My latest column for the National Sports Journalism Center site at Indiana looks at the long-range prospects for the new Fox Sports 1.

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You know this is coming.

The new Fox Sports 1 launches Saturday. Within weeks, maybe even days, there will be stories evaluating ratings from the new sports network compared to the industry giant, ESPN. In some circles, there will be a daily tick-tock, much like following the scoreboard at a basketball game.

Barring some huge upset, Fox Sports 1′s rating will be miniscule. Or at the very least, not even register when put side-by-side with ESPN. Then, boom, there will be the inevitable headlines proclaiming Fox’s new network a complete failure. Maybe even an epic disaster, given all the hype for the launch.

And that would be a mistake.

You need to be looking through a big picture when you evaluate the new Fox Sports 1. As in the biggest window you can imagine.

For all the talk about 2013, the larger view for the new Fox Sports 1 is more about 2023. Make no mistake, despite all the programming that is launching now, the new sports network is a long-term play for Fox.

“I’ve always said our success is going to be judged by years, not days and months,” said Bill Wanger, the executive vice-president for programming for Fox and Fox Sports 1. “Quite frankly, our ratings are going to be pretty small in the beginning. All new networks start out small. It takes a while for people to get used to the channel. So we have no illusions of coming out of the gate and being a behemoth. We’re in for the long haul.”

Wanger noted that it took Fox 13 years to become number one among the networks. But this is the point: Fox got to the top in network television.

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Fox Sports 1, though, snapped up one of those nice houses last week. It paid big money (a reported $1.2 billion over 12 years) to secure the rights to the U.S. Open and other United States Golf Association events, beginning in 2015.

Wanger said the move wasn’t meant as an opening statement, although you could have fooled people in the industry.  It seems like a pretty good indicator that Fox Sports 1 is going to be a major player.

Fox doesn’t get those rights if it doesn’t have a Fox Sports 1. Hence the need to create the new network.

“We realized that to be competitive in future rights negotiations for premiere packages, we needed a fully distributed and highly rated national cable sports channel to be successful,” said Eric Shanks, Fox Sports’ co-president and COO, told investors this week.

Next up are the rights to the NBA, with the league’s TV deals expiring in 2016. I’d be surprised if Fox Sports 1 doesn’t land part of that package. NBA games would elevate the new network to another level.

“The NBA is a big fish,” Wanger said. “We’re going to be aggressive for those rights.”

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And there’s more.