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is a Sports format on radio, a good format for a station to have, does it bring in numbers and money?

secondchoice said:
The are some "economic and legal" hurtles for high school players receiving direct payments. In most states contracts can not be signed by folks under 18.
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Their parents could be part of any contract. Otherwise their kid’s name and likeness is being used for the profit of others without compensation.
secondchoice said:
They are "unprovened" talent too.
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Doesn’t matter. You are still using their name and likeness without compensation for your own profit.
secondchoice said:
Plus unless there is living arrangements the student is limited geographically where he can play.
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For public schools, yes, as there are attendance zones, though families can manipulate that through their choice of housing. There is no high school transfer portal. However private high schools can recruit students from anywhere, and I am not aware of rules preventing students from changing private schools.
 
Kent said:
Keep in mind, also, that parents not letting their kids play football due to the head injuries is also a potential problem for the longevity of the sport, especially at the K-12 level.
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You have to take into account how powerful and pervasive football culture is in much of the country, particularly in the South. In such cultures there are two types of guys in high school: Those that play football, and those that are invisible. Plus there are oceans of money sloshing around in college and professional sports. This is life changing stuff, thus the continued appeal of football.
Kent said:
A high school player has a better chance of winning the lottery at some point in his life than he does playing in the NFL.
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This reminds me of a work colleague from many years ago. He played football at the college level, and his dream had been to play in the NFL. That dream was ended by an injury in a college game.

He told me he had often heard that striving for the NFL was futile, as so few players actually made it. But he pointed out that at any given time there are around 1,700 players on active rosters in the NFL, plus a few hundred on practice squads. He further noted that, at the same time, there is only one President of the United States. He then said “Would any parent ever discourage their child from wanting to be President, despite the odds of it actually happening?” Excellent thought.
 
Mediafrog+ said:
You have to take into account how powerful and pervasive football culture is in much of the country, particularly in the South. In such cultures there are two types of guys in high school: Those that play football, and those that are invisible. Plus there are oceans of money sloshing around in college and professional sports. This is life changing stuff, thus the continued appeal of football.
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It can't be sustained on the South alone, though. At this point, we haven't seen a degradation in the quality of the game, but it wouldn't take very many parents not letting their kids play before we could see that. You're right that NIL might keep it alive longer because even people who have no future in the NFL can still make a lot of money in college. A starting quarterback at a Power 5 school commands about $2 million a year. If, however, the quality of the sport declines, sports talk radio probably won't be sustainable for long. Almost all the talk you hear centers around football either at the professional or college level. Retrans fees will also dry up for TV broadcasters while reverse comp to the networks will drop if the quality of NFL games starts to suffer. That's what everybody's paying for. If football finds itself in a death spiral, it will probably happen slowly, then suddenly.

Mediafrog+ said:
This reminds me of a work colleague from many years ago. He played football at the college level, and his dream had been to play in the NFL. That dream was ended by an injury in a college game.

He told me he had often heard that striving for the NFL was futile, as so few players actually made it. But he pointed out that at any given time there are around 1,700 players on active rosters in the NFL, plus a few hundred on practice squads. He further noted that, at the same time, there is only one President of the United States. He then said “Would any parent ever discourage their child from wanting to be President, despite the odds of it actually happening?” Excellent thought.
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I suppose that's a good attitude to have about it, but I wouldn't want my kids playing football. I've met people with ALS, and it's a really horrible way to go. When I was in college and met those people, worrying about possibly getting it kept me up late several nights. I can't imagine we're going to start seeing real news that football is good for one's health, nor can I imagine we'll find a way to play the sport more safely that can also be more entertaining. It'll be the cupcake league if they try to make it too much safer. Not sure I'd want my kids being President either. At least over the last 30 years, it has seemed like a job only fools and saints want!
 
Kent said:
As some of the others have pointed out, sports talk typically doesn't get very good numbers in terms of listening, though I've seen a few, mostly FM's, do very well. It does, however, get a lot of sales, especially in areas that have pro and/or college sports teams.
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Actually, sports talk stations generally get very good ratings in adult. Of course that applies to locally originated and hosted stations in that format. Those that take national network sports can also do well, but they do not get the kind of ratings that local content stations do.

It is not uncommon for such a local country sports stock station to be outside the top 10 in overall ratings, but it is equally common for them to be in the top few in adult male listening.

The big advantage of such a format is that such stations not only sell to mass market advertisers let all to can take pieces of so-called “sports marketing“ budgets that are dedicated only to tie ends with sports. That sports marketing money is generally not going to go to General market radio stations.

A good example of a sports marketing application can be seen in the Good Karma group of stations that does not seem to even need to subscribe to Nielsen ratings. They are deeply involved in sports activities in their markets and include other services for advertisers beyond just radio.
 
I gave that Wikipedia article a quick going over and still note that the earliest flips to Sports for any of them were in 2007/08/09.

For some reason, the way your original post was written gave me the impression that you had thought those flips had happened earlier. (I'm not going to psychoanalyze why.) But now that I see the dates, that sounds about right in terms of when the Sports format started appearing on FM, and so I agree with your original point on that basis ... in markets where it made sense for CBS to do so, it was the right time to do so and therefore a good strategic move as the "Hot Talk" format -- or whatever you want to call it post mortem -- was dying.
 
Since sports betting has now been legalized in most places much of the talk on these all-sports radio stations has turned to the discussion of betting lines and parlays. Since I'm not a gambler it doesn't interest me personally. I do wish they would increase the amount of live play-by-play broadcasts in their mix. You can only listen to two guys breaking down an NFL team roster so many times.
 
FreddyE1977 said:
Since sports betting has now been legalized in most places much of the talk on these all-sports radio stations has turned to the discussion of betting lines and parlays. Since I'm not a gambler it doesn't interest me personally. I do wish they would increase the amount of live play-by-play broadcasts in their mix. You can only listen to two guys breaking down an NFL team roster so many times.
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Even worse are the game by game schedule breakdowns.
 
It's been my personal experience (last century) High School Sports is the easiest thing to sell. Just get a program and start calling the businesses that are advertisers. I personally sold around half of those businesses. Even a couple that "never" bought radio. Throw in a Christmas package and you could have someone willing or wanting to sign an annual contract.
 


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