ABS-CBN Sports was once the country’s premier sports broadcaster and contractor during its heyday.
In 2020, during what is now considered to be the darkest hour for ABS-CBN as a company, the media giant closed down several of its divisions. Among the biggest departments to be hit is the Integrated Sports group, which saw the retrenchment of all employees. That ultimately resulted to the dissolution of ABS-CBN Sports on August 31, 2020.
Since then, ABS-CBN Sports’ former properties have found new homes in the rivals of the Kapamilya network. NBA, ONE FC, UAAP, PVL, and recently, the MPBL, all moved to the Reliance-based network and pay TV operator TV5 and Cignal. Meanwhile, GMA Network bagged the Philippines’ NCAA and its coverage has been kept under the purview of Synergy via the GMA Sports brand.
While short-lived, post-ABS-CBN Sports era, the MPBL aired the division finals of its 2019-20 season in March 2021 via A2Z.
Now, sports programming is slowly moving back into the ABS-CBN group, albeit in a much rather complicated manner. Just last week, Cignal TV and the UAAP announced that it has reached a deal with ABS-CBN to carry the Cignal-operated UAAP Varsity Channel on the Kapamilya streaming platform iWantTFC. Beginning May 4, the Varisty Channel on iWant will be complementing the global TV broadcast via the Kapatid Channel.
In the Philippines, however, the streaming rights remain with Cignal Play and Smart Giga Play.
While that alone is futile to encourage setting up an entire division anew, it is still interesting to ask how could a revival for ABS-CBN Sports could possibly look like, only if it was considered for such move this year.
They’ve got no rights left, so they need to get at least some.
Rights is at the core of sport broadcaster. Lose or gain one, it might be easily considered a big deal. As for ABS-CBN’s case, they’ve lost most, if not all, of them. If ever ABS-CBN Sports gets a revival this year, that would be problem number 1 for them: where and what are the possible contracts that they could ink to build upon?
First of, how long would it take before the expiry of some of their former prized propeties?
According to the NCAA, they will be in GMA through season 101 or about 3 1/2 years from now. As for the UAAP, they will be with One Sports till at least season 88. PVL, which signed with One Sports in February 2021, will be with them until 2024.
With that, the earliest possible they can be to getting one of their former major rights is 2024, thus they need to be in the lookout for other stuff if they hypothetically get reborn this year.
Other stuff may include niche sports, e-sports tournaments, and even the television-shy Palarong Pambansa (if that too, gets reborn in the near future).
If that doesn’t work, maybe something different could.
If they don’t want to look any further, the interesting prospects they could consider are either sharing the rights or serve as the production team for other broadcasters.
Hypothetically speaking, ABS-CBN Sports in an also hypothetical 2022 form, could opt to join rights pools to share costs with other broadcasters. It is in similar fashion to how the SEA Games in 2019 was covered by the Big 3 networks and PTV.
Another way for them to go by without needing to buy rights is to line produce games for other broadcasters. It could be a win-win situation for the rights-holder, as well, as they would enjoy lower costs in mounting broadcasts of the games as they no longer need to acquire many equipment and technologies, as ABS-CBN already has or can readily have those.
While there would be little to no involvement for a revived sports department, a sub-leasing deal could also be entertained. This might come by way of attracting rights-holders with limited to none access to free-to-air TV, which ABS-CBN does have via A2Z. This could happen similar in the way TAP DMV blocktimed IBC for TAP’s coverage of MPBL back in December 2021.
Perhaps, this what you refer to as the exciting part of this piece: how could they broadcast sports in their ‘new normal’ set-up
While ABS-CBN is still not anywhere close to its pre-shutdown reach and strength, they are still available in many digital platforms, which have become increasingly accessible as time progressed.
If they bagged exclusive rights, the best they can do in terms of streaming is to air the games live and free on YouTube and iWantTFC, something that they have done with the UAAP and PVL in 2019. In a 2022 setting, they might even entertain streaming on KTX for pay-per-view events, on top of their Sky Cable PPV service.
In the TV side of things, this is where the tricky part is. Should there be sufficient properties within their fold, then a revival of sorts for both Liga and S+A might happen, with the latter being the best brand to be of consideration, should the company get to that part.
However, if they only bag a small number of rights or properties, then a dispersal of broadcast within the channels ABS currently has is the best way to go. Now, that boils down to the target demographic of the property. For younger-skewed leagues, Myx could perhaps be a possible venue for such broadcasts. For those targeted at older audience, then either Jeepney TV or CineMo! could be utilized.
The question: will it be worth it for ABS-CBN to revive its sports division in the immediate future?
Given all that was mentioned above, will it be feasible and (generally speaking) worth it for ABS to revive its sports division this year? In all honesty, it won’t be… just yet. With the media giant still grasping the world without franchise two years on and is still on its way to profitability, risking to acquire rights to various leagues — which in turn would be the deciding factor as to whether the sports dept. would be revived — would be rather reckless.
But, if it would be in a such a way that there will be little to no risk, especially if it is in such a way that only sports programs — and not the entire division just yet — are brought back then, it would be a welcome development as there would be added variety to the shows in the roster the Kapamilya network currently has. The first sign of this possibly happening is the carriage of the UAAP Varsity Channel carriage on the international version of iWantTFC.
While it may take a long time before the entire ABS-CBN Sports is completely revived as a department, it as an on-air brand for sporting programs can be the first step ABS could take to at least make its Sports brand relevant still, even without the pre-shutdown properties that made up what is now considered to be its glory days.