Fox Sports Indiana will soon be Bally Sports Indiana
You will soon see 19 regional sports networks take on the Bally Sports name, including the TV partner of the Pacers.
The TV home of the Pacers will be rebranded in the coming months. Fox Sports Indiana, the channel you’ve become accustomed to for Pacers basketball, will soon become Bally Sports Indiana.
Seventeen months ago, Sinclair Broadcasting Group purchased regional sports networks, including FSI. Bally’s then became a naming partner in Nov. 2020. They own and manage 11 casinos and will soon add four more to its portfolio, including Tropicana in Evansville, Ind.
This is a name change and a rebrand. They’ll go away from the blue and white color scheme and move to a bold red color (as seen above). It’s unclear if the network song heard heading into and out of commercials will change as well.
Other than how it looks and potentially sounds, not much else is expected to change for the viewer. However, you can look forward to a mobile sports gaming component — which is legal in Indiana.
It doesn’t mean the network will be carried by the popular streaming services such as YouTube TV, Hulu + Live TV or Sling. FSI is carried in Central Indiana by popular providers like xfinity, AT&T, DirecTV and Spectrum. And if you’re local, Pacers games are blacked out on League Pass.
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I’m told the number of households negatively impacted isn’t what you think, and more like 10 to 15 percent of TV consumers do not receive FSI with their TV subscription.
Early ratings have been positive for the Pacers. Their three preseason games were the highest-rated preseason games on the network since 2016.
Chris Denari (15th season), Quinn Buckner (22nd) and Jeremiah Johnson (7th) are the three broadcasters on each Pacers telecast, all of which originate from inside Bankers Life Fieldhouse this season due to COVID-19.