OT: The truth about TV timeouts, plus the state of CFB TV with Bob Thompson

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Are TV timeouts really longer this year? The answer has two parts. SZD obtained years of documents outlining how media timeouts work in SEC games on ESPN. There’s been no short-term change. (That LSU-South Carolina game was just a weird one, our analysis shows.) But the long-term trend tells its own story about viewers losing more and more of their time to in-game advertising.

Then, to help us parse what we’ve learned, we welcome a guest: Bob Thompson, a sports media consultant and the former president of the Fox Sports Networks. Bob talks with Richard and Alex about the forces shaping our viewing experience, whether there’s any way to lighten the commercial load in a world of ever-growing rights fees, and if the Pac-12’s fight with the Mountain West will wind up worthwhile for Washington State, Oregon State, and their friends.

Producer: Anthony Vito

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