On the Hardwood: After Assisting Fox Sports Sun, Miami Heat Retrofit Control Room for Games in AmericanAirlines Arena Instead of a production truck, the RSN worked from the control room during the NBA bubble By Kristian Hernandez, Associate Editor
Wednesday, January 20, 2021 - 10:47 am
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story Highlights
The doldrums of 2020 may be in the past, but 2021 is still presenting challenges to in-venue production teams. Now out of the Orlando bubble, NBA organizations are hosting games in their home arenas and navigating the continuing difficulties of the pandemic. Like SVG's At the Ballpark and On the Gridiron series, On the Hardwood will take a look the hardships, creative ideas, and teamwork of NBA franchises.
The Miami Heat traveled the 245 miles north to the NBA bubble in Orlando and made a surprise run to the NBA Finals as the No. 5 seed. During the bubble, HEATv, the organization's broadcast- and in-venue-production department, allowed Fox Sports Sun to use the control room in AmericanAirlines Arena as its broadcast hub for the playoff games and subsequently revamped the space to accommodate social distancing and safety protocols during the current regular season.
Miami Heat's Josh Goshin in the NBA bubble last year
While [Miami Heat Director, Game Presentation,] Josh Goshin was in the bubble and helping our players there, we converted our control room for our RSN at the arena, says Kurt Doster, director, arena video production, Miami Heat. Instead of bringing in a live truck, we integrated a lot of their equipment into our room.
MORE ON THE HARDWOOD INTERVIEWS:
Denver Nuggets Repurpose RSN Broadcast With Some In-Venue Flavor
Atlanta Hawks Honor Legacy of Martin Luther King Jr. in First of Season-Long Unity Nights'
Bubble Operations: Fox Sports Sun Takes Over Control Room The players might have been away from the AmericanAirlines Arena, but the building was buzzing with activity down on the floor and up in the control room. When Fox Sports Sun wanted to cover the Heat's play in the bubble, including broadcasts of the non-national games, HEATv adapted the RSN's workflows and hardware to the space.
Down on the floor, the network's broadcast team called the game courtside through TV screens and produced pre/postgame and halftime shows from the arena. Part of the crew at the forefront of this endeavor, Doster served as technical director for the practice games, eight restart games, and the first round of the playoffs.
The Fox Sports Sun broadcast team sat courtside for games played in the Orlando bubble.
It was a weird time because, up in the control room, we're expecting to play off the sound of the fans since we're in the playoffs but it's a silent bowl, he says. It definitely took some adjusting to because, in every other run we've ever had [to the finals], the building's packed and people are going crazy.
In Orlando, the Miami Heat crew had its fair share of responsibilities. Goshin was at the helm of productions in the Wide World of Sports complex. In Miami, production and creative-services crews worked overtime to develop a hefty amount of content to play on the LED videoboards installed behind the team benches at Wide World of Sports.
We tried to provide as much content as we could to make the players feel like they were at home, says Doster. We sent 200 files [to Orlando] using our pool of assets between our media-production and motion-graphics crews. We wanted that content to give the players a little extra push that we hope to give during a normal home game.
Back in Miami: Team Rebuilds Control Room, Commits to In-Venue Energy After the NBA season, instead of returning the control room to its previous layout, HEATv used the two-month offseason to forge ahead in the face of the pandemic. Besides removing a lot of the infrastructure installed for Fox Sports Sun, the effort rearranged other equipment to optimize productions and enforce safety for the onsite crew.
We're doing everything we possibly can to ensure the safety of our workers, says Doster. We've reduced the crew a little bit, but I also have to request permission for anybody who's going to enter the arena. When we arrive, we fill out a form with standard health questions, get our temperature checked, and get a color code that determines the spaces in the arena that we have access to.
After Fox Sports Sun's departure, HEATv rearranged its control room, including installation of additional equipment racks.
Following those guidelines, the control room has plexiglass dividers between workstations, and employees don protective face coverings. From a production perspective, the franchise is diving deep on some of the game-day staples that AmericanAirlines Arena has become known for, including PA announcer Michael Baiamonte's 2 Minutes call and player introductions. In addition, the crew is deploying crowd prompts despite the empty seats.
As we discussed [the plan] more, did a couple of games, and started to get the feel of it, Doster adds, we realized that we could play with the fake crowd noise to match some things that we were doing on the videoboard. If the other team is shooting free throws, we'll pull up a scream graphic or if there's a big three-pointer in the fourth quarter, there will be a huge eruption.
Content Gathering: New-Look Media Day Gives Access to Players Direct access to players is hard to obtain during the pandemic, but, in an effort to create content for the videoboard and, for example, graphics for social media, HEATv worked alongside Fox Sports Sun to host Media Day at the beginning of the season. The three-day shoot was facilitated by a 14-member team representing HEATv, which determined what rooms could be used; the RSN, which handled the interviews; and
North America Stories
13/11/2026
The UIM E1 Series wraps its third season this week with the Bombay Sapphire E1 Miami GP, Nov. 11-14, on Biscayne Bay at the Miami Seaplane Base on Watson Island...
13/11/2026
In-venue and creative video staffers at the professional and collegiate level ha...
13/11/2026
Singer-songwriter Benson Boone will headline entertainment for the Discover NHL Winter Classic between the Utah Mammoth and Colorado Avalanche at Rice-Eccles St...
13/11/2026
Blackmagic Design has announced the Blackmagic Ambisonic Microphone, a 7th order ambisonic microphone array that captures spatial audio for immersive video prod...
13/11/2026
SMPTE has announced that The Studio B&H and Riedel Communications will provide the video infrastructure and communications technology for the Solutions Hub at t...
13/11/2026
The Hollywood Professional Association (HPA) has announced the theme and program focus for the 2027 HPA Tech Retreat, which takes place Feb. 14-18, 2027, in La ...
13/11/2026
Football Manager 27 Touch is available on Apple Arcade starting today. The game ...
13/11/2026
MotoGP has announced a two-year media rights agreement with ESPN covering the Un...
13/11/2026
Apple Sports, the free iPhone app, has added the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) to its lineup of supported sports, in time for Saturday's UFC 334. The...
13/11/2026
The NBA and Fanatics Studios, the joint venture between Fanatics and entertainme...
13/11/2026
ESPN held its annual EDGE Innovation Conference last night and offered up an ove...
13/11/2026
Regional sports network gives Ithaca College, SUNY Cortland students a platform to thrive
One of the biggest games in Division III college football will be pla...
13/11/2026
Share
{alert(Link copied)}).catch(err => {console.error(Failed to copy: , err)}) data-platform=copy_link data-action= class=font-ui-heading py-2 text-sm tex...
13/11/2026
Share
{alert(Link copied)}).catch(err => {console.error(Failed to copy: , err)}) data-platform=copy_link data-action= class=font-ui-heading py-2 text-sm tex...
13/11/2026
Share
{alert(Link copied)}).catch(err => {console.error(Failed to copy: , err)}) data-platform=copy_link data-action= class=font-ui-heading py-2 text-sm tex...
13/11/2026
Blue Lucy, the workflow orchestration and integration platform for broadcasters, rights owners and localisation companies, today announced an integration with c...
13/11/2026
Krotos announces Black Friday offers on Studio Pro and Studio Max
Brie Clayton November 12, 2026
0 Comments
First-year annual plans start at US$195.99...
13/11/2026
Blackmagic Design Announces Blackmagic Ambisonic Microphone
Brie Clayton November 12, 2026
0 Comments
New 7th order ambisonic microphone with 108 MEMS...
13/11/2026
Meet the Berklee Student Setting Planetary Motion to Music With his compositional platform SoniKosmos, Javier Roqueni aims to make the universe the ultimate i...
13/11/2026
Share
{alert(Link copied)}).catch(err => {console.error(Failed to copy: , er...
13/11/2026
Share
{alert(Link copied)}).catch(err => {console.error(Failed to copy: , err)}) data-platform=copy_link data-action= class=font-ui-heading py-2 text-sm tex...
13/11/2026
Share
{alert(Link copied)}).catch(err => {console.error(Failed to copy: , err)}) data-platform=copy_link data-action= class=font-ui-heading py-2 text-sm tex...
13/11/2026
Share
{alert(Link copied)}).catch(err => {console.error(Failed to copy: , err)}) data-platform=copy_link data-action= class=font-ui-heading py-2 text-sm tex...
13/11/2026
Share
{alert(Link copied)}).catch(err => {console.error(Failed to copy: , er...
13/11/2026
Share
{alert(Link copied)}).catch(err => {console.error(Failed to copy: , err)}) data-platform=copy_link data-action= class=font-ui-heading py-2 text-sm tex...
13/11/2026
Share
{alert(Link copied)}).catch(err => {console.error(Failed to copy: , err)}) data-platform=copy_link data-action= class=font-ui-heading py-2 text-sm tex...
13/11/2026
Share
{alert(Link copied)}).catch(err => {console.error(Failed to copy: , err)}) data-platform=copy_link data-action= class=font-ui-heading py-2 text-sm tex...
13/11/2026
Share
{alert(Link copied)}).catch(err => {console.error(Failed to copy: , err)}) data-platform=copy_link data-action= class=font-ui-heading py-2 text-sm tex...
13/11/2026
Share
{alert(Link copied)}).catch(err => {console.error(Failed to copy: , err)}) data-platform=copy_link data-action= class=font-ui-heading py-2 text-sm tex...
13/11/2026
Amagi, the media industry cloud company, today announced a partnership with Golden Times Media Technology (stock code 920021.BJ), a Beijing-based media and tech...
13/11/2026
CGI (TSX: GIB.A) (NYSE: GIB), one of the largest independent IT and business consulting services firms in the world, together with its Malaysian partner, Cedar ...
13/11/2026
SMPTE, the home for media professionals, technologists and engineers, today announced that The Studio B&H and Riedel Communications will provide the video infra...
13/11/2026
iWedia, a global leader in connected TV software solutions, will present its software-first approach to DRAM optimization at Android TV APAC Summit 2026 in Bang...
13/11/2026
From pediatric research to smart hospitals, AI is helping care teams spend less time on routine tasks and more time with patients.
Health systems and startups...
12/11/2026
Industry leaders examine how Dynamic Media Facility, Media eXchange Layer, and c...
12/11/2026
The junior Tar Heel is embracing the technical and creative challenges of live production while emerging as a leader and mentor in the control room...
12/11/2026
Gracenote, Nielsen's content intelligence business, has released its fifth a...
12/11/2026
RTL Deutschland will bring the NHL to free-to-air TV in Germany starting Nov. 30...
12/11/2026
Clear-Com supported On Air 2026, a 24-hour student-led broadcast connecting 45 u...
12/11/2026
uniqFEED has opened a Remote Operations Center (ROC) in Madrid, Spain. It is already operational, delivering virtual advertising for LaLiga matches. The ROC is ...
12/11/2026
Disney, ESPN and the NBA will present Dunk the Halls, the third real-time animated NBA game using Sony's Beyond Sports data visualization technology, on Chr...
12/11/2026
Van Wagner has launched Van Wagner RELAY, a digital platform for official athlet...
12/11/2026
Deal brings together two of the industry's most established graphics brands and significantly expands Vizrt's footprint in U.S. sports and regional broa...
12/11/2026
Euro TV Production GmbH of Austria has upgraded its outside broadcast vehicle with Lawo technology. The mc 36 Classic console in service since 2019 was replaced...
12/11/2026
Tagboard has launched Spark Resize, an AI-assisted tool now in beta that takes an existing graphic and produces a new version for a different aspect ratio or sc...
12/11/2026
Ben Winston, Glenn Weiss, and FIFA's Jenni-Lee Van Gelder headlined a day fo...
12/11/2026
Free interactive platform visualizes team tendencies, formations, and schemes, updated weekly...
12/11/2026
Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer Charlie Jablonski's broadcasting career is...
12/11/2026
Gracenote's 2026 State of Play report signals a rising retention risk: More ...
On the Hardwood: After Assisting Fox Sports Sun, Miami Heat Retrofit Control Room for Games in AmericanAirlines Arena Instead of a production truck, the RSN worked from the control room during the NBA bubble By Kristian Hernandez, Associate Editor 
