Network Fox Sports Networks Language English Founded 12 March 2006 | Country United States Founder Larry Dolan Parent organization Fox Sports | |
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Launched March 12, 2006 (2006-03-12) Owned by Fox Entertainment Group
(21st Century Fox) Picture format 720p (HDTV)
480i (SDTV) Headquarters Cleveland, Ohio, United States Profiles | ||
SportsTime Ohio (STO) (also sometimes referred to on-air as Fox SportsTime Ohio) is an American regional sports network that is owned by Fox Cable Networks, a unit of the Fox Entertainment Group division of 21st Century Fox, and operates as an affiliate of Fox Sports Networks. The channel, which is a sister network to Fox Sports Ohio, broadcasts statewide coverage of professional, collegiate and high school sports events throughout northern Ohio, including the Cleveland area.
Contents
SportsTime Ohio is available from most cable providers in Northeast Ohio and select providers in other portions of Ohio (including Columbus), Northwest Pennsylvania, and extreme Western New York. It is also available nationwide on satellite via DirecTV, as well as outside Ohio on AT&T U-verse.
History
SportsTime Ohio was launched on March 12, 2006; it was founded by the family of Cleveland Indians owner Larry Dolan, becoming the second regional sports network in the Cleveland area, after Fox Sports Ohio (which launched in February 1989 as SportsChannel Ohio). SportsTime Ohio assumed the regional cable television rights to Major League Baseball games involving the Indians from Fox Sports Ohio, which had served as the exclusive local broadcaster of the Indians from 2002 to 2005, when it was majority-owned by Cablevision Systems Corporation (a New York-based company owned by Dolan's brother, Charles) until an asset trade with then-Fox Sports Net parent News Corporation.
Starting off as rivals, the two networks would soon become corporate sisters, when on December 3, 2012, the Indians announced that it would sell SportsTime Ohio to Fox Sports Ohio parent Fox Entertainment Group. The deal was finalized four weeks later on December 28. Fox retained SportsTime Ohio's existing staff despite coming under common ownership with Fox Sports Ohio, with Katie Witham becoming a traveling reporter with the team.
In April 2013, at the beginning of the 2013 Major League Baseball season, SportsTime Ohio began incorporating the Fox Sports branding, imagery and programming used on the other Fox Sports regional networks.
Professional sports
SportsTime Ohio holds the exclusive regional cable television rights to the Cleveland Indians of Major League Baseball and the Ohio Machine of Major League Lacrosse. The channel produces Indians Live, a pre-game and post-game show bookending the channel's Indians telecasts or any national games airing on another network. The network also shares coverage of Cleveland Monsters hockey and Cleveland Gladiators arena football with sister network Fox Sports Ohio.