Memphis game Attendance?

[Jackets N Pones]

PonyFans.com forum members asssssemmmbbblllleeeeeeee! Invite friends, family and co-workers to witness this program-changing W! The program needs MUSTANG NATION!

Below is an e-mail template to cut and paste in an e-mail and send out. Easy as Ke'Mon Freeman on 3rd and 2. Do it!

______________________

Friends,

As you may already know, SMU is currently in first place in the American "West" division. If they win out they will play the East winner for the conference championship, which would obviously be huge for the program. The toughest remaining game will be against the Memphis Tigers this Friday night at 8:00 pm at Ford Stadium. It's going to be a fun atmosphere to catch some college football on a Friday night. Let me know if you are interested in attending and PONY UP!

http://theamerican.org/standings.aspx?path=football

[HarvCrimYaleBlue]

[dr rc]

SMU cries about attendance but has 2 Friday night games. Can't build a fan base this way.

SMU really has no say in the matter. ESPN pulls all the strings. As long as the AAC is with ESPN this will happen with regularity because they have a glut of college programming and need to spread it out over multiple days.

[Nacho]

are we really that much of a draw for espn?
why do we have 2 Friday games?

[malonish]

I will miss the game as well. Friday games make it much less likely that I can make it.

[SMU_Alum11]

Wife and I will be there and Hope friend and his wife. We all know the implications so we will be rowdy and puss off some of our tea sipping safe space fans!

Btw - anyone know what it means when it says: “Your IP has been blocked because it’s blacklisted”? Asking for a friend...

[Insane_Pony_Posse]

Btw - anyone know what it means when it says: “Your IP has been blocked because it’s blacklisted”? Asking for a friend...

https://www.whatismyip.com/why-is-my-ip-blacklisted/

[AusTxPony]

I will be there with friends. We need this one, so anything I can do to help...

[peruna81]

SMU cries about attendance but has 2 Friday night games. Can't build a fan base this way.

Wisdom here....Friday nights belong to high school football in the state of Texas...especially in November playoff time.

Yeah there is TV...but that isn't a butt in the seats. I dread a game that has the legendary "ECU game crowd" this Friday.

BTW, if no one shows and we still win, it is much more palatable...just sayin'.

[SMU Pom Mom]

I wonder how many will take advantage of this special. One football game, one men's bball and one women's bball for $29.
https://www.facebook.com/SMUMustangs/ph ... =3&theater

[dr rc]

are we really that much of a draw for espn?
why do we have 2 Friday games?

Once their Disney overlords started questioning why ESPN spent a bajillion dollars to own the rights to every conference they were forced to air as much football as possible. Just 10 years ago there was maybe a single Thursday night game and those usually didn't start until later in the year. Now they have (oftentimes multiple) games on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, Fridays, and of course Saturdays. The less leverage a conference has with ESPN the more likely they are to get stuck playing a weekday game. Big 12, Pac 12, ACC, AAC, and MWC teams tend to get hit with Thursday and Friday games. The AAC and MWC seem to get designated for Thursday/Friday more so than the Pac/ACC/Big12. Either way, these games tend to hurt attendance numbers. MAC and Sun Belt teams get it the worst as they also get saddled with Tuesday and Wednesday games that absolutely kill their ability to draw a respectable attendance. Big Ten teams will occasionally get Friday night games on FS1 which indicates just how much control they ceded when they got in bed with Fox. Aside from the opening weekend and during Thanksgiving the SEC is pretty much able to avoid mid week games. Fairly new creations like week 0 and week 1 running from Thursday through Monday are also due to ESPN needed to justify to Disney how much they spent on CFB.

[mrydel]

I still remember when ESPN aired only one game a week on Saturday and replayed it many times the following week until the next Saturday. I watched our 1980 Texas win about 20 times the week following the victory.

[Nacho]

are we really that much of a draw for espn?
why do we have 2 Friday games?

Once their Disney overlords started questioning why ESPN spent a bajillion dollars to own the rights to every conference they were forced to air as much football as possible. Just 10 years ago there was maybe a single Thursday night game and those usually didn't start until later in the year. Now they have (oftentimes multiple) games on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, Fridays, and of course Saturdays. The less leverage a conference has with ESPN the more likely they are to get stuck playing a weekday game. Big 12, Pac 12, ACC, AAC, and MWC teams tend to get hit with Thursday and Friday games. The AAC and MWC seem to get designated for Thursday/Friday more so than the Pac/ACC/Big12. Either way, these games tend to hurt attendance numbers. MAC and Sun Belt teams get it the worst as they also get saddled with Tuesday and Wednesday games that absolutely kill their ability to draw a respectable attendance. Big Ten teams will occasionally get Friday night games on FS1 which indicates just how much control they ceded when they got in bed with Fox. Aside from the opening weekend and during Thanksgiving the SEC is pretty much able to avoid mid week games. Fairly new creations like week 0 and week 1 running from Thursday through Monday are also due to ESPN needed to justify to Disney how much they spent on CFB.

i appreciate the response but I wonder why we got hit with 2 Friday night games. did we sell out for more money? is it a money grab at the expense of a Saturday game?

[BUS]

Jacket and pones... cut and pasted the invite to 30 people that just may buy a ticket on cime watch.

Great growth on this team and coaching staff.

Go Mustangs- kick em.

[dr rc]

are we really that much of a draw for espn?
why do we have 2 Friday games?

Once their Disney overlords started questioning why ESPN spent a bajillion dollars to own the rights to every conference they were forced to air as much football as possible. Just 10 years ago there was maybe a single Thursday night game and those usually didn't start until later in the year. Now they have (oftentimes multiple) games on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, Fridays, and of course Saturdays. The less leverage a conference has with ESPN the more likely they are to get stuck playing a weekday game. Big 12, Pac 12, ACC, AAC, and MWC teams tend to get hit with Thursday and Friday games. The AAC and MWC seem to get designated for Thursday/Friday more so than the Pac/ACC/Big12. Either way, these games tend to hurt attendance numbers. MAC and Sun Belt teams get it the worst as they also get saddled with Tuesday and Wednesday games that absolutely kill their ability to draw a respectable attendance. Big Ten teams will occasionally get Friday night games on FS1 which indicates just how much control they ceded when they got in bed with Fox. Aside from the opening weekend and during Thanksgiving the SEC is pretty much able to avoid mid week games. Fairly new creations like week 0 and week 1 running from Thursday through Monday are also due to ESPN needed to justify to Disney how much they spent on CFB.

i appreciate the response but I wonder why we got hit with 2 Friday night games. did we sell out for more money? is it a money grab at the expense of a Saturday game?

SMU doesn't have much choice in the situation. ESPN gets to schedule the games when they want for the most part. It's in the deal the AAC signed (thanks much for giving a lowball offer that was easy to match NBC Sports!) Even the mighty SEC gets stuck playing 11am games they'd prefer be night games on Saturday. They are really only notable in the scheduling talk b/c they've been able to avoid midweek games thus far. However, I wouldn't be surprised if they eventually get tagged for those types of games too.

Remember, ESPN owns so much CFB content they actually sell some of it off to CBSSN (w/none of that money going to the AAC or MWC) just to try and balance out their costs.

If you want Friday night games to end (or at the very least become far less frequent) you are in favor of the AAC signing a deal with somebody other than ESPN. The problem is ESPN still has right of first refusal so the AAC needs to get an offer large enough that ESPN decides against matching.

Of course, that leads into another problem. If you think the ESPN talking heads denigrate the AAC now, just wait and see what happens if they aren't airing any AAC games. Remember how hockey used to be a big part of ESPN? Then remember when ESPN lost the NHL rights how hockey talk practically vanished from the channel? ESPN is already on a crusade to minimize the G5 (a term they made out of thin air) because in the long run they don't want those conferences to command a higher price when their rights deals come up. Their sudden push to split FBS up a few years ago is directly related to Disney telling them to stop spending so damn much on sports rights that aren't turning the profit they thought they would yield due to the Bristol leaders completely missing that cord cutting was going to eat massive chunks out of their cable rights deals. So if the AAC isn't on ESPN at all? Oh my, they'll ignore it other than to bash how terrible the schedules are b/c they won't want teams moving in on the CFB teams they have an investment in.