Another weekend chock full of football, plus some big-time fighting, awards shows and playoff baseball!
Let’s start in Los Angeles, where Larry Sheets is all set for Game 2 of the MLB National League Division Series at Dodger Stadium. The Dodgers looked great against the Braves in Game 1, as did Larry’s broadcast for Fox and MLB. We’re all hoping the Dodgers keep up the winning streak for the whole month of October!
Also in LA this weekend, engineer in charge (EIC) John Bright is back in K34 for a unique production and transmission right here at our office in Van Nuys. We have TVRO set up out front to receive a clean feed of the fight between Luis “Pantera” Nery and Jason “Dillinger” Canoy from the Gasmart Stadium in Tijuana, Mexico, on Saturday night. Our team here — which includes John Jennings, project manager Eric Hall, Cesar Zapata and Alex Mestizo, along with Mr. Bright — will set up an audio booth in our studio for live commentators and a full production package in K34 so that director Marty Corwin can produce the fight for transmission back to ESPN for broadcast on ESPN+. This is just one example of many where PSSI Global Services provides much more than a basic satellite uplink.
There’s not much that’s basic about what Justin Roszak is doing in San Jose this weekend. Justin’s at the helm of another 14-channel “at-home” transmission for our friends at CBS Sports Network. Colorado State is in town to take on the San Jose State Spartans on Saturday night. Justin is uplinking 14 paths to PSSI International Teleport (PIT), where our team will ingest and deliver the signal to CBS headquarters in NYC via the AT&T Global Video Service network. CBS’ production crew there in New York will finish the broadcast for distribution to football fans nationwide.
Following the game, dual-threat project manager/driver Eric Storlie will bring the truck down to LA, where Chris Hovden will begin a few days of testing for ABC’s broadcast of the American Music Awards, live from the Microsoft Theater in downtown LA on Tuesday night. Project manager Tommy Lopez will be down there with Chris to manage the international distribution of this action-packed show, which is hosted by Tracee Ellis Ross this year.
Still another monster show out west on our schedules: UFC 229, live from T-Mobile Arena. While the big show is on Saturday night, our intrepid UFC crew has been hard at work all week in Vegas (and for several weeks prior in the office) getting ready for the main event and all the other hoopla surrounding it. Brian Blomstrom was at the Park Theater at the MGM Grand on Wednesday for an exclusive live interview between Conan O’Brien and Conor McGregor. At that same venue on Thursday, UFC EIC Tracy Michaels, Jim Flowers and John Bright joined project managers Garrett Hunt and Keith Valeri to provide full production and transmission services for the official pre-PPV presser. Friday morning, the entire team gets set at T-Mobile Arena for a full day of testing and weigh-in transmissions alongside our long-time customer and partner Concom.
Saturday brings a full day of fighting, culminating with the much-anticipated matchup between Conor McGregor and Khabib Nurmagomedov. We’ll add quite a bit of crew to our veteran UFC team to pull off extensive transmission and production services. In addition to Tracy, Jim, Garrett and Keith, we have Wes Hill, Brian Blomstrom, Paul Blomstrom, Ray Loyko and Mark Huss on-site to provide ringside commentary services, domestic and international transmission services, emergency backup transmission paths, a 4K broadcast of the pay-per-view, and so much more. We will also have our beautiful, state-of-the-art production/uplink bus on-site for additional monitoring and work space. PSSI Global Services has pulled out all the stops for what is certain to be an exciting night of MMA.
We have still another show this weekend that only PSSI Global Services could pull off: WWE Super Showdown, live from the Melbourne Cricket Ground in Melbourne, Australia. Project manager Logan Schinto and WWE mainstay Zane Michaels are down under working alongside our trusted partners in Australia to provide the origination transmission for the worldwide distribution of this exciting event. Back in the States, Mike Howley and Nick Ray are at WWE headquarters in Connecticut to handle the domestic uplink for the action down in Australia. PIT rounds out what is truly a team effort as they handle some turnaround and recording services for this massive event that spans multiple time zones and hemispheres. Nice job out there (and down there)!
Meanwhile, back to the gridiron. Here’s a look at what we have going on this weekend. Take a deep breath!
- Dave “Mitch” Mitchell’s in Huntington, West Virginia, Friday night at Joan C. Edwards Stadium, where the Marshall University Thundering Herd host the Middle Tennessee Blue Raiders, live on CBS SportsNet.
- Just up the road from him, Rick Kolinek has a CBSSN broadcast of his own. He’s in Mount Pleasant, Michigan, at Kelly/Shorts Stadium, where Central Michigan hosts Buffalo on Saturday.
- Also in Michigan, Marty Smitherman joins forces with Craig Henry on the CK25 mobile teleport at Spartan Stadium in East Lansing. Michigan State hosts Northwestern in a Big Ten matchup live on Fox Sports 1, and we will have C- and Ku-band transmissions back to Fox headquarters in LA for the broadcast.
- Blake Blomstrom was all ready for some Cubs playoff baseball, but when the Cubs lost the Wild Card Game at Wrigley, Blake changed his tack and headed to Columbus. He’s there on C24 for Ohio State versus Indiana on Saturday.
- Steve Hagerty’s in Western Pennsylvania for back-to-back games for the SPORTSfever network. Friday night it’s high school action in Murrysville, where Franklin Regional hosts Gateway. Then Steve heads toward Erie, Pennsylvania, for Saturday’s game at Mercyhurst, where the Lakers host the Edinboro Fighting Scots.
- Not too far from Blake and Hagerty, Steve Toth and Marc Sarazin are setting up C41’s big antenna at Mountaineer Field in Morgantown, West Virginia. It’s a 10-channel at-home transmission of the WVU versus Kansas game on Saturday for our friends at ESPN. Dennis Smith is also there with a Ku-band backup path out of his NT21 truck.
At-home transmission for ESPN - More SPORTSfever action in Baltimore, where Dave Buckman is on hand for Saturday’s game between Morgan State and South Carolina State. Mr. Buckman then heads to D.C. for the other kind of football, as D.C. United hosts the Chicago Fire in some MLS action.
- New dad Mati Kerpen is heading to Bloomsburg University in Pennsylvania for Saturday’s game between the Huskies and the West Chester Golden Rams.
- Continuing south, Ron “Roadrunner” Ford finds himself in Memphis this weekend, where Memphis hosts the UConn Huskies on Saturday at the Liberty Bowl.
- Much deeper south, veteran engineer Rick Ball is back at The Swamp in Gainesville, Florida, for the SEC Game of the Week on CBS. LSU is in town, and looking good, but they are going to get an earful from the Gators fans packed into Ben Hill Griffin Stadium.
- Couple of big games in Texas this weekend. Steve Chaisson is giving John May a well-deserved rest on CK48 this weekend in Waco, where Baylor hosts Kansas State on Saturday.
- Just up the road, Joe Cox is at the Cotton Bowl for what is always a big game. It’s the Red River Rivalry, as the Oklahoma Sooners head south into enemy territory to take on the Texas Longhorns. Football fans nationwide can see this big game on Fox on Saturday, thanks in no small part to Joe’s efforts there on-site.
- All the way up in the Pacific Northwest, David Meyer is keeping busy on the weekends. Thursday night he was at another big Puget Sound region high school football game as Camas took on Sumner. Then, on Saturday, he’ll be at Roos Field at Eastern Washington University as Southern Utah comes to town.
- And this week’s 4K game of the week takes place in Tucson, where the Wildcats host the Cal Bears on Saturday night in Pac-12 action. 4K guru Rick Varney spent a couple of days at the LA office straightening us all out before heading down to Arizona to join Mike Sheehan for the big game.
Another weekend, another exciting set of events for PSSI Global Services. Make sure to tune in to some of our work this weekend — there’s so much going on we’ll be hard to miss!