Posted on 09/12/2009 9:49:28 AM PDT by buccaneer81
TV timeout? Blame the guy in the red hat Saturday, September 12, 2009 3:26 AM By Tim Feran THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
If you become irate over a long TV timeout during tonight's game between Ohio State University and the University of Southern California, there's a good reason to see red.
A person called the "red hat" is to blame. Known officially as the TV commercial timeout coordinator, the official stands on the sidelines, wears a red hat and is responsible for when to stop and start play on the field for commercial breaks.
"It's not very easy," said Oliver Dizon, senior vice president of asset management at ESPN, which is televising the game. "There are a lot of people involved."
The red hats are usually game officials who aren't working on the field that week or are former referees. They have to juggle the demands and desires of networks, teams and referees, said Mark Rudner, associate commissioner at the Big Ten Conference, which hires, pays and manages the coordinators.
"It really is a remarkable type of coordination between the conference, the partners, the referees and the home team, from timing to making sure the format is being followed," Rudner said.
The TV timeout coordinators usually wear red hats so that they can be easily seen by officials on the field. At Ohio Stadium, they usually stand near the 20-yard line on the Ohio State side, near the visiting-team locker room. As is the case with the rest of the officiating crew, the identity of the red-hat official is not announced until game time.
By contract, the network can take only a certain number of TV timeouts. Breaks can last 30 seconds or a couple of minutes. But regardless of the game, the total amount of commercial time must remain the same.
"We can't really expand or collapse it," Dizon said.
The number and length of TV timeouts per football game varies from network to network, from the college ranks to pro level and even among college conferences, depending on the contracts. In most cases, about 20 breaks will air during a three-hour game.
For the OSU-USC game, there will be 19 breaks, and viewers will see about 30 minutes of commercials. The exact number of minutes devoted to commercials is the subject of much discussion among frustrated TV viewers but is kept proprietary, officials at ESPN and the Big Ten said.
Even though the number of commercials per game was set long ago, the breaks still annoy longtime Buckeye fan Steve Pawlowski.
"I hate them, especially after a touchdown," said Pawlowski, who recently moved from Ohio to Arizona. "They go to a break after the score, back for the kickoff, another break, and then back to the game. I also hate how everything is for sale, even the injury report."
Most of tonight's 19 spots are national ads that were sold by the network; six spots are local ads.
While ESPN cannot cash in on a big game by adding commercial time, the network can charge more for the commercials. And advertisers, aware that this game is likely to draw a huge audience, are "willing to pay a premium," Dizon said. For a major game airing at night such as this one, a 30-second local ad sells for at least $30,000, TV ad sales sources say.
But there's no guarantee at what point during the game the commercials will air or how many will air during a quarter, just that they will air sometime during the game.
"It is a live game, and we can't really tell when the breaks are," Dizon said. "There are only four natural breaks -- halftime and the quarters -- and the rest is dependent on what happens on the field. It's not like a general entertainment show where you know exactly when the breaks will happen."
ESPN is obliged by its contracts with advertisers to run commercials in their entirety, so the network director tries to avoid cutting them off. "With a big game like this, where the premium for commercials is fairly high, we don't want to screw up," Dizon said.
But the Big Ten doesn't guarantee that the breaks will last as long as the TV director would like.
"Even though (the red hats) have headsets on and the director is saying, 'Can I have 10 more seconds?' the field officials will say, 'We're playing. You've got your time,' " Rudner said. "It can get pretty tense at times. The fact that the red hat works for the conference helps us control the flow of the game.
"The last thing we want to do, in a game where there's an incredible shift in momentum, is to have the red hat grant a TV timeout," Rudner said. "The red hat has to use his discretion."
Although TV viewers, coaches and fans in the stadium grouse about TV timeouts, "we haven't had a lot of issues where this is concerned," Rudner said. "We'll occasionally get a call from a team saying, 'Oh, that timeout was too long.' So we'll go back and time them ourselves.
"But we don't have too many issues with too many breaks going long," Rudner said. "We do monitor it. The last thing we want to do is lengthen the game more than it has to.
"There's a lot of science to it, but a lot of art to it as well."
Even so, for fans at home, the TV timeout isn't always a frustration.
One Buckeye die-hard who will be parked in front of the TV today said the commercials don't faze him at all.
"Actually, I don't mind the commercials that much," said Rick Minerd of German Village. "Bathroom and snack breaks for me."
tferan@dispatch.com
ping
The red hat dude is gay.
All the commercials on tv will make for a late game tonight, but the traffic delays after the game on 315 will make for an even later game. Go Bucks!
When you’re at the game, tv time outs are a drag.
I am going to show my age, but we had season tickets for a couple of years just to the left of the “Buckeye” endzone. It was before the horseshoe was closed. Being that my DH and I were Auburn fans, it was an rather unusual. We love college football!!
So basically, if your game is televised, you have a lot more time to rest during the 60 minutes of play......
The thing that I love about the college game is that no two schools and no two school’s facilities, traditions, etc. are the same, it’s a different experience everywhere you go.
You sure are right on about that!!!
Traffic on 315 can be a real bear on gamedays.....
Then again, there’s High Street.....
My father can’t stand the red hat ref. He makes several remarks every home game we attend.
What, no threads about the SC OCU game after the fact? Where’s all the Buckeyes this morning?
Make that OSU!
I can’t stand OSU. I’m thrilled over the USC victory. Oh how I hate Ohio State!
USC and TOSU both looked terrible, especially offensively. They’ll both lose 2 games this year, minimum.
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