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Disastrous French Open Coverage in the US

24K views 142 replies 71 participants last post by  VeeJJ 
#1 ·
Unless I am missing something, the French Open is only available in the US on Tennis Channel. Very few people have this. There are no (legal) livestreams of other courts available, regardless of whether you have Tennis Channel or not.

This coverage is absolutely disastrous for a major, being worse than some MM events for people who have Tennis TV and worse than this tournament used to be when TTC had free live streaming of it and Watch ESPN showed it.

It also doesnt help that TTC's quality of coverage has significantly nosedived in recent years as they try to copy ESPN :help:.
 
#2 ·
It's atrocious. The fact that ESPN got rid of showing RG is absurd. Something about "not enough interest" :facepalm:

I still remember waking up at 5 am on the Sunday and setting up my desk top, my laptop, my iPad, my phone, and my living room tv all in the same room and turning on every single court courtesy of ESPN3 and watching tennis nonstop all day. Now I can't do that. I just have to accept the 1 match TC decides is most important.

And I refuse to pay $100 for their shitty online streaming, just to only see like 4 or 5 courts. The thing that upsets me the most is I don't have all the replays online like ESPN3 does. Now I can't watch any replays because I'm not going to pay all that $$$ for TC stuff.

I'm grateful TC shows many match replays around the clock, but them being the only provider of RG this year (except illegal streams) means I'm missing out on like 75% of the tournament.

Wimbledon and ESPN coverage can't come soon enough.
 
#18 ·
It's atrocious. The fact that ESPN got rid of showing RG is absurd. Something about "not enough interest" :facepalm:

And I refuse to pay $100 for their shitty online streaming, just to only see like 4 or 5 courts. The thing that upsets me the most is I don't have all the replays online like ESPN3 does. Now I can't watch any replays because I'm not going to pay all that $$$ for TC stuff.

I'm grateful TC shows many match replays around the clock, but them being the only provider of RG this year (except illegal streams) means I'm missing out on like 75% of the tournament.

Wimbledon and ESPN coverage can't come soon enough.
In US the few fans they have left they are driving away due to cost, whether one can afford it or not. Tennis still has that elitism attitude. Man, I can surf through changes and find many sports available with my package but not tennis. It's to the point I don't even watch as often as I used too.

P.S. I really miss ESPN3 and their many matches, they also have pretty reliable streams. Thank goodness FO has never been my favorite tourney.
 
#3 ·
Definitely. Furthermore, you can't even find any highlights, even short, horrible ones. The RG YouTube site, yesterday, had two highlight videos of two minutes each. The French tennis federation is so vigilant about removing traces of the tournament's existence from YouTube, too, disappearing even ancient highlights and match videos. I don't think the French tennis federation knows how to promote tennis either. They could at least have decent highlights. Seriously, do they think everyone can fly to Paris for the event?

Ridiculous noncoverage. Basically, the event is invisible in the U.S. except for 3 hour windows over the weekend on NBC if you don't get Tennis Channel. It sucks.

Nevermind that I'm chronologically undesirable due to my time zone. :tears: That's not RG's fault, of course.
 
#6 ·
Yeah so I guess we can't quite complain if this is an option but when Watch ESPN is free for all courts and Wimbledon has free streaming yet Tennis Channel, which already requires paying a large premium to have at all, has the nerve to charge $90 more for five courts. For a channel that should try to cater to the most loyal fans they are doing a great job of alienating them.
 
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#5 ·
Now they've talked repeatedly about Carebear's "historic loss" since supposedly a reigning AO champion has never lost in the first round at the French. It literally happened to NaNa two years ago :facepalm:. This doesnt really reflect their coverage quality but does show what a joke TTC has become.
 
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#7 ·
ESPN dropping RG just goes to show that the French are completely out of the loop. They want to keep their tournament in the 20th century, so everyone else living in the 21st century are beginning to move on. Do even French people watch the French Open? What are the ratings in France?
 
#10 ·
Look in the stands :rolleyes:. Obviously French people watch it and tons of others/tourists. It is a huge deal and definitely a major. All the major websites are terrible though so a combination of that and general shitty coverage (and already difficult timing to follow that used to be easier to overlook) in the US do make it a mess to follow this year.
 
#13 ·
No, it does not make you a fool to expect sports stations to cover sporting events, especially international sporting events. Furthermore, if TV stations did not cover the events, you would only have streams from betting agencies available for illegal streamers to stream. TV contracts pay for the coverage. TV coverage is vital, unless tennis wants to accept being a niche sport.
 
#11 ·
Yeah, this was a primary complaint in another thread.

When will the tournaments learn that you increase the fan count by utilizing the current communication technologies?

Make matches available as a video app. for smart phones; live stream as many matches as possible; create 7+ minute match highlights; etc...

They (tournaments and broadcasters) can easily make money from the ad placements through each and every communication medium.

It doesn't make good business sense to be so proprietary at this stage of the game in the 21st Century.

Communication is so abundantly prevalent, but ironically, the broadcasting community seems absolutely clueless as to how to utilize/exploit today's technology.
 
#12 ·
I mentioned this earlier in another thread, to make it worse the tennis channel and Xfinity/Comcasts relationship is about as good as the Tennis Channels coverage, it's really sad NBC is not stepping up and providing better coverage. As for ESPN, they are going to primarily focus on big time sports, and expect to see a lot of changes coming from Disney up in Bristol, CT
 
#17 ·
I don't know about y'all, but not having to hear Chris Evert or McKendry for a fortnight is a definite plus in my book. :hearts:
 
#19 ·
Mary Carillo is the one that's annoying to me. Talking just to hear herself talk about everything but the match.
 
#26 ·
For something to be 'Disastrous', it has to exist. Thank God for online streams.
 
#32 ·
Direct tv generally has that but I left them for Time Warner because of cost. As soon as I get my $300.00 Visa Card for staying with them for three months I plan on going back to them if the price is right. My only concern is that AT&T bought them out and I hate them. UGH!!
Not only does their customer service suck but their internet is like the horse and buggy.
 
#40 ·
I agree the coverage here in the USA is disastrous.

ESPN is not streaming anymore, and the TennisChannel seems to be trying to MILK everyone. I have the Tennis Channel in my cable subscription, but I still can't get it on my smartphone or tab. I can get any channel on my cable carrier on my smartphone or tablet, except the TENNIS CHANNEL.

They are forcing people to buy TennisChannel Plus..

No way.. Some real rotten money hogging chit if you ask me..:(
 
#55 ·
I agree you shouldn't have to buy Tennis Channel Plus if you already have a Tennis Channel subscription.

ESPN doesn't do that with ESPN3.

In fact, you don't even need cable to watch ESPN3 if you have a friend or relative who can give you their email/password. I use my brother's Comcast/xfinity log on to watch ESPN3.
 
#41 ·
I dropped tennis channel like a potato 100 years ago. When I think tennis, I don't even think TV. It's stream and chromecast. That's it. It's era of stream technology. Forget TV programming. It's a thing of the past.

ESPN stream was great for the Replays. But now they prefer showing college softball and basketball.
 
#42 ·
It's just a problem on the wrong side of the pond.

Here, on the right side, we have Eurosport Player that streams at the same time all courts, today 15, and I can view whatever court I want on the big screen of a smart TV, with very good quality, while at the same time follow another match on PC and still another one on the smartphone, all with the same account.

By far the best slam coverage ever! TV cameras on practically all courts.

Only a small fraction of the first round have been made viewable at all others, from AO to Wimbledon to USO. For example in Wimbledon last year the first two rounds of my fave were not visible, only fron the third one, as it was the first round at USO, while today I had been able to see my fave play (and win) even on a rather peripheral court.

Vive Roland Garros!
 
#48 ·
They do too much jumping around between matches, especially at important stages/moments. Plus, doing interviews with every single player, spending all this time talking about stuff we already know, while important matches are going on, is really NOT necessary!!
 
#47 ·
This really is one of the most p*ss-poor things that could happen to tennis right now. The promotion of the sport as a whole, is struggling, and this hurts so much more than it helps. How else will people know about the sport and it's talented stars, if there's no way to see them? ESPN/ESPN2 has way more money, power and pull than Tennis Channel, so there is no way in the hell they should've pull the plug on media coverage for a Grand Slam. It might not be the most popular of the four slams, but it still counts to TENNIS, it counts to the PLAYERS and it counts to the FANS as well!!!

ESPN/ESPN2 can afford to break from a lot of the BS they put on the air anyway. No one wants to see sh*t like bowling, motocross or fishing in the first damn place!!! What if today was the day of the final, and Rena tied Steffi for #22, and they left it up to Tennis Channel????? A whole lot of people would've been screwed, especially if they don't know about how to find the sites streaming matches. None of us should have to resort to a "Third Party" provider, just to get our tennis fix!

Tennis Channel really needs to be expanded and improved upon, as a network, making it more widespread available without hurting people's pockets. ESPN need to get with the damn program or get lost!!! That's money they're throwing away, when they don't want broadcast rights to a GRAND SLAM!!! Tennis needs to come together as a whole, and make things right, not only for the sake of the sport itself, but for the players, and especially the fans too!!!
 
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