Stadium (sports network)

In March 2017, unconfirmed reports speculated that Sinclair was planning to shutter its sports unit, American Sports Network, and give its remaining sports rights to Campus Insiders. The Charleston Gazette-Mail, however, citing ASN employees, reported that the rumors of a complete shuttering were false, but that the division was planning to re-locate its headquarters, restructure its operations, and achieve "stronger, more diversified distribution." The original rumors were based upon reports of layoffs from ASN's current headquarters in West Palm Beach, Florida, connected to the planned re-location.^[1]

On April 13, 2017, Sinclair officially announced that ASN would be re-launched later in the year as part of a joint venture with Campus Insiders owner Silver Chalice (itself owned by the Chicago White Sox), and its online sports video service 120 Sports. The new operation will be operated as linear and digital offerings; the linear service would utilize the syndication and broadcast network built out for ASN, while the digital platform would stream full-time online and through Twitter. 120 Sports would provide original studio and long-form programming to the venture.^[2][3]

On May 1, 2017, it was announced that the new joint venture would be known as Stadium.^[4] On June 1, 2017, it was reported that Stadium would officially launch around late-July 2017.^[5] The service officially launched on August 21, 2017.^[6][7]

In 2019, with Sinclair's expansions into regional sports networks via acquisitions of Fox Sports Networks, a minority stake in YES Network, and the establishment of Marquee Sports Network with the Chicago Cubs, Sinclair CEO Chris Ripley said of Stadium's role in the expanded sports offerings: "That will be our national play. I don’t see it competing head to head with FS1 or ESPN. It's not there yet with its maturity."^[8]

In 2021, Stadium began to synergize with the rebranded Bally Sports, including co-producing an Opening Day launch special for the networks on April 1,^[9] and adopting its on-air graphics package for college sports broadcasts beginning in the 2021–22 academic season.^[10] The Fox College Sports cable channels were quietly rebranded as Stadium College Sports in June,^[11] and in 2022 Stadium began to produce the national studio show The Rally for the Bally Sports channels.^[12]

In May 2023, amid the bankruptcy of Bally Sports' parent company Diamond Sports Group, Sinclair sold its controlling interest in Stadium to Silver Chalice. Sinclair stated that the network did not have enough viewership for Sinclair to continue funding it; Sinclair will continue to supply some programming.^[13][14] As a consequence of the sale, Sinclair discontinued its distribution of Stadium in October 2023, replacing it with its new network The Nest.^[15] Stadium College Sports also ceased operations at the end of the year.^[16]

In April 2024, the Chicago Sun-Times reported that the White Sox, Chicago Blackhawks, and Chicago Bulls were in negotiations with Stadium for it to acquire their regional media rights, as their contracts with NBC Sports Chicago are set to expire in October 2024.^[17] In May 2024, The Athletic subsequently reported an agreement with Standard Media that would involve a newly-launched multi-platform regional sports network;^[18] the Sun-Times later reported that Standard Media would primarily serve as a funding and distribution partner, and that Stadium was to serve as the teams' new home.^[19]

The service is distributed mainly via streaming television services and associated apps (including third-party services, as well as Sinclair's own Stirr service).^[20] The American Sports Network linear service, which was distributed as a digital subchannel network, transitioned to Stadium on September 6, 2017.^[21] The network has also reached deals for traditional cable distribution.^[22] Stadium also offers a subscription service, "Stadium Plus", which offers access to premium events and on-demand content (including commercial-free replays of broadcasts, and classic games).^[23]

In November 2017, Facebook acquired rights to 47 college basketball telecasts from Stadium, which stream exclusively on Facebook Watch and an associated Facebook page.^[24]

In May 2018, Stadium partnered with Twitch to stream its content on the service, as well as an exclusive Twitch Stadium 2 channel that features additional commentary and analysis.^[25]

Live sports airing on Stadium include Minor League Baseball, the Savannah Bananas,^[26] the A7FL^[27] and the United Fight Alliance.^[28]

Its weekday lineup of studio programs currently include The Territory with Michael Kim, Emerge (which focuses on high school sports), Campus Insiders, and Sauce & Shram with Dave Ross and Tyler Jacobs, and The Fantasy Sportsbook.^[29]

Podcasts

• Points In The Paint Podcast – NBA focused podcast hosted by Ben Wittenstein and Zach Badger-House.

Past programming

Stadium's college sports programming at launch included events from Conference USA, the Mountain West Conference, the Patriot League, the Southern Conference, and the West Coast Conference.^[30]

Stadium, as with other networks distributed by digital multicast networks, was required to preempt three hours of its weekly schedule for educational children's programming. With the exception of DragonflyTV, most of Stadium's educational shows are sports-related to minimize interruption; The Real Winning Edge, Sports Lab, Future Phenoms and Sports Stars of Tomorrow make up Stadium's educational lineup as of 2019. This has been discontinued since 2023.

• Michael Kim
• Shams Charania

• Official website