Seth Walters, head of CTV sales at E.W. Scripps, joins The Big Impression podcast on why sports shouldn’t sit behind paywalls.
As sports rights grow more fragmented and expensive, E.W. Scripps is making a different bet: free access, broader reach and a bigger role for ad-supported television.
As Seth Walters, head of CTV sales at E.W. Scripps, says, “Our superpower is distribution.”
Walters joins The Big Impression podcast to explain why Scripps is leaning into free over-the-air and streaming sports at a moment when so much premium live programming sits behind paywalls. Through Scripps Sports, the company is building a portfolio around women’s leagues, local teams and underserved audiences — while giving advertisers a rare combination of scale and live attention.
Damian Fowler (00:00):
I'm Damian Fowler
Ilyse Liffreing (00:01):
And I'm Ilyse Liffreing.
Damian Fowler (00:02):
And welcome to The Big Impression.
Ilyse Liffreing (00:09):
This week we're joined by Seth Walters, head of CTV sales at E.W. Scripps.
Damian Fowler (00:15):
Scripps is making a pretty bold bet on the future of sports, building a network around free over the air distribution at a time when so much of live sports is locked behind paywalls.
Ilyse Liffreing (00:25):
It's a move that flips the traditional model on its head. Opening access while also leaning into the rise of ad supported streaming and fast.
Damian Fowler (00:34):
And it's not just about distribution, it's about who gets seen. Scripps is bringing more local teams, emerging leads, and under-exposed sports into a broader spotlight.
Ilyse Liffreing (00:43):
That creates a very different kind of opportunity for advertisers, especially as live viewing remains one of the last truly real-time high attention environments.
Damian Fowler (00:52):
So today we're going to dig into how free sports can scale and what it means for brands trying to reach those fragmented audiences and where CTV fits into all of this.
Ilyse Liffreing (01:01):
Let's get into it.
Damian Fowler (01:07):
Seth, going all in on free over the air sports, what did you see in the market that made you feel that this was the right time to make that move?
Seth Walters (01:16):
Yeah, thank you guys for having me. Scripps is nearly 150 years old company rooted in local journalism that started with newspapers eventually evolved to radio, broadcast, and then ultimately television. We still today support 60 different local stations and 40 markets and we've also launched our network business through an acquisition of ION Networks in 2019. And so what I oversee today, I'm the sort of head of digital sales both for the networks and for local, which really has enabled us to be an early mover into the streaming space. And let me explain that a litle bit more to you. Because we are rooted in local over the air programming, we were an early mover in Fast. We actually acquired a company called Newsy, which we've since rebranded as Scripps News. And that was our first foray into free ad supported streaming.
Damian Fowler (02:16):
When did you do that?
Seth Walters (02:17):
I think it was 2015. 100%. Yeah, a little bit over a decade ago. And as a result of that, we started to see the immediate impact of the audience migration to streaming platforms, which everyone is acutely aware of today. We very early on recognized that because of our unique position as a local over the air broadcaster, we were not tethered to a particular model that many of our peer set was in both the national broadcasters like your ABCs and CBSs and Fox who are restricted in some part with contracts that they have in place with their affiliates or other cable companies where we're often blocked up against as our competitive set. They're limited by some of their agreements that they have in place with cable operators, the MFNs that restrict them from making their content available everywhere. And then even within the FastSpace, what we've seen over the past few years, early on getting those rights were usually a throw-in or very low premium on top of what we were licensing to get this programming.
(03:29):
Now the major studios in the FastSpace have for the most part launched their own Fast Services and the cost to get fast rights for premium programming has risen. And so because we moved very early on and we're not tethered to a particular model, we made distribution our primary focus and I often refer to ourselves as the largest independent streaming platform. What I mean by that is we're not necessarily ... We have owned and operated apps for our local stations, but all of our networks are basically widely distributed everywhere across nearly every fast service, every virtual MVPD. We also have those channels over the air, they're free over the air and then also in cable packages through operators like Charter. And so that is the same feed that's available over the air in a cable package that's available and Fast. It's a linear mirror is what we refer to it.
(04:24):
They're all channel based. We don't have a ton of AVOD consumption. It's all through our channels that are airing the same thing everywhere that content is available.
Damian Fowler (04:33):
I see. Yeah.
Seth Walters (04:34):
And so really quickly, because we started to lean into sports, we recognize that we can amortize the cost of getting sports rights across all of those different touchpoints and that's really differentiated for the strategy that we're employed for the Script Sports Network.
Damian Fowler (04:53):
What changes though now when you amortize that? What changes when you make it free?
Seth Walters (04:57):
Yeah, of course we need to monetize it through advertising. But I think really the nuance is that our superpower is distribution and for the leagues and for advertisers, the value that we delivered for them is reach. So being able to run with us, reach sports fans everywhere that we're distributing this content and continue to cultivate more meaningful relationships with those audiences on the Script Sports Network, which serves as a better canvas for advertisers to create and engage those audiences more deeply.
Ilyse Liffreing (05:33):
And you know that network has such a strong local broadcast footprint?
Seth Walters (05:39):
Yep.
Ilyse Liffreing (05:40):
How are you then thinking about building something that feels more national in scale but still rooted in those local communities, I guess, especially when it comes to sports?
Seth Walters (05:49):
Yeah. We basically were leaning into two of our strengths. One with women's sports. We were an early mover in that space in a partnership with the WMEA that we struck in, I believe 2022. That was when we formally launched the Scripps Sports brand. That was before Kaitlyn Clark was in the league. That was a multi-year partnership that we continued to see strong growth year after year and that we recently renewed this past season.
Ilyse Liffreing (06:14):
Got ahead of that really fast.
Seth Walters (06:15):
We got ahead of that. We had that at the right time and it served to create a foundation for the model that we use to partner with these sports leagues. So with the WNBA, we run a franchise night every Friday night, a double header of regular season games throughout the course of the regular season. And then we replicated that same model with the National Women's Soccer League on Saturday nights. So the network itself, Scripps Works Network has a bend towards women's sports. We've expanded on those league partnerships most recently with the Professional Women's Hockey League coming off of the exceptional performance of the Team USA during this past Olympics, we began to partner with them for the first ever national broadcast for a professional women's hockey league game and are now airing their playoffs on the Script Sports NetworksThat's assembly finals and finals that are happening this month.
(07:07):
That's called the Walter Cup, not the Walters Cup, but it is their version of the Stanley Cup that's happening this month. We also have partnered with Major League Volleyball, which is a women's volleyball league. Their championships are happening this month. We are also partnering with Professional Women's Rodeo, which is an event that's happening this month. And then of course at Scripps, we're known for the script's spelling bee. Just last day, we saw curated our hundredth anniversary of that event. Historically, we've aired the semi-finals and finals of that event on our networks, but there's several days of competition that we don't get to broadcast and this again gives us that opportunity to do that
(07:46):
That's our lane as a leader of women's sports, but of course you mentioned local. And that's really where I think the value is going to come across this channel over time because we've established a leadership position with some local teams almost replacing the sort of RSM business model where we deliver their content over the air as well as help to manage their teaming services. So far that focus has been with the National Hockey League where we are the largest broadcast partner for NHL with five local teams. We also are partners in specific markets where we have stations with the Las Vegas Aces, which is the WNBA team in Las Vegas as well as the latest franchise for the MWSL in Denver called the Denver Summit.
Ilyse Liffreing (08:33):
Oh wait, are you saying that you're helping distribute their own streaming channels?
Seth Walters (08:37):
Yeah. So for most of those brands, we support the direct to consumer apps that are subscription based and supportive, but we also produce studio shows and ancillary content and programming that we think can start to make its way to reach a larger national audience across this channel.
Ilyse Liffreing (08:55):
Yeah, it does seem like more and more teams are starting their own types of apps and streams.
Seth Walters (08:59):
Yeah. I mean, it's an ecosystem and that is changing rapidly. It's increasingly getting more fragmented and expensive for consumers to access the fans they love, the teams that they love and the games that they want to watch. And so I do think that part of what we're trying to accomplish here is to continue to feed that fandom for sports fans, especially those that are interested in upstart sports that might not be getting the national exposure that they want to better serve that
Damian Fowler (09:31):
Audience. How intentional was that seeking out of sports that certainly may not be mainstream, but of course they're mainstreamly, they are now. How intentional was that when you think about the network?
Seth Walters (09:44):
It's core to the strategy. It's very intentional. I think we recognize that there's untapped value there. It's an underserved audience, underinvested from a broadcast perspective. And we felt that what we can bring to the table that the teams really needed to help build awareness of their sport is the distribution and reach that Scripps brings to the table.
Damian Fowler (10:07):
I would love to know a little bit more about how you think about your audience.
Seth Walters (10:11):
Yeah. For this specific channel, the audience, it's a month old, so the audience is still being developed at this time. But what we do know from, again, having one of the largest streaming portfolios across all these different services is that we know we're reaching a younger fan base. One might think because it's free, we're reaching a less affluent fan base, but that doesn't necessarily seem to be the case. In fact, they might actually be right on par with the rest of the broader television ecosystem that we reach. But I think of it more as we reach everybody and we're cultivating stronger community relationships with the people who are very passionate about the individual supports that we are supporting.
Ilyse Liffreing (10:56):
How are you going about the whole measurements angle? Because when you're trying to broadcast and distribute content across both streaming and linear, it can get complicated.
Seth Walters (11:10):
Yeah. I mean, we're working within the realities of modern media measurement. And the good thing because we are, again, a local broadcaster and we work with small businesses around the country, they're interested in bringing their brands to our sports properties. And for them, it's more tied to driving outcomes for their business. Of course, they want to surround premium programming like live sports and are bought into the strategy of what we're doing with women's sports and leaning more into local sports as well. I think that for them, it might be less about ratings and more about what is the contribution of reaching this audience and how is it influencing whatever sort of outcomes they're trying to drive for their brands, which is usually visitation to their websites or lead generation or sales or store traffic. And we increasingly are trying to help to optimize our campaigns for those advertisers.
Ilyse Liffreing (12:07):
Are they also thinking about data-driven plays within CTV?
Seth Walters (12:12):
Yeah, I mean, that's always sort of core to the strategy. That's again, big part of why we believe that our approach for being independent and reaching audiences across all of these different services as opposed to containing it behind a paywall that is more limited in terms of its reach is playing out to differentiate Scripps from others in the marketplace.
Damian Fowler (12:35):
Well, you said something quite interesting about how you reaching local advertising and that to me is an interesting differentiator
Seth Walters (12:43):
For you. Yeah. I mean, we're not definitely doing it, but we're exploring ways to utilize our local sports highlights, which air as segments in our local news broadcast across those 40 stations, how can we use that content to create original programming for the sports channel that can air nationally? There's lots of other opportunities to co-mingle those strategies and have a major impact and breakthrough. Our sports strategy is back to 2022. So that's when we began to air those franchise nights with the WNBA and the NWSL on our ION network. This is obviously an extension of that.
Damian Fowler (13:21):
So how do you think about pricing and positioning when you're offering premium live sports in a free environment?
Seth Walters (13:27):
Yeah. Well, first off, there's no question that the sports landscape has become more fragmented and expensive for consumers. I believe I read a stat that for week 17 of the NFL season, if you wanted to stream all of the regular season games that week, you would need somewhere upwards of about eight different services, which is just unsustainable for sports fans. When I think of the streaming ecosystem more broadly, I view it very similar to the K-shaped economy recovery post- COVID. And let me provide a litle bit more detail on that. I believe the streaming ecosystem follows a very similar case-shaped dynamic where the largest streaming companies are seeing an outsized amount of viewership promotion on streaming platforms. Obviously seeing a sizable amount of advertising dollars as a shift to streaming and the middle is getting squeezed out a litle bit. And of course the long tail is really what's struggling from a commoditization standpoint, from an advertising engagement and revenue standpoint.
(14:40):
And so the strategy around free with sports is really intended to help better position Scripps to ensure that we're part of the growing upper echelon of that K, knowing that programming really needs to be differentiated to stand out and capture audiences in an environment that's more conducive to on- demand streaming, that might be more designed to leverage algorithms to enable content discoverability. And so having something that is premium and that is exclusive and that really helps something that advertisers want to have their brands surround is a big part of why we've sort of positioned the channel within free and are striving to get distribution for it everywhere we are able to-
Ilyse Liffreing (15:29):
Oh, that's fascinating. Yeah, I like that comparison a lot actually. On that point, when it comes to advertisers, who do you think is leaning in more so or who do you think is sleeping on it?
Seth Walters (15:41):
Yeah, that's a good question. When we launched a channel, our first launch partner was State Farm. Because we have the bend towards women's sports, you start to see brands that might not necessarily be heavily active in sportsspace like beauty brands, beauty retail brands, personal healthcare brands, et cetera. And so we're seeing a bit of that interest for what we're doing for women's sports. And of course the athletes and the teams themselves are cultivating great partnerships with various advertisers. So the nice thing is that we provide them again with a canvas to bring their messaging to Scripps to align and adjacent to the athletes that they're sponsoring or that the teams that they're sponsoring as well as creating more space for longer form content where we can distribute that across the script sports network.
Damian Fowler (16:33):
Let's sort of zoom out a little bit. We have been talking for the last couple of years about the economics around our sports and how incredibly expensive they are getting talk about inflation. So obviously you see free ad supported net spell fast. That's supposed to be a joke about dispelling BPT. Yeah. Okay. I'll try again. Where do you see free ad supported networks
Seth Walters (17:01):
With live sports.
Damian Fowler (17:01):
Yeah, fitting into the whole kind of economics of what's happening around sports.
Seth Walters (17:07):
Look, I lead monetization for our brands. So there's a separate team of folks whose job it is to go out and partner and find partners with our leagues. I think that the best thing or the only thing that I would say is I think there's going to be more opportunities, especially with some of these more the upstarts that are looking for reach and whose rights perhaps are not necessarily locked up for a huge period of time. And as a consumer, I think the response from consumers is very meaningful and very measurable and these leagues listen to social media. They understand the frustration that fans have about finding the sports that they want to watch. And I think there's going to be more sampling. I think there's going to be greater, over the coming years, more opportunities to find premium live sports across everywhere as opposed to being locked behind a specific AWOL.
(18:05):
Naturally, there's a lot of money behind that. So I'm sure there's other perspectives that might think otherwise because of just how much money flows into that marketplace.
Ilyse Liffreing (18:15):
Yeah. There's sort of tension between making sports widely available and then keeping it premium and there has to be some kind of balance there.
Seth Walters (18:26):
Yeah. Look, with the K-shaped economy analogy I made earlier, taking it back to the customer side of things, is sports going to become something that only the affluent can afford to watch? And what does that mean for the teams and the leagues and ticket sales and merchandise sales over time as they look to evolve their fan base and make sure that they're continuing to generate new fans and not just make it about those who can afford to watch. I can't say for sure because I'm not in the meetings, but I have to imagine that's on the minds of some of the people who are responsible for growing the audience for these sports.
Damian Fowler (19:09):
When you think about audience and fanbase, how strategic do you get when it comes to partnerships?
Seth Walters (19:14):
Yeah. Prior to being at Scripps, I worked at two different smart TV. I am and a streaming platform on the platform side. I think the data that the platforms have, some of the ones that I've been most impressed with, they really look for white space and gray space within their user base. And with rising subscription prices, I think we're starting to see things like Roku launched Howdy, which is an inexpensive commercial free streaming experience. And I believe that they recognize that with everything increasing significantly over a year, that there's an opportunity to serve those people who still want to access commercial-free content but not pay a ton for it. Additionally, you see someone like a YouTube TV who's rolling out new tiers and different price points for separate bundles within their service. And so as a broadcast company, who has channels distributed across platform, both of those platforms as well as many others, I think we are looking towards the streaming marketplace and trying to identify where there are opportunities for us again as IFRI over the air, which typically adds value to all those tiers because we make it accessible and figuring out how and where we can fit into some of the trends that are happening for the platforms who are trying to serve audiences who want to pay a little bit less for their entertainment.
Ilyse Liffreing (20:50):
What would you say is one part of the sports ad experience that feels overdue for Refre?
Seth Walters (20:58):
Yeah, I think there's a lot more engagement that we can create beyond the traditional 15 second, 30 seconds, 60 second ads. And again, in streaming where we're creating a connected experience where we have a lot more flexibility in creating ancillary content and programming around the shows that we're creating to highlight the athletes, to highlight the teams. I'd love to see brands when we're pitching brands on doing more things like that as part of larger packages that support the network.
Damian Fowler (21:36):
And that's it for this edition of The Big Impression.
Ilyse Liffreing (21:39):
This show is produced by Molten Heart. Our theme is by Love and Caliber and our associate producer is Sydney Cairns.
Damian Fowler (21:45):
And remember
Seth Walters (21:47):
When I think of the streaming ecosystem more broadly, I view it very similar to the K-shaped economy recovery post- COVID.
Damian Fowler (21:56):
I'm Damian.
Ilyse Liffreing (21:57):
And I'm Ilyse.
Damian Fowler (21:58):
And we'll see you next time.