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With Titans media deal, NLL has good coverage
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Titans become the 9th team with a broadcast deal. (Photo:Cory Shannon/NLL.com)
Early this week, the Orlando Titans (formerly based in New York) announced the details of a radio deal for their 2010 season. The Titans, led by president Steve Donner, struck a deal with ESPN 1080 “The Team”, the ESPN Radio AM affiliate for the Orlando area. The deal includes broadcast of the entirety of the regular season and any post-season games. ESPN 1080 will also broadcast a pre-game show, a daily team report during the season, and a hour long “Meet the Titans” show to air prior to the start of the 2010 season.
Orlando’s deal gives the National Lacrosse League game coverage for nine of its eleven teams. Out of those nine teams, two have their games broadcast on the radio, three have games televised, and four teams have both games broadcast on both television and radio. Currently, there are only two teams without radio or television coverage: the Washington (formerly San Jose) Stealth, and the Boston Blazers. All NLL teams have games streamed live on the NLL’s website, regardless of a team’s broadcast contracts.
The NLL’s television deals often involve regional sports networks. The Colorado Mammoth has a deal with the Altitude Sports Network, a regional network known for their coverage of the NBA’s Denver Nuggets and NHL’s Colorado Avalanche. Altitude is available on many sports packages offered by satellite networks, such as DirectTV and Dish Network. Similarly, the Minnesota Swarm have games on Fox Sports North, and the Philadelphia Wings have games on Comcast Sports Net Philadelphia, both available on some high level satellite and cable sports tiers.
The Rochester Knighthawks (Orlando president Donner’s former team) have a unique television deal with Time Warner Sports Network (TWSN), a regional sports channel with reach into the Western and Central New York cities of Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse, and Binghamton. Despite the channel offering unique programming for each of those cities, the Knighthawks are one of the blanket features for the network, appearing in every city. The Buffalo Bandits are not covered by TWSN, with the team’s only television coverage being on Verizon FIOS on demand in the Buffalo area. This creates an interesting predicament for many Buffalo lacrosse fans, as the only NLL game coverage they can see is of Thruway rival Rochester, and not their beloved Bandits.
Radio deals within the league are mostly on AM sports stations, with the exception of Minnesota, who has a deal with a FM rock station, KXXR, and Colorado, with a deal on FM sports radio station, KKFN.
As a league, the NLL has a presence on Sirius Satellite Radio, which includes a Game of the Week and highlight show. The league has had television deals in the past, most notably having their All-Star and Championship games on NBC in 2005, and a Game of the Week on Versus in 2007. Since the labor dispute the threatened to cancel the 2008 season, the league has not had a national television presence.
However, with the proliferation of digital cable and satellite sports tier packages featuring regional sports networks, and the seemingly limitless possibilities presented by the web based coverage, one could question if a national television deal should even be a priority of the NLL. If a national coverage deal did materialize, like the current Major League Lacrosse - ESPN2 deal, it would only give the NLL more visability.
This analysis is based on current information. Since we are still two months out from the start of the 2010 NLL season, some of these broadcast deals could change.
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