In the aftermath of Lionel Messi and Argentina’s thrilling FIFA World Cup win over France this past December — ending arguably the greatest tournament in the history of the sport — no one would have begrudged Fox Sports from taking its own victory lap. Fox Sports’s successful coverage of the international soccer tournament wrapped up one of the most successful performances in the 28-year history of the organization.

In a year in which live sports programming firmly secured its position as the foundation for the struggling linear television universe, Fox Sports was the category’s North Star, led by its CEO and executive producer Eric Shanks. In 2022, the company’s live sports programming — which ranged from the World Cup and Major League Baseball’s World Series to Big Noon Saturday college football games, Fox NFL Sunday “America’s Game of the Week” coverage and NASCAR races — aggregated an industry-high 265.3 billion minutes of live event consumption this year. It’s the fourth straight year Fox Sports has led all sports distributors in minutes viewed while continuing to embrace the traditional TV bundle for distribution of the majority of its marquee events.

“The thing that’s worked very well for Fox Sports and for Fox is their increased emphasis on broadcast,” TV sports consultant Lee Berke said. “They’ve placed most of their major events on broadcast, buttressed by [cable networks] FS1 and FS2. Sports is a growing percentage of primetime programming on broadcast in general and Fox early on has taken a leadership position on that.”

Fox Sports programming was so prevalent on the Fox network, particularly in the fall, that more than 90% of all the broadcaster’s viewing from Labor Day to New Year’s Eve was attributed to sports. The remarkable amount of consumption was bolstered by Fox Sports’s World Cup coverage. The morning and afternoon telecasts — which aired in November and December, instead of the typical summer, due to host country Qatar’s desert heat — averaged 3.6 million viewers across Fox and FS1, up 30% over Fox’s 2018 World Cup coverage from Russia.

Shanks, the former DirecTV programming executive who joined Fox Sports as CEO in 2010, continued to fortify the division’s portfolio in 2022 by reaching long-term TV rights deals with several important properties. Under Shanks’s tutelage, Fox Sports worked alongside the Big Ten college conference to negotiate a new, seven-year rights deal with Fox, NBC and CBS worth a reported $7 billion. 

Fox Sports in October renewed its Big 12 TV rights as part of a reported $2-billion deal that also includes ESPN and keeps the conference on Fox through the 2030 season. Fox also renewed Major League Soccer in a four-year deal, shutting out ESPN and ABC, which had aired MLS games since the U.S. league’s inception in 1996.

Fox Sports also forged a league of its own with the April 2022 launch of the United States Football League (USFL), the spring league it owns and manages. 

Industry executives said Shanks’s ability to build strong relationships with content partners has helped Fox Sports lock down most of its high-profile sports properties through the latter part of the decade.

‘A Moving Force’

“Eric is a moving force,” MLB commissioner Rob Manfred said. “He’s always coming to us with ideas about things that we might consider rather than him just being receptive to ideas that we have. That’s what makes for a good partnership.” 

NFL commissioner Roger Goodell commended Shanks for being a key member of the team that has helped foster the three-decade relationship between Fox and the league. “Quite simply, Eric has made the NFL better,” he said. “He’s been an incredible partner who’s never afraid to challenge us, which is something I really appreciate.” 

Under Shanks, Fox Sports has also helped evolve the way viewers watch live sports content through technological innovations that have added to the enjoyment of fans rooting for their favorite teams. Whether it’s aerial drone usage and virtual production technology in its NASCAR productions to the introduction of a helmet cam for its USFL telecasts, sports executives said the company’s on-air technical innovations are second to none. 

“Working with Eric Shanks and Fox Sports has been nothing short of phenomenal,” NASCAR president Steve Phelps said. “We love how Fox Sports is willing to push the envelope from a technology and production perspective when it comes to covering NASCAR.”

Not one to rest on laurels, Fox Sports in 2023 will air a second season of the USFL, new baseball and NASCAR campaigns and the FIFA Women’s World Cup. First up this month is Super Bowl LVII, the network’s first telecast of the Big Game since the pre-pandemic 2020 contest. 

“Eric thrives in constantly innovating while consistently executing at the highest levels,’  News Corp. executive chairman and CEO Lachlan Murdoch said. “From launching the new USFL this past spring to the epic fall calendar consisting of the best coverage of college and NFL football, the World Series, World Cup and preparing for the Super Bowl, Eric and his team have performed masterfully in bringing our audience the best in sports.”

Fox Sports on-air veteran Kevin Burkhardt will call his first Super Bowl after succeeding the ESPN-bound Joe Buck as Fox’s top NFL play-by-play announcer. Burkhardt said the Fox culture under Shanks’s direction is to remain aggressive and innovative in its approach to working marquee events.

“We go after things that we want and get big properties and hire good people to work on those properties,” he said. “It’s a message and attitude of being loose, having fun and embracing being on the big stage.”

Shanks, who is the B+C Multichannel News Sports Executive of the Year for 2023, spoke about Fox Sports’s phenomenal 2022 performance and discussed the future of the sports TV in a wide-ranging interview, presented here with edits for clarity and space.

B+C: Put Fox Sports’s 2022 campaign into perspective. Did it meet your
expectations?   

Eric Shanks: Clearly, we couldn’t have predicted such an unprecedented year. When we set our budget in 2021, we couldn’t have predicted that we were going to have probably the greatest sporting event of all time in the World Cup final. The performance of everything that we’ve put on the network just validated the strategy that Lachlan Murdoch and [Fox chairman] Rupert Murdoch put in place, which is to be very focused on being the leader in live television, whether it’s sports or news. It feels to me like we’re unique in that there’s no doubt that we know who we are, and we aim to be the leader in live sports and news every day. By any metric, whether it’s total consumption or whether it’s the individual performance of our events or our leagues, that’s the case. And in the areas where we’re not quite No. 1, I mean, that’s the challenge that we have going forward. 

B+C: You mentioned the World Cup. Fox Sports had some daunting challenges going into the tournament, including an unprecedented fall start plus unfriendly time differences with Qatar. How was Fox Sports able to overcome those challenges? 

ES: It really is all about planning. We were in Qatar two and a half years before the World Cup to start setting all of the pieces in place for the planning. So when that month [of the tournament] comes on the air, it’s the result of this amazing team that we have here to put a plan in place and to execute it. Of course, we can’t predict that an event will unfurl where the biggest stars in the sport actually show up and are the key components of the event at the end. So that’s what kind of paid off: the planning was there and then the stars showed up. 

B+C: Fox Sports continues to offer all of its marquee sports events, whether it’s all 64 World Cup games, the Super Bowl, or even USFL games, on linear television. In a TV environment when more content distributors are moving to streaming, why is Fox Sports so invested in the traditional television platform? 

ES: I actually look at it a little bit differently. If you look at the big rights deals that have been done, there might be media companies that are trying to move things into their streaming services. But if you look at what the professional leagues are doing, the NFL deal had clear priority on broadcast. There are more games on broadcast now for the NFL than ever before. If you look at the Big Ten deal, it’s a move away from cable to three broadcast entities. You look at the MLS deal that we just did. While they did a streaming deal [with Apple TV Plus], they really wanted to have games on broadcast every week. The biggest events from the biggest leagues are still on broadcast television. So our focus is there because we know that being a leader in news and sports is the driver of value in the bundle. 

B+C: So what is Fox Sports’s streaming strategy going forward? 

ES: A big chunk of our consumption comes from streaming — it’s just not direct-to-consumer streaming. We still have great products and availability for people to watch on any device, anytime. So we’re not against streaming; we just aren’t in the business model of direct-to-consumer. For the World Cup, we did a unique deal with Twitter, where we showed the first few minutes of every game live, which set social records for us. We used [Fox Corp.-owned streaming service] Tubi for highlights and on-demand replays which help set streaming records. When the games ended there was a message to go to the Fox Sports App, so the conversion of those fans was tremendous for us. 

B+C: Having said that, could we see a Fox Sports direct-to-consumer streaming service in the next five years? 

ES: We have the rights and the flexibility if we ever wanted to jump in and go DTC. Whether it’s the NFL or Major League Baseball, we have the same rights as everybody, so it’s our choice what to do with them. We can look at our crystal ball and know some of the things that will happen in five years. We know in five years that Fox’s [NFL] ‘America’s Game of the Week’ is still going to be the No. 1 one show on television. We’re still going to have the NFC package and the Super Bowl. We’re still going to have the World Series. Those are the core properties that drive our business. There are a lot of things outside of our strategy that can’t be predicted, such as how many streamers will be around in five years and how many direct-to-consumer offerings there will be in five years. There are things that we have already solidified while letting others help us make future decisions without us having to make the investments. 

B+C: In an era where sports rights are seemingly moving from network to network or to streaming services, Fox Sports last year was able to secure TV rights to such marquee properties as the Big 12, Big Ten and Major League Soccer. How have you been so successful in securing rights deals in such a competitive marketplace?

ES: From a non-business standpoint, we pride ourselves on being a good partner in terms of promoting, cross-promoting and producing content. If you look at our core rights for football, including the NFL, Big Ten, USFL, Pac-12, and also the core rights of NASCAR, Major League Baseball and FIFA international soccer, we really focus on promoting them on-air and being good partners which drives value for us and for them. Our core partners are not commodities; they’re not interchangeable. So I think we’re good partners and because we have identified our core rights, we know that they’re a part of our value equation. I also think one of our success stories was getting more upstream in the rights process, whether by starting our own league or acting as a true partner to the Big Ten as a media rights consultant and playing that role that we did with securing the rights. That’s another thing that we feel sets us apart this year, other than our distribution strategy. 

B+C: Do you see a more competitive marketplace over the next few years as Google, Apple, Amazon and other digital/streaming companies negotiate for sports rights? 

ES: Every time you think that it’s going to be less competitive, it’s always more competitive and a competitive marketplace doesn’t drive prices or costs down. That’s a good thing: You want your partners to be successful if they’re driving value for you. Just like earlier when we talked about our crystal ball, I don’t know in five years if there’s going to be more people bidding for rights or less, but I think they’re in that mode right now. You have companies that aren’t in the sports business now looking to be in the sports business. We’ve always been used to competition, but this is the first time that we’ve competed against $2 trillion companies that aren’t even in our business for rights. So it’s yet to be seen in this competitive environment what will be a success for them and whether they’ll keep going or revert back to their traditional business. 

For us, we’re in the sports business. It’s existential to us. To our newest competitors, it’s not existential; it’s kind of a toe dip in the water to see where it goes. That’s why I’m not sure if there will be more competition or less. History says there’s never less. Even with that, they really can’t impact our business in the next six years because we’ve wrapped up about 80% of our core rights deals, and I think we’re in a really good position to renew those other contracts like NASCAR when it comes up. So at least from our position, the window for them to really impact us has closed. 

B+C: One way to protect rights fees is to create your own league, which Fox Sports did with the USFL last April. Given spring football’s failed history, what made you confident that you could pull this off? 

ES: Well, it was a big jump into the deep end, and I credit my bosses here who believed in the vision. We were born to do football and we believe that in America there is demand out there for more high-quality football across more parts of the year, and we knew that we could make the media part of it a success. In year one, it performed as well as any longstanding sports event in that second and early third quarter. We have a long-term plan for growth. We took our media expertise and put a group together that actually was able to do the football operations, health and safety protocols for the players, ticket sales and marketing for the whole league. We even sold rights to another media partner at NBC. One of the most unique things we did in 2022 was having a media company actually run a league. The crowning of a champion, for the first time since the ’80s, of a spring football league was definitely a unique moment for Fox Sports. 

B+C: Fox Sports is televising Super Bowl LVII. The last time Fox had the big game was in February 2020, just a month before the pandemic. Are you approaching post-pandemic Super Bowl coverage differently than in 2020?

ES: The other thing that was interesting for our last Super Bowl was that it was the NFL’s 100th anniversary, so the content, pregame and everything that the NFL wanted to accomplish along with us was totally different than this year’s event. That being said, every year the network is really responsible for making the Super Bowl bigger than the one before, so we work hand in hand with the NFL on what moments to discuss, what we want America to remember from the event and making the event as big as possible.

B+C: Will we see any new technological innovations during the game?

ES: We’re trying to do some things to get fans closer to the game, whether it’s with audio or new cameras. We usually end up doing some really interesting things from a graphics perspective or data perspective. I think this year, obviously, the thing that’s on top of everybody’s mind is the continued improvement of Damar Hamlin, so we’ll be figuring out how we could celebrate his recovery or improvement. Whatever that ends up being is going to be a great moment. 

B+C: Fox Sports has been aggressive in creating content around sports wagering. Do you believe that such content will inevitably have a major influence on the overall sports television marketplace?

MS: I think we were really aggressive moving into the wagering space, not just as a vehicle for advertising or taking advertising dollars. I’m pretty sure we’re the only media company that has an investment in horse racing wagering, with our 40% ownership in [the New York Racing Association]. We have Fox Bet, and we have our 18.66% [purchase] option in FanDuel. We’re in poker and iGaming and we’re the leading free-to-play app. We’re the only media company that is really invested from an ownership standpoint. So yes, wagering is having an impact and will have an even bigger impact as more states roll out [legalized sports betting]. 

I would say that specific wagering-only content is probably less important because that’s speaking to a niche of a niche. Rather, what’s happening is, in every NFL pregame show and college pregame show, someone is talking about odds, spreads, odds to win a championship or even prop bets. It really has become integrated into the mainstream. I think that’s the biggest impact — everybody feels more free to talk about and use wagering in an event. People now understand odds, so I think those things have the biggest impact today, but we haven’t been able to figure out yet whether wagering is having an impact on viewership. 

I think that the amount of sports on television clearly impacts wagering, because the more sports that you have and the bigger that you make those events, the more [bets] there are. But we don’t really see any evidence yet of wagers impacting viewership.

B+C: In 2019 Fox Sports exited the regional sports business. Given the recent upheaval and evolution within the category, do you see any value in potentially getting back into the regional sports business?

ES: I think there’s a lot of forces that will cause it to evolve, whether it’s a new business model for consumers, whether it’s technology, whether it’s owners and leagues having an expectation of economics that they eventually use to pay players and to put a product on the field. So there’s no question that it’s going to evolve. 

I feel like it will create opportunities for us at Fox, because I’m not sure that the … volume of games will still be played on what we consider to be an RSN. There still may be some, but there may also be the ability to put more games on broadcast television that used to be on an RSN. Look at what [Los Angeles Clippers owner] Steve Ballmer did out here with the Clippers — he just took more games off of his RSN to put them on a broadcast platform. When you’re in 210 markets around the country with a broadcast station, that gives you the opportunity to do a few local over-the-air pro game telecasts and take advantage of our structure, our broadcast nature and our broadcast reach. That might be the evolution of some of that RSN product.

B+C: What’s on your wish list for Fox Sports in 2023? 

ES: As we look at 2023, we have another really unique event in the Women’s World Cup, which is something that we’ve been planning for for years. It’s an event where you really root for the U.S. women’s national team to bring home another World Cup. It’s exciting for us to be able to serve as the flagbearer for women’s sports in this country at the highest level. I don’t think there’s anybody that invests more in the success of women’s sports. Also for us, it’s the beginning of the new NFL contract next year, so working with the NFL on some of the new rules around scheduling and what games we get.

I also want to continue to be the leader in holiday sports fare. It used to be that the holidays were not a great time to put sports on television, but now it’s the best time. Owning Thanksgiving, Christmas, and being around with sports content on New Year’s and Thanksgiving Friday and Saturday is really exciting for us, and that’s only really come around in the last three years for the most part. ￭

Fox Sports’ telecast of Super Bowl LVII telecast Sunday will feature the familiar voices of its lead National Football League announcing team of Kevin Burkhardt and Greg Olsen, but for the announcers themselves the game marks their first time on the NFL’s biggest stage.

After taking over Fox’s lead NFL announcing team at the beginning of the season — replacing Joe Buck and Troy Aikman, who left for ESPN — Burkhardt and Olsen will deliver the play-by-play action for Fox’s Philadelphia Eagles-Kansas City Chiefs Super Bowl telecast. Burkhart becomes the first play-by-play announcer other than Buck or Pat Summerall to call a Super Bowl for Fox since the network first acquired NFL television rights in 1994.

The significance of the opportunity is not lost on Burkhardt. A former reporter and substitute play-by-play announcer for New York Mets games on regional sports network SNY, he joined Fox Sports in 2013 to call the NFL and host Major League Baseball studio coverage. Burkhardt said he’s grateful for the opportunities that Fox Sports and its CEO and executive producer, Eric Shanks, have provided him over the years leading up to the Super Bowl LVII gig. (Shanks will be profiled in February’s B+C Multichannel News magazine as our 2023 Sports Executive of the Year.) 

Also: Tom Brady Announces NFL Retirement. When Will Legend Suit Up For Fox Sports?

“It’s amazing … the whole experience is going to be so unbelievable,” he said. “I owe a ton to [Shanks] — he’s taken multiple chances on me,” he said. “I was doing TV for the Mets and he brought me on as a baseball studio guy, and then right away as a NFL play-by-play guy as the [number] two crew with [former Fox Sports announcer] John Lynch,” he said. “Then this year Joe and Troy leave and we had the A (team) to fill. Just because I was on the B crew didn’t mean I was automatically going to get the gig, but [Shanks] pretty much said ‘you’re our guy.’ To entrust me with that responsibility is a big deal.”

Despite the high-profile nature of the Super Bowl, Burkhardt says he’s not doing things much differently to prepare for the Super Bowl than he does preparing to announce a regular-season matchup. “I know this won’t be like every other game, but I’m just preparing like I do every game,” he said. “When I got promoted this year, I said I was going to keep doing what I’m doing and keep the same prep routine because that’s what got me here. If I did something completely ridiculous for the Super Bowl I’d be an idiot.”

Burkhardt, who began his career calling high-school football games at a Northern New Jersey radio station in the late 1990s, says once the Super Bowl action starts, he’ll call it as he has every football game throughout his career.  

“The beauty for me is once the ball kicks off, it’s no different than any high school game I did,” he said. “I know how to do the game, so I think I’m just going to focus on that.” 

Fox Sports will deploy more than 94 cameras and 29 field-level microphones during its Super Bowl LVII telecast as it looks to provide in-depth coverage of the event. “We’re trying to do some things to get fans closer to the game, whether it’s with audio or new cameras,” Shanks said. “We usually end up doing some really interesting things from a graphics perspective or data perspective. But we'll be putting our second-to-none talent out front, from Kevin and Greg to our pre- and post-game talent. We always remember to put the game first.” ■  

TV executive Jamie Horowitz is out as Fox Sports National Networks president effective immediately amid reports of sexual harassment allegations, according to published reports.

“Jamie Horowitz is no longer with Fox Sports effective immediately,” Fox Sports said in a statement released Monday (July 3). "There is no further comment at this time."

Related: Fox News Settles Sexual Assault Case, Report Says

Horowitz’s departure comes less than a week after 21st Century Fox began investigating allegations of sexual harassment at Fox Sports and began interviewing women at the company about Horowitz’s behavior, according to the Los Angeles Times.

The Times also quoted Horowitz's attorney Patricia Glaser, who called Fox's treatment of Horowitz "appalling" and added that "any slanderous accusations to the contrary will be vigorously defended.”

Related: Fox News Channel, Ailes, Shine Named in New Sexual Harassment Lawsuit

Horowitz, the former ESPN and NBC Today executive, took over as president of Fox Sports National Networks in 2015 with oversight of national cable sports networks FS1 and FS2. During his tenure, Horowitz has placed a greater emphasis on opinion-themed, sports-centric talk shows as part of the networks' daytime block. Among his on-air hires were former ESPN personalities Skip Bayless and Colin Cowherd.  

Fox Sports has signed up for Nielsen’s National Out-of-Home reporting service, which counts people watching ballgames on TV in bars, hotels and other locations.

The ratings lift a game can get by adding out-of-home viewers can be significant. Nielsen said Fox NFL regular-season games saw a 16% lift from out-of-home viewing last season.

Fox, ESPN and some other TV companies are negotiating to add out-of-home viewers to the eyeballs they sell to advertisers in the current upfront market. ESPN was the first to subscribe to the Nielsen out-out-of-home reporting service when it launched in April.

Related: Nielsen Launches Out-of-Home TV Ratings Service

The multi-year agreement covers Fox Sports on broadcast, FS1, FS2 and Fox Deportes with program and commercial ratings ranging from live to live plus 7 days of delayed viewing.

“Sports are being watched everywhere, every day and on every type of screen. Our business has to keep pace with changes in viewer behavior,” said Eric Shanks, president, chief operating officer and executive producer, Fox Sports.

Read more at broadcastingcable.com.

Ultimate Fighting Championship’s $4 billion sale to talent company WME-IMG has delivered a powerful financial and brand-building punch to UFC as well as the wider mixed-martial-arts sports category, industry observers said.

The deal, the most expensive purchase of a sports franchise in history, completes a journey begun in 2001 when Zuffa LLC, owned by brothers Frank and Lorenzo Fertitta as well as UFC president Dana White, purchased the then-struggling franchise from Semaphore Entertainment Group for $2 million. At the time, UFC was limited to pay-per-view distribution and was outlawed by many states that considered MMA fighting too violent, but the Fertittas and White slowly created a franchise that now is considered a legitimate pro sport alongside boxing and has strong appeal with millennials.

“Nobody involved in the UFC could have imagined that the franchise would be valued at $4 billion,” said Bas Rutten, UFC Hall of Fame fighter and co-host of AXS TV’s mixed-martial-arts series Inside MMA. “The sale will solidify the UFC, and more people will now be interested in the UFC because they heard about the deal and want to check it out.”

Currently, UFC is in the midst of a multiyear television deal with Fox Sports that expires in 2018. Live UFC events televised by Fox and FS1 have delivered knockout ratings for the networks — thus far in 2016, UFC on Fox fights have averaged a combat sports high of 2.6 million viewers, while Fight Night bouts on FS1 have averaged 1.1 million viewers.

“We’re happy that the hard work and value created by Lorenzo, Frank and Dana has been rewarded,” Fox Sports president and chief operating officer Eric Shanks said regarding UFC’s sale. “We have been thrilled to be a partner on the ride and are big believers in the sport and the stars that have been created. We’re looking forward to beginning the next chapter with [WME] and Dana.”

The deal was also celebrated by owners of other mixed-martial-arts franchises who believe the $4 billion UFC purchase price also builds more value for their franchises and the MMA sport itself.

“It just shows that this industry can be a very profitable one if done properly, and there are people that want to invest in MMA,” said Scott Coker, CEO of Bellator MMA, which is owned by Viacom and offers live MMA events on Spike TV. “To see a number like that is great because the credibility and respectability of MMA is finally coming to the forefront.”

Eric Shanks is sitting pretty as president, chief operating officer and executive producer of Fox Sports, a global sports behemoth that’s only getting bigger as it positions itself as a viable contender for the pound-for-pound TV-sports championship belt, currently held by ESPN.

As brand-building becomes more vital in a more complex TV advertising and distribution climate, Fox Sports has stepped up its game in 2015, securing rights to both marquee and fledgling sports properties that it hopes to turn into ratings gold in the near future.

The company’s decision this past February to extend its FIFA World Cup soccer rights deal through 2026 was vindicated in part on July 5, when the Fox broadcast network’s coverage of the U.S.-Japan Women’s World Cup final set a ratings record, averaging more than 25 million viewers.

Rights deals inked this year for such national properties as the National Hot Rod Association, Premier Boxing Champions, the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show and Major League Soccer — as well as regional team and college-conference rights secured for several of its regional sports networks — have only enhanced Fox Sports’ profile within the TV sports universe.

Add the continued ratings growth of two-year-old national cable sports networks FS1 and FS2 through the addition of live Women’s World Cup games, regular and postseason Major League Baseball telecasts (including most of the just-concluded American League Championship Series), NASCAR races and Ultimate Fighting Championship programming, and its not hard to see why Shanks is among the most successful sports executives in the game today — and why he’s being recognized as the Multichannel News Sports Executive of the Year.

Shanks recently spoke with MCN programming editor R. Thomas Umstead about what made Fox Sports so successful in 2015, and about his take on the opportunities and challenges brought by new technologies altering the television landscape. An edited transcript follows.

MCN:Everyone is talking about this period as a golden age for television with regards to scripted programming, but I’m of the thinking that 2015 in particular has been a great year for sports, with a number of TV networks setting ratings records with live sports programming. From your vantage point, do you consider this a great time to be in the sports-television business?

Eric Shanks: More people are watching more sports than ever before, and I think the quality and the multiplatform access is driving a lot of that. The fact that you no longer are bound by being in a certain place at a certain time to watch the teams and the games you want to watch is one of the reasons I believe that sports seems to be rising above the rest, as far as it relates to media consumption.

Clearly, we’re in an age of transformation by new technologies, and the fact that consumers are in control now more they have ever been, and viewers have more choices than they have ever had, is a great thing. Sports continues to be the thing that brings communities, families and young people together, and gives us all something in common, whether it’s your favorite team or your favorite event or just the chance to get together and be a part of the community. Sports, probably unlike ever before, is the thing that holds tribes together.

MCN:To extend those sentiments to Fox Sports, how would you define the performance of Fox Sports this year?

ES: I think globally it has been a year that has been unmatched. What’s happening at Star in India is really incredible, being a leader in that emerging market and taking a leadership position in sports.

I do think that we’re coming into an era where, more than before, there will be clear winners and losers as it shakes out, whether it be through engaging in multiplatform distribution of content or the consolidation on the distribution side. The value of brands — and whether those brands deliver on their promise — will be judged by consumers in a way that we haven’t seen before. I think that Fox Sports, around the world and domestically, delivers on the promise of bringing the best and the biggest events and your local teams to you in away that creates real value.

It’s the Fox Sports brand, more so than niche brands, that is one of the things that consumers and distributors can see the value in. It’s the Fox Sports brand that brings them every game of their local baseball, NHL and NBA team; it brings you great college football, baseball playoffs; all the big events. I think that is what we believe is a winning formula going forward.

MCN:You mentioned bringing the best brands to consumers. Is that why you guys have been so aggressive with securing rights deals, certainly over the last 12 to 18 months, as well as bringing in some high priced on-air talent, such as Colin Cowherd? Is the need to define a brand much stronger in an environment that is uncertain at this point driving your acquisition strategy?

ES: Yes. I think once we made the decision to coalesce around big, multi-sport brands and Fox Sports or your local Fox Sports Arizona or Fox Sports Florida, you want to have the product to deliver on the promise of that brand. So whether it’s the Super Bowl, the World Series or the Daytona 500, we believe that having the content and the events that get people attached and engaged to your brand is delivering on the promise that we make to the viewer and to the fans.

I think we have been disciplined in our approach, but we have also been aggressive when we think it fits with our strategy. And there are segments of the sports-fan population, whether it be with the NHRA deal or whether it be with renewing the local team rights that we have done this year, that’s really delivering on the promise of the brand.

MCN:Another big acquisition was hiring Jamie Horowitz [former vice president of original programming and production at ESPN] as president of Fox Sports National Networks. Why was he the best person for that position and how has that worked out to this point?

ES: There is clearly an internal culture at Fox Sports that we believe is special and unique. Probably more so than any of the rights acquisitions that we’ve done, the thing I am most excited about is the increased energy that we have brought with the addition of Jamie and his team and the path forward.

I think that Jamie and his team fit really well because we recognized that going forward into year three, after some of the investments that we’ve made in live rights, that the next frontier for us is really in non-event programming and also in honing our big-events strategy and making our big events even bigger. And I couldn’t think of anybody that fit more perfectly with the culture of Fox Sports and the expertise that Fox Sports needs going forward than Jamie and the team that he has brought in.

MCN:Are FS1 and FS2 on pace with where you wanted them to be at this point?

ES: I think, as always, it’s not a straightforward answer. I think some of the things that we’ve done from a product standpoint and results standpoint are ahead, and some of the things are a work in progress. But we have more momentum, and I’m more energized about going into year three and with the team that we have assembled than when we launched.

Momentum is an amazing thing, both creatively and culturally, and I think we are on a path right now that is very encouraging. I think that I am more excited going into year three of our new national networks probably more so than when we launched, and a lot of it has to do with the fact that we have kept the culture of bold innovation and risk-taking intact.

MCN:You mentioned that with all these acquisitions and personnel hires, you have been disciplined in spending. Is there a ceiling that you have in mind for the amount of money you want to lay out for those particular acquisitions and are you close to that at this point?

ES: Whether it’s Fox Sports or any business on Main Street, you manage your business at the time and you evaluate opportunities that are in front of you for any number of reasons, whether it’s the growth aspect of the opportunity, or other offensive or defensive rationales.

We are the leading sports company in the world, we are always evaluating global opportunities and we are always evaluating opportunities that make us stronger and make the brand stronger and engage more with fans on any platform. That’s kind of our mindset going forward — making sure that it’s the right fit for our brand and that there is a rationale for doing it that meets with our business objectives.

MCN:The reason I ask is we’re seeing a change in the television marketplace with distributors losing subscribers and creating skinny bundles with fewer networks, and recalculating the value of existing cable networks. Can Fox Sports and the TV-sports industry in general continue to pay significant rights fees for sports content, given an uncertain future in terms of where the revenue to pay for those rights are going to come from, whether it’s from subscribers or advertising?

ES: I think that as a part of 21 Century Fox and as part of strong global brands, sports is one of the areas of strength within that portfolio, and we manage that strength and we look for opportunities. I think that this is an age of transformation, and we believe that strong brands will come through on the other side, probably stronger than ever.

Again, it goes back to a little bit of trying to predict the future, but also wanting to make sure that you’ve set the table for a business that is stronger in five years than it is today and we manage towards that. And so we have, I believe, the resources, the brands and clearly the opportunities to make that happen. So I think that’s how we look at the world.

MCN:One of the big franchises that you’ve secured long-term is the FIFA World Cup, and that immediately paid ratings dividends this past summer. Were you surprised by the enormous ratings the women’s tournament generated and did it exceed your expectations?

ES: I would say it exceeded our expectations to the nth degree. We had high expectations going in, and the script couldn’t have been written any better from our perspective. Clearly, there is a movement happening in women’s sports that has never been greater than it is today and it’s amazing to be a part of, whether it’s women’s soccer, whether it’s [UFC star] Ronda Rousey being one of the most popular athletes, male or female, on the planet — and having UFC as one of our core partners from the very beginning — or whether it’s Venus and Serena [Williams], no one can deny that this is the best time probably in women’s sports history.

Combine that with the fact that this is probably the highest point of soccer interest in this country. We believe that we are really only at the beginning of the second generation of soccer fans. So right now in this country, it’s the first time that sons, fathers, mothers and daughters have soccer in common because it really wasn’t until the ’70s and ’80s that we generated the first soccer fans in this country, and now for the first time those moms and dads that were the first soccer fans have kids of their own. So the idea that you start to see this exponential fan effect happening with soccer I think nobody can deny that it’s happening.

Being a part of those two things this past summer was absolutely incredible. It was a great experience for everybody involved at Fox Sports, and I think we’ll do everything we can to see those two things continue.

MCN:You mentioned the growth of soccer and you mentioned the UFC. What sport do you see that has the biggest growth curve in terms of audience and also just growing fan base?

ES: You know what I think the beauty is? You don’t know. I think that what we’ve done is created a portfolio of rights from the biggest events in this country like the Super Bowl and the World Series and the Daytona 500, and also in that portfolio are young, growing sports, like the UFC and soccer — both MLS and international soccer.

And the great thing about having a portfolio, whether it’s a sports portfolio that you can deliver to fans or your investment portfolio, you have that great mix. And if you’ve made some of the right investments, the entire portfolio grows — some faster than others at certain points. That is how we view our acquisition strategy, making sure that we have the right mix of growth sports and sports that deliver the consistent big events.

MCN:Continuing to look into the future, technology has been a big theme for you, from camera drones to talk about virtual reality. Why are such technological innovations so important to you and Fox Sports and what’s next on the horizon?

ES: Bringing the fan closer to the action has always been a goal for us, whether it’s our emphasis on audio and having probably invested more in audio and using audio as a means to bring fans closer to the game, or some of the new technologies like virtual reality. At the end of the day, there is a certain segment of fans that are going to want the experience of being at the event. And I think that our investment in virtual reality does that.

Being the first sports network to shoot an event with multiple drones all at once is an experiment in seeing what new perspectives we can bring to fans. There is a whole generation of sports fans watching on TV that the majority of their sports consumption has been through video games, and video games shoot sporting events much differently than we do. So, can we meld the two together? Drones are a big factor in being able to do that.

I think virtual reality is one of the things that we believe will eventually be uniquely positioned to bring fans closer to the game and the action. Then there’s simple things like our acquisition of a company called Pro Cast, which allows athletes to send footage directly to our servers here in the studio. That’s how we get our “On the Bus” segments, taking you on the bus with NFL players before they go to their game or leaving the house with a baseball player before they go to a playoff game is something that we weren’t able to do before without everybody having a camera in their pocket. The ability for these professional athletes now to connect with their fans and extend their brand through our broadcasts is exciting.

So everything we do has an eye toward the fan experience and bringing the fans closer to the game and inside the game, because there’s no doubt that the more engaged fans are the more they consume not only linear media but digital media, and that’s good for everybody.

MCN:Does that also help bring what is widely known in the industry as the “Fox attitude” to sports like golf, which hasn’t been covered that way by other platforms?

ES: I think the investment we made in the USGA this year clearly gave us, with some added technology, an experience that probably attracted hard-core fans because we heard that they can’t get enough of the ball tracer technology, the added microphones and the added camera angles. Hopefully what that does is not only enhance the experience for the fans watching USGA events but — whether it’s us or another network — help break new ground technologically, which drives the entire industry forward.

The innovations happening in the industry as a whole are really exciting. I think you see new innovations happening in every sport around every big event. And again, it’s fun to be a part of that competitive environment where your peers are constantly pushing you and you’re constantly pushing your peers to make the fan experience better.

MCN:Continuing on the competition theme, what do you make of new digital OTT services that are getting a lot of press these days? Do you foresee them ever getting into the sports business?

ES: I think whether it’s here in the States or around the world, I mean, we’ve dealt with competition for a very long time and that’s a good thing. As new people consider whether or not they want to be in the sports business, I think you have to believe in sports. We here at Fox believe in sports. We’re a content company and we believe in creating value through content, and sports are a big part of that. And I think that to have a long-term view, I think you have to be in the sports business for the right reasons, and that’s keeping the fan at the top of the pyramid.

MCN:How do you see overall distribution of content on various platforms other than traditional television? What is the future distribution platform for sports content?

ES: As far as multiplatform goes, it’s amazing. I remember 10 years ago when people were at conferences saying the Internet would never have the ability to deliver highquality video in a large number of streams. Well, in less than a decade, [Fox] and others are delivering the biggest sporting events in this country multiplatform, through the Internet. And I would say that it’s a great experience.

Having said that, it doesn’t seem like it’s something that today should be talked about as being distinct and apart from the creative process of sports. I mean — and I don’t think we’re unique in this — nobody around here thinks about the different platforms as it relates to our linear product. Nobody thinks about those different platforms at all.

We produce content and it’s so seamless to go between devices and have access across those devices. It kind of goes back to our original comment: You think about the brands and you think about the promise of those brands and the product that those brands should deliver to you, and I don’t think anybody really thinks about the difference between the TV on the wall and their tablet and their phone when it comes to getting access to that content.

Now I think that all of us have distinct digital businesses, whether it’s increasing engagement on social media or whether it’s on your website or whether it’s on your app, and I think that each media company has their strategies for the products on those different platforms.

So, we have products that are produced and delivered only through social media. We have multiplatform products, like [FS1’s] Garbage Time With Katie Nolan, that is really a multiplatform show that has a television component to it. But Katie is always on, whether it’s through social media or whether it’s through YouTube or whether it’s through any of our platforms we have for those products.

So, I hope that we’re at a moment in time where going forward we, in the industry, are starting to put ourselves in the fans’ perspective. I don’t believe the fans really think about the idea of, “Oh, I’m watching on my phone so it’s different than watching on my tablet.” They have more unparalleled access than any time before. And I think that we as a company believe that again our product has never been more accessible to more fans and that sports fans in general are really in an era of unprecedented control and unprecedented value and benefit for the sports product they get.

MCN:A couple of short questions for you: Biggest accomplishment in 2015 for Fox Sports so far?

ES: I think the product we put on the air for the Women’s World Cup.

MCN:Toughest call you had to make this year?

ES: I think because it had a very personal impact to a lot of people, but evolving the programming grid so far in 2015 for FS1. Obviously making some programming decisions that affected people here at Fox Sports.

MCN:Who’s coming out of the NFC this year, going to the Super Bowl?

ES: The beauty of the NFL is, we don’t know.

Highlight Reel: Fox Sports Milestones in 2015

Fox Sports president, chief operating officer and executive producer Eric Shanks oversaw a whirlwind of activity in 2015, including these headlines:

National Football League Gains

The NFL on Fox had its second most-watched year since the network began broadcasting NFL games in 1994, with an average audience of 20.7 million viewers. Fox Sports’s five most-watched NFL seasons have all come within the last five years. Fox’s “America’s Game of the Week” is the top program in television for six consecutive years.

FIFA World Cup Marks

Fox extended an existing contract with FIFA that gave Fox Sports the next six FIFA World Cups in international soccer. Coverage began with the 2015 FIFA Women’s World Cup, hosted by Canada. The 5-2 U.S. victory over Japan in the final game was the most- watched soccer match in U.S. history with 25.4 million total viewers, according to Nielsen. The 2015 tournament averaged 1.824 million viewers per each of the tournament’s 52 matches across all networks (Fox, FS1, FS2), up 21% over 1,511,000 averaged on ESPN and ESPN2 for 32 matches played in 2011.

MLS Games Return

In May, Fox Sports agreed to an eight-year deal to televise Major League Soccer (the top U.S. professional league) regular-season and playoff games, including MLS Cup and MLS All-Star Games (divided with ESPN). MLS had been on Fox between 2003 and 2011.

USGA Tees Off

Fox began a new 12-year partnership with the United States Golf Association, airing the first U.S. Open Golf Championship on Fox and FS1. Coverage included drones and virtual reality elements. Viewing averaged 3.5 million viewers across both networks, up 40% over 2014’s combined average on ESPN and NBC (2.5 million).

FS1 Viewing Grows

Fox Sports 1 (now branded as FS1), bolstered by Major League Baseball, the addition of NASCAR Xfinity and Sprint Cup races, soccer and the USGA Championship, saw a rise of 40% in total day viewers year over year when it turned two years old in August. Viewing of live events rose 53%, to average 488,000 vs. 319,000 a year ago, per Nielsen.

UFC Rises

UFC on Fox on Saturday nights held top spots in key male and adult demographics in broadcast and cable primetime: so far this year, UFC Fight Nights and pay-per-view preliminary matches on FS1 rose 24% versus the same period last year.

Horowitz Hired

Fox Sports president Eric Shanks hired former ESPN and NBC News executive Jamie Horowitz as president of Fox Sports National Networks, hired to develop original programming on FS1 and FS2. An early move was signing on-air personality Colin Cowherd; Fox later added widely read journalist Jason Whitlock.

Rights Gained, Renewed

Fox Sports extended its rights agreement for the FIFA World Cup through 2026; signed deals for National Hot Rod Association races, Premier Boxing Champions contests and the Westminster Dog Show. It inked key regional sports network renewals, including long-term rights deals with the St. Louis Cardinals and Arizona Diamondbacks.

SOURCE: Fox Sports

KICKING SOCCER UP A NOTCH

Fox Sports’s FIFA Women’s World Cup coverage this summer propelled the sport to record-setting ratings levels for U.S. televised soccer, claiming half of the 30 most-watched soccer events thus far this year. The July 5 Japan-U.S. final (won by the U.S.) was the most watched soccer match in U.S. TV history. Most of the other top soccer events on the year were Confederation of North, Central American and Caribbean Association Football (CONCACAF) international contests.

July 5 . . . . . . . . . . .USA vs. Japan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .22,317 . . . . . . . . . . . . . Fox *

June 30 . . . . . . . . .USA vs. Germany . . . . . . . . . . . . .8,425 . . . . . . . . . . . . . Fox *

June 26 . . . . . . . . .China vs. USA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .5,736. . . . . . . . . . . . . . Fox *

July 26 . . . . . . . . . .Jamaica vs. Mexico. . . . . . . . . . . .5,711 . . . . . . . . . Univision +

Oct. 10 . . . . . . . . . .USA vs. Mexico. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .4,814 . . . . . . . . Univision #

June 22. . . . . . . . . .USA vs. Colombia . . . . . . . . . . . . .4,716. . . . . . . . . . . . . . FS1 *

July 19 . . . . . . . . . .Mexico vs. Costa Rica. . . . . . . . . .4,664 . . . . . . . . Univision +

July 22 . . . . . . . . . .Panama vs. Mexico. . . . . . . . . . . .4,265 . . . . . . . . . .UniMas +

July 12 . . . . . . . . . .Mexico vs. Guatemala . . . . . . . . .3,746 . . . . . . . . Univision +

June 8. . . . . . . . . . .USA vs. Australia . . . . . . . . . . . . .3,311 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . FS1 *

Figures in thousands. * FIFA Women’s World Cup + CONCACAF Gold Cup #CONCACAF Cup

SOURCE: Ratings Intelligence analysis of Nielsen live-plus-same-day figures