BTN Sux

[SIBoiler2]

My real issue is with their choice of early season games. When we sucked I fully understood them dumping us on BTN+ but we've left those days behind.

 

[Boiler Wolf]

Because before BTN, the game would have been available...and, because when BTN was created, it (BTN representatives and B1G officials) said that would not change...so they did not blatantly lie, as it is still available, they just failed to mention that you would have to pay even more to watch it...despite the fact that they have the means by which to make it available at no charge as was the case before they stepped in and took that away.

Before BTN, only ESPN and occasional CBS games were available to those of us not living in Indiana. The number of Purdue alums that can watch Purdue games as well as potential recruits had to have increased manyfold. Keep in mind, that many of the fine scientists and engineers who graduated from Purdue live and work elsewhere than Indiana. My career has taken me to work in 3 different states so far. The first dozen or so years after I graduated, the games I saw were CBS games, which wasn't many. Now, 38 years later, I can see over 20 regular season games, including all conference ones.

You may or may not know what it was like waiting for the ESPN schedule to come out to see which 6 games on average they would carry. That was it until the NCAA tourney.

So saying every game was carried before BTN is simple not true for a HUGE part of the fan base, only for those in the channel 18 or channel 4 viewing area, which isn't many.

 

[Dryfly88]

ESPN Full Court was the solution for out of staters prior to BTN. I bought that when we lived in Iowa and Illinois. BTN gives more games but EFC wasn't too bad.

 

[boilerzz]

ESPN Full Court was the solution for out of staters prior to BTN. I bought that when we lived in Iowa and Illinois. BTN gives more games but EFC wasn't too bad.

It was a partial solution but we still had less games than we currently do.

 

[TC4THREE]

I have lived in Indiana my entire life and I remember most of the games on free TV in the early 90s when I was growing up in the Indy TV market. When I graduated in 99 and moved to Northern Indiana I don't remember getting hardly anything until BTN came along. Nothing locally. Only what was on ESPN and unless we were good they pushed most of our games to their Full Court package.

Regardless I still don't remember any promises to provide all basketball games when they tried to launch the network and I think the only games that were on BTN Plus this year were an exhibition and one crap game against an overmatched opponent we probably shouldn't even have scheduled. Seems like really good coverage from my perspective.

Frankly I grew up in a household that didn't get cable so I can tell you that even in the State Farm days you had to pay for ESPN to get all the games. It has been a very long time since they were all free.

 

[DG10]

Before BTN, only ESPN and occasional CBS games were available to those of us not living in Indiana. The number of Purdue alums that can watch Purdue games as well as potential recruits had to have increased manyfold. Keep in mind, that many of the fine scientists and engineers who graduated from Purdue live and work elsewhere than Indiana. My career has taken me to work in 3 different states so far. The first dozen or so years after I graduated, the games I saw were CBS games, which wasn't many. Now, 38 years later, I can see over 20 regular season games, including all conference ones.

You may or may not know what it was like waiting for the ESPN schedule to come out to see which 6 games on average they would carry. That was it until the NCAA tourney.

So saying every game was carried before BTN is simple not true for a HUGE part of the fan base, only for those in the channel 18 or channel 4 viewing area, which isn't many.

Fair...and good point with respect to availability where it had not existed before...and admittedly something that I had/have not had to worry about or deal with fortunately.

That said, when launched (or before even and in an effort to drive interest in/for it), the pitch was that viewers would not lose any access that had already existed, and, that there would be more access actually (to the point that you made)...and that has not been the case, and not just that, but it is a conscious choice to have that not be the case.

 

[BoilerBulldog]

I have lived in Indiana my entire life and I remember most of the games on free TV in the early 90s when I was growing up in the Indy TV market. When I graduated in 99 and moved to Northern Indiana I don't remember getting hardly anything until BTN came along. Nothing locally. Only what was on ESPN and unless we were good they pushed most of our games to their Full Court package.

Regardless I still don't remember any promises to provide all basketball games when they tried to launch the network and I think the only games that were on BTN Plus this year were an exhibition and one crap game against an overmatched opponent we probably shouldn't even have scheduled. Seems like really good coverage from my perspective.

Frankly I grew up in a household that didn't get cable so I can tell you that even in the State Farm days you had to pay for ESPN to get all the games. It has been a very long time since they were all free.

Someone can probably dig up an old TV schedule from the 80s or early 90s. I'm still not convinced 100% of the games were televised outside the Lafayette TV market. I think what we have now is comparable/close to what people had in Lafayette and +1000000 what everyone else had. BTN has been an absolutely huge positive for us.