NBC Sports Washington expanded its predictive gaming production around Wizards games into a season-long, once-a-week schedule that will allow users to win $500 per quarter. The gambling-related telecasts will appear on the RSN’s Plus channel -- essentially an overflow channel -- and start on Thursday with a Wizards road game against the Pacers. “Once sports betting gets rolled out into different states, we’ll be educated and our viewers will be educated,” said NBC Sports Washington Senior VP & GM Damon Phillips. “This is an on-ramp to prop bets.”
The telecasts have viewers answer various questions about the game, like which player will score the most points in a quarter or which player will grab the most rebounds. The RSN rolled out this production for a handful of Wizards games last year, plus Redskins preseason games this year -- productions that the RSN’s execs describe as tests. This schedule of 20 “Predict The Game” productions for Wizards games is more of an official rollout. Phillips cited several statistics that showed “Predict The Game” viewers were staying with the game longer and, of course, were more engaged with the telecast.
During the Redskins’ preseason games, for example, participants averaged 17 responses and stayed on the RSN’s web-based gaming platform for an average of 66 minutes. “Sports betting is a big topic in the business right now,” Phillips said. “We’re all trying to figure out what this is going to mean in the future.”
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The RSN will have some changes this season. While it will still use the announcers from the traditional telecast, it will have on-air analysts specifically for the gambling-related production, offering advice and interacting with viewers. Last year, broadcasters on the main telecast did not send viewers to the “Predict the Game” telecast. This season they will highlight the gambling-related telecast much more frequently, Phillips said. MGM will return as a sponsor for the “Predict the Game” telecast. “At some point, I want to put this on our main channel to expose more people to it, but we’re not there yet,” Phillips said. “We’re trying to get as many reps as we can to get really good at predictive gaming.”
