![\"Learfield](\"https:\/\/staging.sportsvideo.org\/main\/files\/2013\/05\/CollegeBiz1.gif\")
<\/a>Learfield Sports\u2019 Joe Ferreira (left) and Fox Sports South\u2019s Jeff Genthner<\/p><\/div>\n
\u201cPro sports is like trading entertainment stock. It\u2019s day stock: if your team is doing well, then everyone buys the stock, and you jump on the bandwagon; but, if your team is on a 12-game losing streak, everyone is sell, sell, sell,\u201d said Jeff Genthner, SVP\/GM, Fox Sports South. \u201cBut you don\u2019t see that in college sports. Fans are extremely passionate no matter what. There is something unique about college sports to tap into there.\u201d<\/p>\n
Evolution of Production
\n<\/b>Both the production side and the distribution side of college sports video have evolved dramatically over the past decade, with leaps forward in technology and changing consumer viewing habits leading the way.<\/b><\/p>\n
Few have been closer to the front lines of this evolution than Mark Rodin, director of Seminole Productions, Florida State University, who was honored with the second-annual SVG College Sports Summit Pioneer Award. Since he arrived at Florida State University 26 years ago, Seminole Productions has gone from a two-person department shooting on film and focused solely on football and basketball to a staff of 14 full-timers and 50-plus students producing nearly every sport on campus.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe amount of content we are producing has skyrocketed. We used to be focused on bigger sports, like football, basketball, baseball at FSU,\u201d he said. \u201cBut now every sport we are producing. When I started, it was me and one other person. Now I have a staff of 14 with 50 students working on a variety of productions and features. Everyone wants to see everything all the time so we are having to cover things we\u2019ve never had to cover before.\u201d<\/p>\n
Evolution of Distribution
\n<\/b>Another major development in the past decade has been the total overhaul of the distribution model for college sports content. Genthner harked back to his days as managing director of the U.S. Olympic Entertainment Properties during the Nagano and Sydney Olympics, noting that he had had all the production facilities and tools necessary (including an HD production facility in Colorado Springs, CO, and a Panasonic technology sponsorship) to produce plenty of content in non-Games years but there was nowhere to distribute it. In today\u2019s world, of course, there are countless linear-television and broadband distribution paths for rights owners to distribute this kind of second-tier content.<\/b><\/p>\n
\u201cWe had the tools \u2026 but we couldn\u2019t get distribution because there weren\u2019t the distribution paths,\u201d he said. \u201cBut today there is so much distribution out there. It goes way beyond television. ESPN3 is a viable distribution network in the eyes of [major college conferences]. The distribution is available; the discussion is, how does an institution invest in and create the machine through which they can feed that distribution pipe.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Challenge of the Coaches Show
\n<\/b>One element of college video that has yet to evolve to the next level, at least according to Learfield Sports Chief Content Officer Joe Ferreira, is the coaches show. While interest in college sports has never been higher, the production value of this type of shoulder programming continues to lag at many schools.<\/b><\/p>\n
\u201cOne challenge I would throw out to all our school partners and any schools here is, coaches shows stink. They\u2019re horrible,\u201d he said. \u201cThey\u2019re the same show that they were 20 years ago. It\u2019s always \u2018Hey, Coach, wasn\u2019t that a great week? Here\u2019s some highlights? What about next week? And goodnight.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cSo one of the challenges I present to us and to colleges is, how do we create that coaches show 2.0,\u201d he continued. \u201cYou have [University of Alabama head coach] Nick Saban for a half an hour; you just don\u2019t get that kind of access anywhere else. We need to do a better job of that with social-media [integration] and making it more relevant. It\u2019s not just coaches shows but everything that surrounds the programs you care about.\u201d<\/p>\n
How Can You Create an ROI on Gear? From left: Florida State University\u2019s Mark Rodin, The Cheyenne Group\u2019s Bill Cella, and Ferreira<\/p><\/div>\n Then, he took it one step further and began producing content for state and legislative entities in Tallahassee, where FSU is located. Today, according to Rodin, Seminole Productions creates hundreds of thousands of dollars of self-funding by producing these non-sports shows, bringing in more funds for athletics production endeavors.<\/p>\n \u201cAbout 70% of our work is still athletics with the video boards and all the other content we do, but that other 30% allows us to have funds to maintain our equipment without tapping into the boosters and athletic department all the time for funding,\u201d he said. \u201cIt has served us in that we utilize students and help them learn and get the labor but [we ] also maintain a mechanism to upgrade our facilities without having to go to athletics all the time. So everyone ends up benefiting because we have the ability to those types of production.\u201d<\/p>\n The Next Big Thing in College Sports Production \u201cWhen we see some kind of technology that is interesting, \u2026 it really intrigues people and gets people to be more attentive to what they are watching, and they become more loyal to that brand,\u201d said\u00a0<\/strong>Bill Cella, Partner at The Cheyenne Group. \u201cThe Pac-12 has video of the pregame show with the referees, which I think is really cool. You need things like that in production that really get viewers\u2019 attention. So I only encourage you to keep doing what you\u2019re doing and keep coming up with innovative production ideas for us viewers.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" To see what a booming business college sports is today, one need look no further than the rapidly increasing media-rights deals and proliferation of revenue-rich conference and university networks over […]\n More<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[7382,7341,3250,7383,2657,3251],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.sportsvideo.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55118"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.sportsvideo.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.sportsvideo.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.sportsvideo.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.sportsvideo.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55118"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/staging.sportsvideo.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55118\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.sportsvideo.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55118"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.sportsvideo.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55118"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.sportsvideo.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55118"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n<\/b>Budget-consciousness and student staffing can take video departments only so far. At some point, they have to show their athletic directors and presidents some sort of return on investment. In Rodin\u2019s case, Seminole Productions opted to seek out production gigs in other campus departments to justify the cost of expensive gear and ever-changing technology. <\/b><\/p>\n<\/a>
\n<\/b>As much as the state of college sports production has evolved, however, there is still plenty of room for further growth, especially when it comes to the search for the next great production or technology element in a sports telecast. <\/b><\/p>\n