Future of Live Coverage?
This has been a hot topic in the sport for the past few seasons. What do we do about live coverage? Let’s face it, disc golf is growing in popularity. Paul McBeth inked a $10M deal with Discraft. Kevin Jones and Hailey King won $20,000 at the DGPT Championship, the largest cash prize ever for the sport. Professional Disc Golf will continue to bring in more and more money, and this money will change how players treat their practice, their fitness, and their mindset . This will improve their performances and make the sport more competitive and better to watch. This means that there will be more fans wanting to watch live coverage. If they can’t find an easy way to consume the live tournaments the sport will never grow to its potential.
Disc Golf is in a unique position. You can either watch the coverage live on the Disc Golf Network for a subscription fee or watch next day coverage on YouTube, primarily with Jomez Productions and GK Productions. We got to see the DGPT Championship on ESPN, but it was months after the tournament.
Neither of these options are good for the sport. The Disc Golf Network keeps getting better don’t get us wrong but having a paywall to watch live coverage on a growing sport will hinder its growth. Jomez also is the best. Their editing, commentating, and quick breakdown of each hole are the reason we fell in love with the sport and why many people do. However, it’s the next day. That’s it, that’s the problem. No top tier sports rely on next day coverage.
Next season, the DGPT needs to consider losing money on the subscription fee for the Disc Golf Network and have the live coverage available on YouTube. This may be an unpopular opinion for those of you who want to keep the sport small in its niche market. As someone with a background in sports business, I want to see this sport bring in money, as much as possible, for the players and the brands. When big media companies like TMZ, Barstool, and ESPN mention McBeth's new contract and a bunch of people become interested in Disc Golf, if they can’t find an easy way to watch, it’s a turn off. This sport has a ton of potential. Down the road these players can make hundreds of thousands of dollars, if not millions. We need to let the sport reach its potential while there is interest.
- Mainstream Disc Golf -
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