Henrico begins streaming service for baseball games at 2 venues

Henrico County has contracted with a streaming video provider to offer streamed and archived baseball games at two county facilities – with the potential that other county facilities (and other sports) could be added in time.

The HiCast service from Highlight Broadcast Network LLC is available for all games played at RF&P Stadium at RF&P Park in Glen Allen and Dorey Stadium at Dorey Park in Varina. Viewers can watch on their computers or mobile devices. The service costs $19.99 per month for a single user (or the discounted rate of $144 on an annual contract) or $29.99 monthly for as many as four concurrent users (or about $216 for a discounted annual contract). The plans automatically renew but may be canceled anytime.

A one-time seven-day package also costs $19.99, according to HiCast’s website.

County officials chose HiCast in part because the company agreed to provide all set-up, installation and service free of charge, while also providing the county with a revenue share. Henrico will earn 15% of each subscription, according to Michael McCormack of the Henrico Sports and Entertainment Authority, who helped select the vendor.

Other bidders would have required the county to pay substantial up-front costs, McCormack said. Though Highland Broadcast Network is a smaller company, it received rave reviews from other users McCormack spoke with, and its products are used at the Cal Ripken Experience in Aberdeen, Maryland and elsewhere. (The Ripken name is attached to Babe Ruth League’s baseball program for children 4 through 12.)

The HiCast service also offers on-demand events (archived for as long as three months) for prices as low as $1, depending upon the event, as well as highlights and other moments that may be saved and shared.

Henrico had offered streaming service of games at RF&P for years, McCormack said, but that system – which relied upon six basic security-style cameras and a press-box-based control panel that required someone to be on site – had become outdated.

HiCast’s system requires no officials to be on site, McCormack said – instead, they simply provide a schedule of games and HiCast sets its cameras remotely to activate and show each one.

The service will play all games at both fields, he said, not just all-star tournaments. (For example, the fall Babe Ruth League seasons at each field will be streamed.)

“I’m just excited that grandparents or uncles or aunts can tune in and watch,” McCormack said.

Though there are no definitive plans to add the technology at other fields in the county, McCormack is bullish about the opportunities to do so in the near future.

“I hope so,” he said. “I’ve been kind of beating the drum on the softball side – we do so much travel softball [in Henrico]. Every single backstop you see is going to have a GoPro [camera] on it [already].”

HiCast cameras can be set up on most fields, McCormack said, even those that only have a metal backstop or fence.

“We wanted a company [whose system] would be easily replicable,” he said.