What happened to RSNs official coverage of worlds this year?
I know I’m not alone in saying that I really loved the NFL redzone-esque coverage of the world championships in 2019. It was awesome, and made it way easier as someone with no horse in the race to participate in world champs. Getting caught up on matches and scores in real-time with crazy cool or wild footage on the instant replay. It was even more awesome during playoffs, getting live analysis of how matches go beyond just the normal game announcing.
What happened? Why wasn’t RSN asked to come back this year? Following worlds with the 6-screen field view on TBA is fine, but the redzone style coverage was awesome, and I really think that FIRST should bring that back.
It is a shame that it was not brought back and I hope in future years it will be. I enjoyed on breaks at champs brining it up and it would be on screens in other areas of the convention hall.
You mean you asked to be compensated for your time providing a service and FIRST balked? Or that the budget for the actual production just wasn’t there (and you guys were volunteering)?
Either way, bummer. I hope that RSN makes a return to the worlds broadcasting desk in the near future. It dramatically improved at least my viewership experience!
I’m not RSN so I can’t speak for them. I don’t even think they were compensated though for their time. More on flights/hotels sort of thing.
There’s a lot cut back here at champs due to budget constraints. It’s a great event still but FIRST had to make cutbacks. Unfortunately RSN coverage was one of them.
Finally (mostly) recovered from Champs. It was great to see many of our friends and meet new ones!
Tyler is spot on that cost-cutting was why RSN was not involved in any of the broadcast this year for FIRSTChampLive/PlayXPlay. We were all disappointed to not be able to do it, especially with just the one Championship and so many more teams watching from home!
I won’t go into details on our typical arrangements with FIRST, but it is my understanding that the primary driver behind cutting the whip-around “NFL Redzone” style coverage was the on-site costs related to the extra A/V equipment, hookups, sports desk, etc. Most of the RSN crew was in attendance in Houston anyways. There were efforts with FIRST to make some version happen this year but in the end we couldn’t work out a way to do it that was satisfactory to all parties.
We’ve gotten lots of comments, both this thread and in person on how much it was missed, and that’s very much appreciated. If you want us back on broadcast in the future, please, PLEASE make sure that you tell FIRST, either via the formal Championship feedback form or via email. Hearing from the community that it was missed will help make sure they put priority on bringing it back for future years!