Pertinent quote from the mostly unrelated article:
"Baseball also announced its new one-game wild-card playoffs will be televised Oct. 5 by TBS and that two division series games will shift from TBS to the MLB Network under a deal running through 2013. TBS Sports President David Levy said a rights fee was involved."
Link:
Selig: Oakland move might be considered - Yahoo! Sports
I guess Dish added MLB Network just in time.
Still, stuff like this is infuriating to me as a sports fan on a budget. In the old days, all your nationally televised sporting events and playoff games were on channels you'd get with a relatively basic package- you know, channels like ESPN, and that kind of thing, or even major over the air networks. Increasingly, stuff is being moved to higher tier channels like NBC Sports Channel (NHL), MLB Network (Exclusive *playoff* games), NFL Network (NFL Thursday night package that, granted, has periodically sprung into and out of existence- I remember a Thursday night package on ESPN or TNT back in the day that disappeared for some years and came back as an NFLN thing).
I mean, I often bring this up in reference to Dish not having these channels in the more basic packages sometimes, but I am also kind of ticked at the leagues themselves. Like why the heck did the NHL sign a deal like that with Versus/NBCSN in the first place? Why does MLB feel the need to move some of their playoff games over a channel that's not in a lot of households? It seems like it's always about the dollars over the best interest of the fans, and even a sport's long-term best interest (Retaining fans and creating new ones gets harder if people have trouble finding ways to watch the games).
Very frustrating. The whole thing. I mean, at this second, I think I have a package that includes MLB Network (It's in AT200, right?), but I can't always afford that. If I switch providers, I may wind up with a deal that sets me up with a package that doesn't include it also. My father and some much younger siblings are sports fans, and they can't pay for NFL Network, MLB Network, etc., which are on a digital preferred or premiere tier with Comcast in his area (They do get NBCN, because they include it with regular expanded basic).
You want to know why people are always calling up asking for promos and threatening to quit? Why they switch providers constantly? Why some people cut the cord altogether? Well, there are a lot of reasons, but one simple one is that you are always having to pay more and are always getting less. Your package goes up in price and the channels may remain the same, but the sports games they used to show move on to lesser viewed channels you'd have to pay even more extra (Beyond the usually annual price increases on your own package) to get. You can say, well, sure the same package that had ESPN in 2000 has it now, but ESPN doesn't show all the events it used to show (And that's just one example), yet that package still costs a lot more anyhow.
"Baseball also announced its new one-game wild-card playoffs will be televised Oct. 5 by TBS and that two division series games will shift from TBS to the MLB Network under a deal running through 2013. TBS Sports President David Levy said a rights fee was involved."
Link:
Selig: Oakland move might be considered - Yahoo! Sports
I guess Dish added MLB Network just in time.
Still, stuff like this is infuriating to me as a sports fan on a budget. In the old days, all your nationally televised sporting events and playoff games were on channels you'd get with a relatively basic package- you know, channels like ESPN, and that kind of thing, or even major over the air networks. Increasingly, stuff is being moved to higher tier channels like NBC Sports Channel (NHL), MLB Network (Exclusive *playoff* games), NFL Network (NFL Thursday night package that, granted, has periodically sprung into and out of existence- I remember a Thursday night package on ESPN or TNT back in the day that disappeared for some years and came back as an NFLN thing).
I mean, I often bring this up in reference to Dish not having these channels in the more basic packages sometimes, but I am also kind of ticked at the leagues themselves. Like why the heck did the NHL sign a deal like that with Versus/NBCSN in the first place? Why does MLB feel the need to move some of their playoff games over a channel that's not in a lot of households? It seems like it's always about the dollars over the best interest of the fans, and even a sport's long-term best interest (Retaining fans and creating new ones gets harder if people have trouble finding ways to watch the games).
Very frustrating. The whole thing. I mean, at this second, I think I have a package that includes MLB Network (It's in AT200, right?), but I can't always afford that. If I switch providers, I may wind up with a deal that sets me up with a package that doesn't include it also. My father and some much younger siblings are sports fans, and they can't pay for NFL Network, MLB Network, etc., which are on a digital preferred or premiere tier with Comcast in his area (They do get NBCN, because they include it with regular expanded basic).
You want to know why people are always calling up asking for promos and threatening to quit? Why they switch providers constantly? Why some people cut the cord altogether? Well, there are a lot of reasons, but one simple one is that you are always having to pay more and are always getting less. Your package goes up in price and the channels may remain the same, but the sports games they used to show move on to lesser viewed channels you'd have to pay even more extra (Beyond the usually annual price increases on your own package) to get. You can say, well, sure the same package that had ESPN in 2000 has it now, but ESPN doesn't show all the events it used to show (And that's just one example), yet that package still costs a lot more anyhow.
Thankfully MLBTV worked out.
