By Phillip Swann
The TV Answer Man –Follow me on X.
TV Answer Man, I noticed that you haven’t done any 4K updates on sports that will be in 4K lately. How come? Are they not doing sports in 4K? I know there isn’t much but don’t the networks understand that 4K is very important to people who paid major bucks to get a 4K TV? Why don’t they give us more sports in 4K? — Johnny, Hermosa Beach, California.
Johnny, there have been a few live national sporting events in upscaled 4K over the last month. Fox offered an upscaled 4K feed of the special MLB game from Rickwood Field in Alabama and a few UFL games in the format, again upscaled. There were also several baseball games available in market in 4K from NESN (actually native 4K!) and Spectrum SportsNet LA (upscaled 4K.)
But that’s about it. The networks continue to produce next to nothing in 4K. And when they actually provide a 4K broadcast, it’s not really 4K. It’s upscaled 4K from a 1080p HD production, which means the picture might be better than HD but still inferior to a native 4K production (one where 4K cameras and on-site 4K production facilities are used.)
And to make matters worse, the networks do next to nothing to promote the 4K offerings. There are no press releases or even a mention in their social media feeds or web sites. The 4K TV owner has to find out about them through sources such as this web site or the hard-working AVS Forum group.
The reason for this is that 4K is an extremely low priority at the networks. Most network executives do not believe a 4K broadcast, even just an upscaled one, is worth the extra cost of producing it. Consequently, there is little support within the network to provide live sports in 4K.
This is also why you don’t see any promotions or press releases for 4K productions. (Besides a special event such as the Super Bowl.) The network’s communications department realizes that the top brass simply doesn’t care about 4K so there’s no point in investing their time and resources in promoting it. By example, did you know that NBC will offer a 4K feed of next month’s Olympic Games from Paris? I bet not because NBC hasn’t said two words about it in their multitude of press releases on the games. It’s simply not a big deal at the network.
I have asked NBC if the 4K feed, which will likely be on the usual providers such as DIRECTV, Comcast, and YouTube TV, will be available on Peacock, the NBCUniversal-operated streaming service. Thus far, the response has been crickets, which is not unusual when I inquire about 4K. I usually have to badger the PR team to get a response to 4K inquiries. (One network’s PR department, which I won’t name, actually became enraged when I repeated my inquiry because I hadn’t received a response from my first inquiry of five days earlier.)
Update, June 29: NBC Sports tells The TV Answer Man that it will check whether the Olympics will be in 4K on Peacock. We will update if we get more information.
Again, it’s because the networks, in general, don’t give a flying flip about 4K and only provide the infrequent upscaled 4K presentations if they don’t crush the budget. It’s too bad this is true because there are many 4K TV owners who would like to watch live sports in real 4K. But I’m here to tell you that it’s not happening in this country anytime soon.
Have a question about new TV technologies? Send it to The TV Answer Man at swann@tvanswerman.com Please include your first name and hometown in your message.
The TV Answer Man is veteran journalist Phillip Swann who has covered the TV technology scene for more than three decades. He will report on the latest news and answer your questions regarding new devices and services that are changing the way you watch television. See the bio for Phillip Swann here.
