I've posted this before but it seems relevant.
Move to both Friday night and Saturday night doubleheaders on Free to air with the nights split between different networks (eg Nine and Seven). Instead of Super Saturday, make Sunday afternoon the Pay TV super day with three live games from 1pm to 7pm AEST. On Sunday night allow the third free to air network (eg. Ten) to show an edited replay of one of the Super Sunday games in the style of the old Big Match Replay from the late eighties (ie. four full games plus a fifth edited replay each week on network television). And sell Monday nights separately from the rest of the Pay TV games to allow the possibility it could be picked up by a newcomer who only wants to commit to one game a week (eg. ESPN)
Assuming an 18 team comp running over 26 weeks and that New Zealand are one of the two new teams then we could offer packages something like this...
Friday Night Free To Air
- 49 game package + finals
- Broadcast rights in Australia
- 1 x Live at 7pm + 1x Replay at 9pm
- First 16 weeks scheduled in advance of season
- 1 match per week involving a Queensland team
- 1st pick for remainder of season
- 4 x Finals matches
- Grand Final in even numbered years
Saturday Night Free To Air
- 49 game package + finals
- Broadcast rights in Australia
- 1 x Live at 7pm + 1x Replay at 9pm
- First 16 weeks scheduled in advance of season
- 1 match per week involving a Queensland team
- 2nd pick for remainder of season
- 4 x Finals matches
- Grand Final in odd numbered years
Weekend Subscription Television
- 100 game package (26 Saturday, 74 Sunday)
- Broadcast rights in Australia
- 1x Live 5pm Saturday
- 3x Live 1pm, 3pm and 5pm Sunday
- First 16 weeks scheduled in advance of season
- 1 match per week involving a Queensland team
- 3rd pick for remainder of season
Sunday Night Free To Air Replay (Low cost package)
- 26 game package (All second airing)
- Broadcast rights in Australia
- Replay of one Sunday afternoon match (not before 7pm)
- Localised by region
- No production costs
Monday Night Subscription Television
- 18 game package (All live)
- Broadcast rights in Australia and New Zealand
- 1x Live 7pm Monday
- 1 home game per club
- All games scheduled in advance of season
New Zealand Free To Air
- 52 game package (44 live, 8 replay) + finals
- Broadcast rights in New Zealand
- 1 x 7pm NZT Saturday, 1x 7pm NZT Sunday
- 48 games involving Zealand team
- 2x New Zealand derby
- 4x Finals matches
- Grand Final
New Zealand Subscription Television
- 146 game package (102 live, 44 replay) + finals
- Broadcast rights in New Zealand
- 1x Live at 9pm NZT + 1x Replay at 11pm NZT Friday
- 1x Live at 9pm NZT + 1x Replay at 11pm NZT Saturday
- 2x Live at 3pm and 5pm NZT Sunday
- 4x Finals matches
- No production costs
Some points worth nothing.
I suggest a compromise between fixed and rolling schedule. Fix the schedule for the first half to two-thirds of the season when every team is still in contention and the contenders haven't yet been separated from the pretenders (I've suggested the first 16 rounds - ie. the first 8 out of 12 home games for each club would be fixed). And then post Origin, when the club comp needs a boost and we start building to the finals, move to a rolling schedule to allow us to showcase our best games and avoid showing turkeys.
The only exception to the above would be the Monday Night package where all 18 games (ie. one home game per club per season) would be scheduled up front at the start of the season. This gives the Monday night package an extra kick in value while allowing us to spread the burden evenly among all teams. And it allows us to maximise the chance for fans to plan to get to the ground for what would still be our most inaccessible timeslot.
For free to air the idea would be to split the Friday night and Saturday night doubleheader packages between two different networks. So if Seven hang onto the Friday night AFL and Nine gets the Friday night doubleheader then ideally we'd get Seven showing the Saturday night doubleheader against the AFL on Channel Ten. And to take it one step further, you could end up with Ten (or their OneHD subsidiary) showing the Sunday night edited replay. The big advantage of spreading around the packages like this is that no one gets complacent in their coverage. If one of the networks is being lazy in the quality of their commentary or camera work then it'll quickly get shown up by the competition. But most importantly in my opinion, by ensuring all the major networks have a stake in the coverage you deter them from trashing the game to build up a rival code. They'd be damaging their own product instead of just the competition (ie. Seven's position up till now)
As I've described in another post, I'd like to see us move our second Free to Air timeslot away from Sunday afternoon to a Saturday night doubleheader. Instead on Sunday we'd offer Pay TV a tripleheader of live games (with a guarantee of one match involving a Queensland team in rounds with fixed scheduling and 3rd pick in rounds with rolling scheduling) But then to help ensure that some teams like the Raiders aren't left hidden on Pay TV we bring back the edited 90 min Sunday night replay, with the replayed match varying by region. So Fox would get to show three live matches and then Channel Ten would get to replay one match in each region. In southern NSW they would show the match that involved the Raiders, in Sydney they'd show a game with one or two Sydney teams and in Queensland they show a match involving a Queensland team. For the free to air channel, this would be a nice cheap package with no production costs because they'd just be replaying the Fox production. But there'd still the incentive for Pay TV because it's the exclusive place to see the games live or watch an out of market match.
New Zealand is the one market that I am continually amazed we overlook when talking about expansion and television rights. The potential a second team would give us - in terms of being able to offer NZ television a regular weekly primetime timeslot with a local team, two games most weeks with a local team and two blockbuster local derbys each season - it really would be Queensland mark two. We could offer one high value package for free to air that had two matches each week with a Kiwi team and the blockbuster derby matches and then a second lesser value but zero production cost package for pay television that had all the other matches - including the first and second pick Friday and Saturday night doubleheaders.
Leigh.
