the broadcast rights to the Champions League, which in this case is the lab rat, but is better recognized as the world’s second most-prestigious soccer tournament. Leading the research is Bleacher Report, which is trying to walk a line between appealing to the traditional soccer fan that reveres the book “Inverting the Pyramid,” while bringing in the casual fan who can tell you more about Neymar’s tattoos than they can about his club, Paris Saint-Germain.
The line is as fine as hitting a successful free kick, and one Travis Rettke, Bleacher Report Football’s executive producer, explains as Neymar smoothly dribbles past three Red Star Belgrade defenders on a quartet of televisions in the lobby of a room in Turner Studios on 10th Street.
“What B/R Football wants to do is we want to redefine the culture of the game in America,” Rettke said. “Not just with Champions League, but with coverage of the sport. Creating a product that is both entertaining and engaging for our current demographic and fan base in America, but also grow it amongst the most casual fans in America that haven’t necessarily been exposed to or are interested in the sport because of the way it’s been presented.”
Stunned was the best way to describe reactions when the news started breaking that Turner had outmuscled ESPN and Fox Sports for the rights to the tournament. Eric Wynalda was on-air during his satellite radio show when he stopped the segment to tell listeners that the Champions League was going to have a new home. The price was a reported $180 million over three years.
Turner hadn’t done anything with soccer in more than 25 years. Basketball is its thing as the home of arguably what is considered one of the best sport’s studio shows, “Inside the NBA,” as well the NCAA men’s basketball tournament.
But Matt Mosteller, Turner Sports VP of Content, said he thought the Champions League fit very well what the network is good at doing.
“We are into premium sports content, and Champions League is as premium as you can get,” he said. “Get the best stars, the best players, the biggest teams.
“It just felt like this is the next step in that process to bring a prestigious tournament like the UEFA Champions League.”
Bleacher Report, mostly known for its coverage of basketball and sports culture, was tasked with producing the content, focused from a spinoff B/R Football.
“They come into it with a very social-first thought process, which is good because it can drive that conversation 365, which is really what we want as we try to build up Champions League to a U.S. audience,” Mosteller said.
Continuing a trend in sports broadcasting, decisions were made to highlight 1-2 games each match day, and broadcast the rest of the games (more than 340 in total) on over-the-top (OTT) media service called B/R Live that requires a subscription for $9.99 per month. Rettke explained that decision by saying the traditional way of broadcasting will keep the soccer diehards, but doesn’t grow the audience in a way that putting all of the content on OTT can.
The OTT platform carries the pregame, halftime and postgame shows, as well as features produced for each matchday. Rettke said B/R is the first network to carry the three shows on its OTT platform.
Most of the reactions to the July announcement that broadcast coverage would mostly occur on the OTT platform were filled with vitriolic headlines. It was an odd reaction because many other networks, including NBC for the Olympics in Rio de Janeiro and NBC Sports for Premier League soccer, have carried games on their OTT platforms.
But that is the challenge of keeping the traditional viewer who is used to appointment-based soccer viewing on TVs, with luring the newer viewer that may be more accustomed to different broadcast and viewing models.
The reviews after the first week of games featured some positive feedback about the personalities and ideas, and some negative regarding a lack of in-game breakaways to significant moments in other matches. Rettke said he’s not a fan of the model of switching to goals, assists, cards and subs that most soccer broadcasts use. He prefers the story of the game and the moments that defined that game. In some cases, it’s not goals. In some cases, it’s a dirty tackle. Sometimes it’s a reaction.
Rettke did listen to viewers after “Matchday 1” and added a few breakaways in “Matchday 2,” as well as elements to the postgame show to include a “Man of the Match” segment to highlight the day’s best performance from among all of the matches, as well as a “Moments that Matter.” Other ideas to enhance coverage are being fine-tuned.
“Some people aren’t going to be super-excited about the way we are going with things,” Rettke said. “But know that we are creating this with audience in mind of trying to grow the game amongst the younger, more casual fan while also creating product that is catering to people who have loved this game for a long time and are passionate about it.
“By no means do we have it solved right now. We are basically a start-up and are coming at this from a completely different angle. Something we are consistently working on.”
Rettke and his team are trying to approach all aspects of the coverage from a new angle.
Start with the studio. Each game day features a crew in Atlanta, and another in L.A., which Rettke said was needed because he feels it is the cultural epicenter of the sport in the U.S.
The studio in Atlanta is designed to look industrial chic, with a look of broken concrete behind host Kate Abdo, and analysts Tim Howard and Maurice Edu. The design is quizzically simple, and void of soccer imagery, but was done to keep the viewer’s focus on the analysts and what they are saying.
Like the crew on “Inside the NBA,” today’s crew in Atlanta and L.A. have a good chemistry. Abdo makes fun of Stu Holden, who is on a screen to her right because he is in the studio in L.A. along with former NBA legend and always soccer aficionado Steve Nash, while Howard, who is sitting to Abdo’s left, returns the barb by making fun of her gold lame pants.
The moment may capture exactly what Bleacher Report is attempting to do because it is an intersection of Abdo’s ability to keep things moving, with a reference to culture (the pants), while some of best soccer players of their generation get ready to watch PSG take on Red Star Belgrade, and Nash, whose soccer knowledge is underappreciated, is ready to offer the viewpoint of a fan and former professional athlete.
Their goal is talk about soccer in a way that doesn’t talk down to the new fans in “Get off my lawn” way, but keeps the traditional fans. Abdo’s challenge is interesting because she is the ringleader of this ever-changing cast and the one who must lead the walk down the fine line between the sport and the important results on the field, and the sport’s periphery.
“It’s a new project, so everyone is massively invested in this working out,” Abdo said. “It feels new. It feels fresh. We are doing it in a way that soccer hasn’t been covered before. I think everyone is having fun.
“I think the European approach is slightly different in that we will happily put together a two-hour show that’s a non-stop breakdown of tactics that feels very high-brow in some ways. I grew up with that so it feels like home to me, and I quite enjoy it. Do I think it makes for engaging television? Not necessarily. I miss my mom’s cooking sometimes. It’s not the best cooking in the world. But I miss it. Similar thing for me.”
Rettke said he thinks Abdo is the best studio host in sports. He’s enjoyed watching and listening to Holden since he began doing work while rehabbing various injuries suffered as a professional player. Howard is one of the better soccer players in U.S. history and is good at explaining tactics. Edu, another former U.S. national team player, is tapped into the intersection of soccer and culture.
Among the pregame segments is a feature on a rapper in London who is supporter of Tottenham Hotspur. Another segment is about Neymar’s tattoos and the artist in Brazil who does the ink. That transitions to the studio crew discussing Howard’s tattoos before they analyze how Neymar fits within PSG, a team loaded with stars and bankrolled by billionaires. All of these clips are put on the OTT platform and pushed out on social media. Access to the content is unlimited with the subscription.
Culture and soccer. Soccer and culture.
“I think soccer coverage in America gets a bit boring sometimes,” Howard said. “Same old song and dance and same old people. What we are doing at B/R is showing another side to the players. There’s a cultural side of football that people are hungry for. You see that in our coverage. We are giving them stories that they may otherwise see. It’s Neymar’s tattoos, and it’s the fashion and all the things that surround the game.”
The studio also frequently brings in guests whose soccer acumen is equal to their ability to converse: former Manchester United player Owen Hargreaves and Atlanta United Vice President Carlos Bocanegra are among a few, with more planned.
Rettke said the Holy Trinity of guests would be LeBron James, Kobe Bryant and Zlatan Ibrahimovic. James and Bryant, like a growing segment of athletes in the U.S., are soccer fans. James is part-owner of Liverpool. Bryant, who grew up in Italy, supports A.C. Milan as well as Barcelona. He reportedly was part of a group that unsuccessfully attempted to buy a club in Italy a few years ago.
“Hearing those stories is interesting to people like us who follow the game, but for others who don’t follow the sport, if that’s an in-road to get them interested then we have to give those people a voice,” Rettke said.
Would Turner have bid on the Champions League if Atlanta United wasn’t experiencing its success of leading the league in attendance for its two seasons and being the favorite to win the MLS Cup? Yes. Mosteller said the network is in soccer for the long haul, and would be open to bidding on other events.
But Mosteller said that the way the team and sports has galvanized the city and region has amazed him. He grew up in Warner Robins as a fan of football, basketball and baseball. Soccer and Atlanta United are now among his interests.
“I think that us being able to bring champions league here. ... I think it’s just kind of helping to continue to build Atlanta as a soccer home,” he said. “We are doing a small part. United have done the heavy lifting.”
The most important question is B/R successfully walking the fine line of marrying televised content about the sports and its influence on culture, with social-media conversations, debates and talking points?
The best way to know is if the model is copied by other networks. In that way, it’s too early to tell because they’ve been doing this for less than months. Rettke said their audience is “incredibly engaged” with the content on all of the platforms, saying it’s at the top of the industry.
Mosteller said Turner isn’t focused on the number of subscribers B/R is gaining because the network is engaged with soccer for the long haul.
“We see soccer on the uptick here in the U.S.,” he said. “We want to continue to fuel that here. If we can slowly starting to get fans used to watching soccer on B-R, but it becomes a constant every day thing where they are coming back, and at that point they start following players and teams, at that point they will start watching more games. We understand that takes some time. We will be patient with it and try to grow it over time.”
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