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SportSouth |
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| Type | Cable television network |
|---|---|
| Country | United States |
| Availability | Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi, South Carolina and parts of North Carolina |
| Owner | FOX Cable Networks |
| Key people | Jeff Genthner, senior vice president and general manager |
| Launch date | October 13, 2006 |
| Website http://msn.foxsports.com/regional/south |
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SportSouth is a regional sports network in the United States, with its headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia. SportSouth, formerly Turner South, relaunched on October 13, 2006. The first official event on the channel was a National Hockey League game between the Atlanta Thrashers and the Carolina Hurricanes.
SportSouth reaches about 8.9 million cable and satellite subscribers in Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi, South Carolina and parts of North Carolina.
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In March 2006, FSN's parent company News Corporation, looking to further expand its roster of sports teams and events, bought the network for $375 million. [2]. After the deal was completed, FSN sought a new name. After about 60 different suggestions, network officials chose SportSouth, the original name of the other network owned by News Corp, FSN South.
SportSouth plans to air 61 Thrashers games, 45 Hawks games in 2006-07 and 55 Braves games in the 2007 MLB season. That number will expand to 80 in 2008, when TBS ends national broadcasts of Braves games in favor of a leaguewide package.[3] It shares local Braves broadcasting with WPCH-TV, the spun-off local broadcast version of TBS, an arrangement which begun in 2008. (Select games of the Cincinnati Reds and St. Louis Cardinals will also be distributed on SportSouth, subject to Major League Baseball territory restrictions.) However, conflicts with NBA and NHL playoff games could see the split between SportSouth and FSN South differ from the planned 80/25 games per network. Also, in 2006-07, SportSouth began televising some Memphis Grizzlies games. [4] This ensures that both they and the Nashville Predators have the maximum number of games televised that they wish to offer.
Sportsouth also has acquired the rights to University of Tennessee sporting events as of August 28, 2007, including 12 encore presentations of Tennessee football, four men’s basketball games, four women’s basketball games, six Olympic sporting events, 12 60-minute episodes of The Phillip Fulmer Show, nine 30-minute episodes of The Pat Summitt Show, and nine 30-minute episodes of The Bruce Pearl Show.
There are two major differences between FSN South and SportSouth:
Promotional commercials for SportSouth have included sports figures such as Steve Spurrier, Bob Hartley, Bo Jackson, and Heath Shuler.
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