E.W. Scripps’ Seth Walters on making premium sports more accessible

As sports rights grow more fragmented and expensive, E.W. Scripps is making a different bet: free access, broader reach and a bigger role for ad-supported television.

As Seth Walters, head of CTV sales at E.W. Scripps, says, “Our superpower is distribution.”

Walters joins The Big Impression podcast to explain why Scripps is leaning into free over-the-air and streaming sports at a moment when so much premium live programming sits behind paywalls. Through Scripps Sports, the company is building a portfolio around women’s leagues, local teams and underserved audiences — while giving advertisers a rare combination of scale and live attention.

He also shares why he sees the streaming landscape as a “K-shaped economy,” how sports risk becoming “something that only the affluent can afford to watch” and why free, ad-supported distribution could be one of the industry’s biggest growth opportunities.