Some insight on why NBC walked away from the NHL

[tarheelhockey]

Cable isn't going to go poof and disappear permanently. Not everyone in the country has the internet or has the means to stream stuff.

At this point it’s looking increasingly likely that the companies simply collapse under their own weight. They’re carrying an absolute ton of infrastructure for a product that is rapidly losing its customer base. It’s a bad investment, and when the investors pull out they won’t be able to cover the capital overhead.

At that point I expect we’ll see the parent companies which don’t go bankrupt shift to an all-streaming model (which means they’re no longer cable companies) and sell off their infrastructure to mom n’ pop regional companies, especially in rural areas.

 

[jkrdevil]

That infrastructure is still needed for internet at this point.

 

[Reaser]

ESPN didnt want to pay for rights after the full season lockout.

Yup, it was the lockout that lost ESPN. ESPN was always going to offer less after they massively overpaid in the expiring deal. The deal for 2004/05 wasn't great but was better than most people remember when they claim ESPN/2 was only going to show 30-40 games INCLUDING the playoffs, which wasn't the lockout year deal.

ESPN game 1&2 of Stanley Cup & ASG
ESPN & ESPN2 having majority of playoffs.
ESPN2 40 games Wednesday and Sunday (which amounted to essentially games on Wed and Sun every week of the regular season.)
NBC's no-fees deal had 7 Saturday post-Jan 1 windows, Saturday playoff games and games 3-7 of the Cup.

Wasn't perfect, but was a lot better than the return in 05/06 with OLN.

 

[OG6ix]

Except...after 2007, the league had ratings that either matched or bettered anything that NHL on ESPN ever did

Yeah that's fine but they didn't do much to grow the casual sports fan. Say what you want about ESPN but from the mid 2000s to now they have had a lot of growth based on how they treat their sports properties. Of course I still think it's up to the players to start marketing themselves and maybe get away from the players code that has been beaten into them since they were in peewee hockey. Carriage numbers for sports channels are one thing but they do not equate to viewing habits. Way more cross promotion and relevancy on ESPN and than channels like NBCSN and even fox sports.

 

[Big Z Man 1990]

NBC is desperately in need of more college football rights. Their lone major CFB property, Notre Dame, has not won a national title since 1988, three years before NBC signed on. If ND is their own conference, this "conference" has the longest active national title drought of all the P5 leagues, 16 years longer than the next-longest drought, that of the Pac-12, whose last national champion was a rival of ND, USC, much to NBC's consternation (though USC now only has the AP title in regards to 2004, because of Reggie Bush).

When CBS decided to dump the SEC after the 2023 season (two seasons shy of the partnership's 30th anniversary season), I felt NBC should have taken the SEC CFB OTA rights, as it would have looked very good if NBC had the league with the most national titles in the 21st century to supplement the ND rights.

I've held the sentiment that NBC might drop the Irish if their national title drought isn't ended by the time the current contract, which runs through 2025, runs out, although it seems ND is getting closer to a title each passing year.

With ABC taking the SEC package, NBC could look towards two other conferences with TV deals that will expire before the first CFP contract ends - the Big Ten and Big 12. NBC could partner with CBS to acquire the latter completely from Fox and ESPN. Both networks would share the OTA rights, and air games on affiliate cable networks: NBC on USA, and CBS on CBSSN and Paramount Movie Network (as part of an effort to put sports broadcasts on the latter that are too prestigious to be on CBSSN, which is in fewer homes than PMN).

NBC would very much be interested in the Big Ten too, but the Big Ten currently does not play night games in the last two weeks of November. This hurt Fox on Thanksgiving weekend in 2018, when they were forced to air Michigan-Ohio State at noon, and a game between two middling Big 12 teams at night against ABC's broadcast of Notre Dame-USC, which easily beat the Big 12 game in the ratings battle. Fox was probably not pleased with this.

I feel that any potential Big Ten broadcasters for 2024 onward should make it known that they will not commit to the conference without the guarantee/promise that the conference will play at least one night game every week, up to and including Thanksgiving weekend. The MAC, which is in a similar footprint to the Big Ten, does in contrast stage night games every week in November, many of them on weeknights. So if the Big Ten stands firm, they will be fighting an uphill battle to stay on TV. I feel that the Michigan-Ohio State game should be at night. It never aired on Saturday Night Football the last 11 years ABC had the game, not even in 2006 when it was 1 VS. 2. I felt ABC should have been more aggressive that year in getting UM-OSU at night, even threatening to tape-delay the game to air at night, given the ratings potential. While it was a highly-rated game, it could have been even higher-rated had it been at night.

So yeah, I think NBC would love the ability to air UM-OSU on Saturday night during Thanksgiving weekend.

 

[MK9]

People actually watch that?

You need to get out of your little sphere there. There is a whole bigger world than apparently you're aware of.

 

[oknazevad]

CBS is not putting sports on Paramount Movie Network. For the fifteenth time! It's is not a general interest cable network like TBS/TNT or USA. It is not ViacomCBS's equivalent.

 

[Spydey629]

NBC is desperately in need of more college football rights. Their lone major CFB property, Notre Dame, has not won a national title since 1988, three years before NBC signed on. If ND is their own conference, this "conference" has the longest active national title drought of all the P5 leagues, 16 years longer than the next-longest drought, that of the Pac-12, whose last national champion was a rival of ND, USC, much to NBC's consternation (though USC now only has the AP title in regards to 2004, because of Reggie Bush).

When CBS decided to dump the SEC after the 2023 season (two seasons shy of the partnership's 30th anniversary season), I felt NBC should have taken the SEC CFB OTA rights, as it would have looked very good if NBC had the league with the most national titles in the 21st century to supplement the ND rights.

I've held the sentiment that NBC might drop the Irish if their national title drought isn't ended by the time the current contract, which runs through 2025, runs out, although it seems ND is getting closer to a title each passing year.

With ABC taking the SEC package, NBC could look towards two other conferences with TV deals that will expire before the first CFP contract ends - the Big Ten and Big 12. NBC could partner with CBS to acquire the latter completely from Fox and ESPN. Both networks would share the OTA rights, and air games on affiliate cable networks: NBC on USA, and CBS on CBSSN and Paramount Movie Network (as part of an effort to put sports broadcasts on the latter that are too prestigious to be on CBSSN, which is in fewer homes than PMN).

NBC would very much be interested in the Big Ten too, but the Big Ten currently does not play night games in the last two weeks of November. This hurt Fox on Thanksgiving weekend in 2018, when they were forced to air Michigan-Ohio State at noon, and a game between two middling Big 12 teams at night against ABC's broadcast of Notre Dame-USC, which easily beat the Big 12 game in the ratings battle. Fox was probably not pleased with this.

I feel that any potential Big Ten broadcasters for 2024 onward should make it known that they will not commit to the conference without the guarantee/promise that the conference will play at least one night game every week, up to and including Thanksgiving weekend. The MAC, which is in a similar footprint to the Big Ten, does in contrast stage night games every week in November, many of them on weeknights. So if the Big Ten stands firm, they will be fighting an uphill battle to stay on TV. I feel that the Michigan-Ohio State game should be at night. It never aired on Saturday Night Football the last 11 years ABC had the game, not even in 2006 when it was 1 VS. 2. I felt ABC should have been more aggressive that year in getting UM-OSU at night, even threatening to tape-delay the game to air at night, given the ratings potential. While it was a highly-rated game, it could have been even higher-rated had it been at night.

So yeah, I think NBC would love the ability to air UM-OSU on Saturday night during Thanksgiving weekend.

I am guessing you are not a Big Ten fan.

OSU-Michigan is noon on Thanksgiving weekend because they want it to be. It has been for about 100 years, it probably will be for the next 100 years, too.

And considering that Fox owns 49% of the BTN, I wouldn’t expect them to walk away from the TV rights. CBS has a basketball contract with the league and might consider football, but NBC has about a zero chance of going there.

 

[Big Z Man 1990]

I am an OSU fan as a matter of fact. I'm only thinking about the networks that televise Big Ten games. I think UM-OSU would work as a night game. Fox shouldn't have to surrender the primetime ratings battle the way they did in 2018. In fact, I see them sponsoring a new NCAA bylaw that requires every FBS conference to schedule at least one night game every week from week 1 through Thanksgiving weekend to help out each conference's TV partners.

If SpongeBob SquarePants taught me anything, it is that some things are better at night.

 

[SupremeNachos]

Basically what was speculated on here and in the media. Comcast was not willing to bid at the same amount of money that they pay for the package they have now for a lower package with less inventory. They benefitted a lot from the exclusive deal that they signed in 2011 and probably realized that was coming to an end and didn’t want to be 2nd to ESPN.

NBCSN is ending because they were not able to get a big time 2nd sports property like the NBA, MLB, or a Power Conference in College sports to boost their sub numbers to compete with ESPN.

To me the big question is the future of NBC Sports as a whole. Do they go big and bring back the NBA?; nostalgia is still big for the NBA On NBC even after all these years. Do they go after the CFP rights which I’m sure will be broken up once the playoff is expanded to 12 teams? How long do the hold on the Olympics before the cost becomes too much? A lot of interesting questions that might be answered by the end of the 2020s imo.

Don't go bashing Mecum auctions now.

 

[Bondurant]

Cable isn't going to go poof and disappear permanently. Not everyone in the country has the internet or has the means to stream stuff.

In 2021 do you think more people have cable or the internet?

 

[supsens]

In a short-sighted immediate revenue stream, yes. That is where the money might be now.

Ask Blockbuster how their battle against streaming went. Rather than join Netflix when they had the chance, they opted for MOAR MUNNEH NOW!

Then ask all of the industries related to CD's how well their fight is going against streaming.

Ask EB Games how their fight against Steam XBLA and PS store is going.

Being in cable, means they're putting all of their eggs in something incredibly short-term and short-sighted for immediate money right now despite being on a steep downward trajectory.

Anyone can tell you that's a mistake, but go ahead and keep believing that cable is the future and will always exist.

Literally everything converted to streaming because IT'S A BETTER SERVICE.

Blockbuster tried but they had a lot of debt when the financial crisis went down and more credit was impossible to find netflix was just starting so they were not a huge debt risk.

 

[OG6ix]

Blockbuster tried but they had a lot of debt when the financial crisis went down and more credit was impossible to find netflix was just starting so they were not a huge debt risk.

Netflix also offered to sell their company to blockbuster but we're laughed out of the room.

 

[aqib]

Comcast KNOWS the cable model is broken and they are going after the cord-cutters

Xfinity-Flex

Their primary concern is you still buy the internet from them.

In a short-sighted immediate revenue stream, yes. That is where the money might be now.

Ask Blockbuster how their battle against streaming went. Rather than join Netflix when they had the chance, they opted for MOAR MUNNEH NOW!

Then ask all of the industries related to CD's how well their fight is going against streaming.

Ask EB Games how their fight against Steam XBLA and PS store is going.

Being in cable, means they're putting all of their eggs in something incredibly short-term and short-sighted for immediate money right now despite being on a steep downward trajectory.

Anyone can tell you that's a mistake, but go ahead and keep believing that cable is the future and will always exist.

Literally everything converted to streaming because IT'S A BETTER SERVICE.

Ironically Blockbuster was trying to launch a streaming service but its partner (I kid you not) was Enron!

 

[Big Z Man 1990]

Fox owns 49% of the BTN

Following up on my last post.

They can very easily dispose of that stake.

Furthermore, both OSU and UM have a lot of fans on the West Coast, including in Alaska and Hawaii.

A noon start in Ann Arbor or Columbus would be 9 AM in LA, 8 AM in Anchorage, and 7 AM in Honolulu. In the past, this would put UM-OSU up against Saturday morning cartoons on other networks.

On the other hand, 8 PM in Ann Arbor or Columbus would be 5 PM in LA, 4 PM in Anchorage, and 3 PM in Honolulu.

 

[jkrdevil]

I doubt NBC has much interest in college Football outside what they have in ND. With ND they get a national schedule filled with a ND playing a few top teams every year and this getting big games (NBC’s deal with ND is about the opponents ND plays and ND always plays a good schedule) without having to deal with the filler games. It also cheap in comparison on buying a full conference rights. It isn’t like Notre Dame is an also ran, they have been in the CFB playoffs twice in the last three years; with a New Years Six appearance and a BCs championship appearance in the last decade.

They were interested in the Pac12 rights when that was up a decade ago, but that was about NBCSN. They don’t have that concern anymore. They can fill their fall schedule with the 7 weeks of ND football, NASCAR and Golf. It is the April-May stretch where they have holes to fill.

College sports have a lot of politics that go beyond rights fees that make it more challenging for a network to break into.

 

[oknazevad]

Ironically Blockbuster was trying to launch a streaming service but its partner (I kid you not) was Enron!

Oh, it's even more entertaining than that.

See, Netflix had been started in 1997 with a goal of launching internet video streaming. It was the height of the dot-com bubble, everyone hyped anything Internet related, money was thrown at any plausible idea (and a bunch that just plain weren't) and it all got a lot of publicity. But the streaming tech that Netflix was pursuing was a technological dead end, and the dot-com bubble burst.

At one point Netflix, now burning through cash, approached Blockbuster about a merger, and were promptly rejected. So they fell back on the DVD-rental-by-mail model to stay afloat. It worked and they quickly began eating into Blockbuster's market. A lot. All the while they continued to plan to eventually do streaming as was their original intent.

Well, Blockbuster, in an effort to beat Netflix to the streaming punch, announced a partnership with Enron, which had added a pretty robust data technology division to their energy business when they realized that they could overcharge for it by restricting and commodifying data flow, just as they did with electricity. (Seriously, they were scumbags who are directly responsible for the 2000 California electric crisis that outright killed people.)

Of course, Enron collapsed when it turned out that their entire accounting practices were totally corrupt and they weren't worth anything outside their physical assets (Seriously, Ken Lay and company were utter scum). So the deal with Blockbuster collapsed as well, and Blockbuster walked away fully, despite Enron's work on streaming tech only existing so Blockbuster could use it. And despite the fact they actually got it to mostly work properly in the short time they worked on it, though it still needed a bit of polish.

But here's the funniest twist. Remember how I said the physical assets was the only part of Enron actually worth something? That included their nascent streaming tech infrastructure. So it was sold by the bankruptcy court.

To Netflix.

Who now actually had a working streaming tech with which to finally fulfill their originally planned purpose.

Irony is so ironic sometimes.

 

[Spydey629]

Following up on my last post.

They can very easily dispose of that stake.

Furthermore, both OSU and UM have a lot of fans on the West Coast, including in Alaska and Hawaii.

A noon start in Ann Arbor or Columbus would be 9 AM in LA, 8 AM in Anchorage, and 7 AM in Honolulu. In the past, this would put UM-OSU up against Saturday morning cartoons on other networks.

On the other hand, 8 PM in Ann Arbor or Columbus would be 5 PM in LA, 4 PM in Anchorage, and 3 PM in Honolulu.

I loathe both schools, for the record.

As for this discussion, that game is set in stone. Neither school has ever given a hint of moving out of that time slot. And with Fox pushing the noon slot even more, the only thing about The Game that has changed in 50 years in the network showing it. Would the ratings be huge for a primetime game? Absolutely. But even a quick google says the ratings are high, regardless of the time slot:

OSU-Michigan Top Game of Season

For so much change in CFB in the past 10-15 years, this is one of the few that shows no sign of doing anything different.

 

[Big Z Man 1990]

I loathe both schools, for the record.

As for this discussion, that game is set in stone. Neither school has ever given a hint of moving out of that time slot. And with Fox pushing the noon slot even more, the only thing about The Game that has changed in 50 years in the network showing it. Would the ratings be huge for a primetime game? Absolutely. But even a quick google says the ratings are high, regardless of the time slot:

OSU-Michigan Top Game of Season

For so much change in CFB in the past 10-15 years, this is one of the few that shows no sign of doing anything different.

Only cable stations should be showing games at noon. And despite that, UM-OSU will never go to cable.

Here's why noon (and late night games) should be exclusive to cable networks.

Most cable channels, especially those dedicated to sports, have only one feed that is based on Eastern Time Zone scheduling. So a game on ESPN at noon ET airs at 9 AM PT.

Broadcast networks have three feeds for the lower 48 states - one for Eastern/Central, one for Mountain (ET/CT delayed an hour), and one for Pacific (ET/CT delayed three hours, also shown at the same relative time in Alaska, but 8 PM PT is 7 PM Alaska).

When Fox airs games at noon ET, it forces their affiliates in the West to delay Xploration Station to another timeslot that weekend, or air it on a digital subchannel.

Prior to 2006, most games that aired at noon ET/11 AM CT on ABC aired only in those time zones. This is because airing the games in the West would have interfered with the (usually) network-mandated broadcasts of ABC's children's lineup, in those days Saturday mornings, currently programmed by syndicators who make deals with affiliate groups, were programmed by the networks themselves (except for when Fox leased their Saturday mornings to 4Kids Entertainment from 2002-08).

For example, on September 9, 1995, ABC aired three games regionally at noon: Texas Tech at Penn State, Nebraska at Michigan State (now a Big Ten matchup), and Florida State at Clemson. ABC only permitted its ET/CT affiliates to air one of these games, which would serve as a lead-in to Notre Dame at Purdue at 3:30 PM. MT/PT stations had to show the Saturday morning cartoons, which would be over by 12:30 PM PT and the start of the ND-Purdue game. After ND-Purdue concluded, viewers in the West got to see a game between BYU and UCLA.

Notably, the 1995-96 Saturday morning line-up for ABC included the last ever Hanna-Barbera show to premiere on network television, a sequel series to the 1994 movie Dumb and Dumber. Turner Broadcasting, H-B's owner at the time, was looking to turn the studio into the production arm of its Cartoon Network cable channel, launched only three years before. It was also the last season before ABC was bought by Disney, who began producing more Saturday morning cartoons for ABC under the One Saturday Morning brand.

So, if UM and OSU really want their game at noon, they would either have to sign off on the game airing on the cable channel Fox Sports 1, or permitting live telecast only in the Eastern and Central Time Zones. A different game would air late afternoon Western US time (after the game Fox airs nationally in the late afternoon Eastern US time), while in the East, Fox would air in primetime repeats of their regular series. And I don't think either solution will make all parties involved happy.

So, I think broadcast networks need to limit their college football broadcasts to where games are only airing in PM time at the same time in the entire lower 48 states.

Over time, UM and OSU would love the fact that their game is being played at night. Their fans would love it too.

While it would force those with only antennas for TV watching to wait until like 3:30 PM to watch a college football game on a Saturday afternoon, the elimination of noon games on broadcast networks could prove beneficial to the affiliates of the major networks.

 

[IU Hawks fan]

Only cable stations should be showing games at noon. And despite that, UM-OSU will never go to cable.

Here's why noon (and late night games) should be exclusive to cable networks.

Most cable channels, especially those dedicated to sports, have only one feed that is based on Eastern Time Zone scheduling. So a game on ESPN at noon ET airs at 9 AM PT.

Broadcast networks have three feeds for the lower 48 states - one for Eastern/Central, one for Mountain (ET/CT delayed an hour), and one for Pacific (ET/CT delayed three hours, also shown at the same relative time in Alaska, but 8 PM PT is 7 PM Alaska).

When Fox airs games at noon ET, it forces their affiliates in the West to delay Xploration Station to another timeslot that weekend, or air it on a digital subchannel.

Prior to 2006, most games that aired at noon ET/11 AM CT on ABC aired only in those time zones. This is because airing the games in the West would have interfered with the (usually) network-mandated broadcasts of ABC's children's lineup, in those days Saturday mornings, currently programmed by syndicators who make deals with affiliate groups, were programmed by the networks themselves (except for when Fox leased their Saturday mornings to 4Kids Entertainment from 2002-08).

For example, on September 9, 1995, ABC aired three games regionally at noon: Texas Tech at Penn State, Nebraska at Michigan State (now a Big Ten matchup), and Florida State at Clemson. ABC only permitted its ET/CT affiliates to air one of these games, which would serve as a lead-in to Notre Dame at Purdue at 3:30 PM. MT/PT stations had to show the Saturday morning cartoons, which would be over by 12:30 PM PT and the start of the ND-Purdue game. After ND-Purdue concluded, viewers in the West got to see a game between BYU and UCLA.

Notably, the 1995-96 Saturday morning line-up for ABC included the last ever Hanna-Barbera show to premiere on network television, a sequel series to the 1994 movie Dumb and Dumber. Turner Broadcasting, H-B's owner at the time, was looking to turn the studio into the production arm of its Cartoon Network cable channel, launched only three years before. It was also the last season before ABC was bought by Disney, who began producing more Saturday morning cartoons for ABC under the One Saturday Morning brand.

So, if UM and OSU really want their game at noon, they would either have to sign off on the game airing on the cable channel Fox Sports 1, or permitting live telecast only in the Eastern and Central Time Zones. A different game would air late afternoon Western US time (after the game Fox airs nationally in the late afternoon Eastern US time), while in the East, Fox would air in primetime repeats of their regular series. And I don't think either solution will make all parties involved happy.

So, I think broadcast networks need to limit their college football broadcasts to where games are only airing in PM time at the same time in the entire lower 48 states.

Over time, UM and OSU would love the fact that their game is being played at night. Their fans would love it too.

While it would force those with only antennas for TV watching to wait until like 3:30 PM to watch a college football game on a Saturday afternoon, the elimination of noon games on broadcast networks could prove beneficial to the affiliates of the major networks.

What in the world...

Things evolve. Limiting college football timeslots because of kid's programming is loony.

 

[edog37]

Comcast KNOWS the cable model is broken and they are going after the cord-cutters

Xfinity-Flex

Their primary concern is you still buy the internet from them.

and yet they still make you sign a contract. They haven’t completely gotten the word yet.

 

[Big Z Man 1990]

What in the world...

Things evolve. Limiting college football timeslots because of kid's programming is loony.

It's not unreasonable to want the B1G's biggest game at night.

Say it does get played at night, and it goes into multiple overtime periods. Starting in 2021, the 2 point conversion shootout starts in OT 3. And somehow, UM and OSU keep forcing OT after OT.

Can't get any more magical than that. Fans staying up well after midnight, what's not to love?

 

[IU Hawks fan]

Less choice is never a good thing.

FOX is committed to making Noon their biggest window, which makes a ton of sense. It's always been a fairly poor window for game quality, now neutrals always know where to turn if their school isn't playing and there's less overlap of big games in midday or night slots.

 

[tarheelhockey]

That infrastructure is still needed for internet at this point.

Which is why it makes a lot more sense to either stop being a cable company and become an internet media company, or simply sell that infrastructure to an internet company.

The one thing that doesn't make sense long-term is to keep being a hard-wire cable TV company.

 

[aqib]

Oh, it's even more entertaining than that.

See, Netflix had been started in 1997 with a goal of launching internet video streaming. It was the height of the dot-com bubble, everyone hyped anything Internet related, money was thrown at any plausible idea (and a bunch that just plain weren't) and it all got a lot of publicity. But the streaming tech that Netflix was pursuing was a technological dead end, and the dot-com bubble burst.

At one point Netflix, now burning through cash, approached Blockbuster about a merger, and were promptly rejected. So they fell back on the DVD-rental-by-mail model to stay afloat. It worked and they quickly began eating into Blockbuster's market. A lot. All the while they continued to plan to eventually do streaming as was their original intent.

Well, Blockbuster, in an effort to beat Netflix to the streaming punch, announced a partnership with Enron, which had added a pretty robust data technology division to their energy business when they realized that they could overcharge for it by restricting and commodifying data flow, just as they did with electricity. (Seriously, they were scumbags who are directly responsible for the 2000 California electric crisis that outright killed people.)

Of course, Enron collapsed when it turned out that their entire accounting practices were totally corrupt and they weren't worth anything outside their physical assets (Seriously, Ken Lay and company were utter scum). So the deal with Blockbuster collapsed as well, and Blockbuster walked away fully, despite Enron's work on streaming tech only existing so Blockbuster could use it. And despite the fact they actually got it to mostly work properly in the short time they worked on it, though it still needed a bit of polish.

But here's the funniest twist. Remember how I said the physical assets was the only part of Enron actually worth something? That included their nascent streaming tech infrastructure. So it was sold by the bankruptcy court.

To Netflix.

Who now actually had a working streaming tech with which to finally fulfill their originally planned purpose.

Irony is so ironic sometimes.

I was getting my MBA at NYU when Enron was a big deal. In the fall of 2000 they came to recruit new grads. I wasn't aware of any operations in NY so before their presentation I asked the guy "do you have operations here or are all the jobs in Houston" he said something to the effect of "I don't we're going to go over that." So presentation begins and he spends half of it trying to explain what the company did and the jobs (a room full of MBAs and no one could clearly state what the company did at the end of it) then he goes "now let me talk a little bit about Houston" the whole room is suddenly deflated (literally no one other than one woman who was from Houston had any interest in moving there) and he was like "I know what you're thinking but its not that bad" Why he couldn't have said to me "yeah the jobs would require you to move to Houston" before I wasted an hour sitting through the presentation is beyond me. That should have been my clue this was a shady outfit.