Incessant Commercial Breaks?

[rstone7727]

Is it me or are there way too many breaks in the action this year? It seems like they play for 2 minutes then take a commercial break, play for 1 min and another 6 commercials. This has gotten out of hand imo...

 

[skurey]

cbs

 

[pearl31]

agree. it's almost unbearable.

 

[sufandu]

Maybe because in the past they were trying to show pieces of the games that weren't featured and now that they have 4 networks they don't switch between games nearly as much, so they have more time to sell.

 

[Ghost]

It gives you extra time to get out there and get a shamrock shake.

 

[seanmac1844]

It started with a whisper

 

[EastCoast2]

the commercial breaks are long also. Not a single game has been the standard 2 hours. Even the games that start right on time are 2:15-2:30

 

[HoustonCuse]

It's CBS. This happens every year. Going from watching the whole season on ESPN to the tournament on CBS is like driving a Ferrari to a race and then hopping into a Camry to drive in the race.

 

[SyracuseFan]

I'm sure there are more breaks today or maybe its worse during these national games? There have been a hundred commercial breaks today. its almost 2:30.

 

[Scotiacuse]

The halftime of the Syracuse/Kansas State game was 22 minutes long.

 

[Marsh01]

commercial breaks are 3:15 this year and the halftime is 20 minutes.

Yesterday at the arena during the OSU game I went to the head and got something to eat and still made it back before the game started.

 

[rstone7727]

At some point this will minimize our depth advantage, as the players get more/longer breaks, the teams that have less depth are getting more rest.

 

[SBU72]

I mentioned after the UNCA game that at the 2:40 mark, there was a time out, 3 minutes (6 commericals) long. SU turned the ball over, UNCA scored and called another time out, another 3 minutes, then I think that was when there was the out of bounds play happended which took a whole to take care of with anothe 1 minute time out and when they came back the UNCA coach took another 30 sec to get the shot clock right and the game clock had yet to go under 2 minutes! I bet it easily took 20 minutes for those 2:40 to go by. Yesterday I taped the game, stopping during half time and my 2 hour tape ran out just as time ran out. The game had started at 12:15 and finished about 2:30.

 

[pearl31]

Agree with all of the above. A couple of other observations...

- It's not just the commercial time away from the games that's aggravating - how about all of the graphics and "in-game" CBS programming ads? Alot of times, they put that stuff on the screen during game action with the commentator then having to read the network-mandated script instead of noting what's actually happening in the game.

- It's weird, but in this year's tourney it seems like many of the coaches are calling their own team time-outs after the game clock is under the 16/12/8/4 mark, not waiting for the media time-out. So then CBS goes to commercial break for the team timeout, comes back for like 5 seconds of game time, and then goes right to commercial break again for the media timeout. Thankfully there have been other games to switch to during these extended breaks over the past few days, but that won't be an option starting Thursday. :bang:

 

[HoustonCuse]

- It's weird, but in this year's tourney it seems like many of the coaches are calling their own team time-outs after the game clock is under the 16/12/8/4 mark, not waiting for the media time-out. So then CBS goes to commercial break for the team timeout, comes back for like 5 seconds of game time, and then goes right to commercial break again for the media timeout. Thankfully there have been other games to switch to during these extended breaks over the past few days, but that won't be an option starting Thursday. :bang:

They probably have sponsor agreements with the coaches. $100k per unnecessary timeout.

 

[rottweiler44]

Other thing I noticed in Pittsburgh is that even when the coaches call a 30 second timeout, they still run with a full media timeout regardless

 

[zhanjuzi]

I only watch the games over the Internet. Paid $3.99 to the NCAA for all the games .. resolution is pretty decent. As soon as a commercial comes, it goes into the background and I either go back to work; play an internet blitz chess game; or surf for news.

You couldn't pay me enough to sit in front of the tube for the CBS crap they put on.

 

[heresjohnny88]

For anyone interested, here's the way it works with TV timeouts (might be confusing):

- During a normal ESPN game, there are the usual under-16/12/8/4 breaks for each half. Easy enough. But then there are "floater breaks." These floaters are made up of usually about 4 minutes of commercial time, to be used throughout the game. ESPN typically a :30 break in the first half on a team-called timeout, so that leaves about 3:30 left for the second half.

-In the second half, the first team-called timeout usually results in a 2:30 floater break. So now, combining that with the :30 break they took in the first half, you're left with another 1:00 of breaks. Those are usually taken later in the game, when the timeouts start piling up. ESPN will pick and choose where they want to take those two :30 breaks.

-So in all, you absolutely will get 8 commercial breaks within a game (not including the break to halftime, or the breaks within halftime). Adding in the 4 or so "floater breaks", and you're looking at 12 for the game. This can vary depending on the network (a game on ESPNU might have fewer floaters than ESPN/ESPN2).

-Now, with the tournament games on CBS, everything changes. There are unlimited floaters. The first team-called timeout of EACH half is a 2:30 break, and everything after that is a :30. They NEVER stay during timeouts, where as ESPN will stay for most team-called timeouts, only going to break for those 3-4 designated floaters.

- One more thing to note: with ESPN, the 16/12/8/4 timeouts are not always 2:30 in length. Sometimes they are 2:00, sometimes they are 1:30 (1:30 is usually the minimum). With CBS, they are ALWAYS at least 2:30 (sometimes 3:00 or 3:15).

Hope I didn't confuse all of you.

 

[thebigeast44]

The worst thing is that they are the same ones over and over and over...

Sent from my Droid using Tapatalk

 

[pearl31]

For anyone interested, here's the way it works with TV timeouts (might be confusing):

- During a normal ESPN game, there are the usual under-16/12/8/4 breaks for each half. Easy enough. But then there are "floater breaks." These floaters are made up of usually about 4 minutes of commercial time, to be used throughout the game. ESPN typically a :30 break in the first half on a team-called timeout, so that leaves about 3:30 left for the second half.

-In the second half, the first team-called timeout usually results in a 2:30 floater break. So now, combining that with the :30 break they took in the first half, you're left with another 1:00 of breaks. Those are usually taken later in the game, when the timeouts start piling up. ESPN will pick and choose where they want to take those two :30 breaks.

-So in all, you absolutely will get 8 commercial breaks within a game (not including the break to halftime, or the breaks within halftime). Adding in the 4 or so "floater breaks", and you're looking at 12 for the game. This can vary depending on the network (a game on ESPNU might have fewer floaters than ESPN/ESPN2).

-Now, with the tournament games on CBS, everything changes. There are unlimited floaters. The first team-called timeout of EACH half is a 2:30 break, and everything after that is a :30. They NEVER stay during timeouts, where as ESPN will stay for most team-called timeouts, only going to break for those 3-4 designated floaters.

- One more thing to note: with ESPN, the 16/12/8/4 timeouts are not always 2:30 in length. Sometimes they are 2:00, sometimes they are 1:30 (1:30 is usually the minimum). With CBS, they are ALWAYS at least 2:30 (sometimes 3:00 or 3:15).

Hope I didn't confuse all of you.

Thanks for that!
(doesn't make me feel any better about it, but thanks for explaining )

 

[STEVEHOLT]

For anyone interested, here's the way it works with TV timeouts (might be confusing):

- During a normal ESPN game, there are the usual under-16/12/8/4 breaks for each half. Easy enough. But then there are "floater breaks." These floaters are made up of usually about 4 minutes of commercial time, to be used throughout the game. ESPN typically a :30 break in the first half on a team-called timeout, so that leaves about 3:30 left for the second half.

-In the second half, the first team-called timeout usually results in a 2:30 floater break. So now, combining that with the :30 break they took in the first half, you're left with another 1:00 of breaks. Those are usually taken later in the game, when the timeouts start piling up. ESPN will pick and choose where they want to take those two :30 breaks.

-So in all, you absolutely will get 8 commercial breaks within a game (not including the break to halftime, or the breaks within halftime). Adding in the 4 or so "floater breaks", and you're looking at 12 for the game. This can vary depending on the network (a game on ESPNU might have fewer floaters than ESPN/ESPN2).

-Now, with the tournament games on CBS, everything changes. There are unlimited floaters. The first team-called timeout of EACH half is a 2:30 break, and everything after that is a :30. They NEVER stay during timeouts, where as ESPN will stay for most team-called timeouts, only going to break for those 3-4 designated floaters.

- One more thing to note: with ESPN, the 16/12/8/4 timeouts are not always 2:30 in length. Sometimes they are 2:00, sometimes they are 1:30 (1:30 is usually the minimum). With CBS, they are ALWAYS at least 2:30 (sometimes 3:00 or 3:15).

Hope I didn't confuse all of you.

is EACH team's first called time out of each half a 2:30 time out? or just one per half?

 

[STEVEHOLT]

Here is how it USED to work...back in the early 90's...each team time out wiped out a tv time out..in other words..if a team called a time out at 17:00 ...this would take the place of the under 16 minutes tv timeout. if neither team called a timeout up to that point..then the tv timeout would kick in..

what was really crazy is that I believe each team only had 3 timeouts for the entire game...so in reality, there very few commercial breaks...

 

[Millhouse]

Is it me or are there way too many breaks in the action this year? It seems like they play for 2 minutes then take a commercial break, play for 1 min and another 6 commercials. This has gotten out of hand imo...

longer timeouts = more minutes for christmas and less for keita.

at this point with melo out, that swamps any depth advantage we might have at non-center positions

 

[pfister1]

I really hate what TV has done to these games. The unbearably frequent and lengthy commercial breaks to the terrible start times.

Absolutely brutal yesterday that possibly the best matchup of the day Cincy vs. FSU doesn't tip off until after 10:00 p.m.

6 of the 8 games tipped after 5 p.m. yesterday. I much prefer when the Sunday games would kick off at noon and be wrapped by 7 ish. I used to go to a Friday / Sunday site each season because we could typically do it with just one off day from work, but with how late the games are scheduled now you have to travel back on Monday or risk potentially having to miss both games of your Sunday slate.

Seemed like the several of the arenas yesterday bordered on grossly empty. They still get a decent turnout for games with teams whose fanbases travel, but I wonder how many "basketball" matchup neutral fans they get anymore given higher prices and completely uncertain start times.

Fortunately most of the exclusive games were at least competitive and the Florida vs. Norfolk State game ran with an alternative.

 

[MGP]

Wrecks the game. Wrecks it for the viewer as well. YOu really see how superior the WWL is in production. Staying on air during the last 2 minutes of the game makes the viewer feel like they are part of the action. This is what the experience of a game should be. CBS takes that away, you feel isolated, like you're watching a movie of a game instead of a live game. -1 CBS.