Starting from scratch, the team built an in-house content platform comprising game broadcasts, studio programming, and digitalWhen the Atlanta Braves decided to bring the club's broadcast operations fully in-house and launch its own network, the team faced a seemingly impossible timeline. The club officially exited its Main Street Sport Group deal at the beginning of February - less than two months before Opening Day.
What Braves President/CEO Derek Schiller and club leadership had in mind was not simply a new regional sports network but a comprehensive content platform centered on one of the most successful franchises in sports.
Based on the DNA of the ballclub and everything it has achieved on the media side over the years, Braves leadership made the decision to bring broadcast operations in-house, says industry veteran Jeff Cravens, whom the Braves brought in to oversee the project. And due to the timing, we needed to launch a network in about 35 days. The only way you can do it is with great partnerships, a lot of trust, and a lot of hard work.
The result was BravesVision, a new content platform built around live game production, studio programming, and a growing digital footprint, with sales, marketing, and distribution of its telecasts all controlled by the Atlanta Braves.
At the front bench: (from left) TD Chris Birchfield, Director Brent Krzytan, producer Gretchen Kaney From the outset, the club was focused on reaching Braves fans where they are in today's fast-changing, multimedia environment, and that means providing fans with a variety of destinations to get our content, says Cravens. The Braves have a long and storied relationship with the media entity and the fans, and we also have one of the largest footprints in all of Major League Baseball, so it was important for us to think about this as a long-term content platform.
Distribution and content consumption continues to change very rapidly, he continues. We want to be there for our fans regardless of what the future looks like. We now have a linear network that we will continue to build, but we also have a lot of other ways we're distributing that content to reach the fans.
Raycom to the Rescue: Tapping a Southeastern Sports Giant
The first call the Braves had to make was choosing a production partner. Raycom Sports, the Charlotte, NC-based sports-television company and Gray Media subsidiary, had a working relationship with Atlanta through a prior deal that covered Spring Training games, regular-season simulcasts, and studio programming. Raycom Sports also has a long history in the Southeast (especially in broadcasting college sports) and had successfully partnered in recent years with the New Orleans Pelicans to launch Gulf Coast Sports & Entertainment Network (GCSEN) and PWHL to run point on their broadcast operations.
I think the easiest decision that Derek Schiller made for the Braves during this process was to partner on the production side with Raycom, says Cravens, not just because of the existing relationship with Gray but because of the phenomenal people involved and the expertise that they bring to the table.
Once Raycom Sports was in place, BravesVision had to fill out the rest of its lineup of partners: suppliers of mobile units, master control, DTC streaming, studio facilities, new graphics package, and much more.
We tried to take it one step at a time, explains Rob Reichley, SVP/executive producer, Raycom Sports, but we had to do it in very quick fashion. Raycom Sports is truly a part of the sports scene here in the South, and we've worked with pretty much everyone at this point, but the Braves are definitely the gold medal [of pro-sports properties in this [region]. Obviously, we were very excited, but it was a truly a massive lift on both the technical and production side to make this all happen in time for Opening Day.
The Trucks: The Operation Goes In-House, Side-by-Side
Raycom was already in the process of upgrading its in-house mobile units with an eye toward adding more pro-sports teams to its portfolio. The upgrades, some of which are still in process, include full-1080p capability, Sony HDC-5500 cameras (running as high 6X-super-slo-mo), 12-channel EVS XT-VIA production servers, and Grass Valley K-Frame switchers. With that in mind, Raycom tapped its RHD1 unit as the Braves' primary home truck, with RHD3 covering the majority of away shows on the East Coast.
We've been in the process of building out our trucks to [better serve] the pro-sports [market], notes Bill Stafford, VP, engineering and technology operations, Raycom Sports. When this opportunity came up, it was perfect timing. It worked well with Raycom's existing production schedule because we do a lot of college sports and are busy in the fall, winter, and spring but there's a big gap in the summer.
Instead of deploying a dual-feed model and sharing cameras with the home-team production as many RSNs do, BravesVision has opted to roll out full side-by-side productions for its away games.
Raycom Sports' RHD1 mobile unit - shown here with the SkyCandy drone team, Director Brent Krzystan, and Tech Manager Nick Marks - serves as the home for Braves' home-game productions this year. Since we're starting something new and have such a big [production], we wanted to have full control of our shows - whether that's home or away, says Stafford. In talking with Braves VP/Executive Producer Gretchen Kaney, we decided to go side by side pretty much across the board. That gives us more control of our truck and our schedule and gives Gretchen and her team the ability to do broadcast the way they want for both home and away shows and not be handcuffed.
Says Kaney, Since we're not sharing all our cameras and have more camera operators of our own, it gives the director
