tcpuccio,
I live in Rochester, and I watch every game, or I did until the beginning of this season. I've had Dish since 1997. I was bent when Dish Pulled the VOOM Channels, before that Speedvision, The Viacom channels, then SmithsonianHD, FX, Nat Geo, then RSN's ETC....
To me it looks like MSG is not going to be coming back to Dish for weeks or months. I looked into DirecTV, and decided to jump.
I still have Dish and now DirecTV. I'm not a huge fan of the DirecTV DVR, and the several missing HD channels that Dish has. I can say I really like the MRV feature, and the NO FEE External Hard Drive feature. Best of all I get the Buffalo Sabres Games and in HD, instead of the awful overly compressed SD feed on some random Alternate Sports channel.
If you are a Hockey Fan, DirecTV is vastly better as DirecTV has larger Local Regional coverage areas, this means as a DirecTV sub (in Western NY) you get access to Sabres, Islanders, Devils, and Rangers games instead of just Rangers, and Sabres games on Dish. If you get Center Ice every RSN Center Ice feed is HD, except for some of the Canadian games when both teams in a game are Canadian.
Currently in Western NY the deal is totally free equipment with Free installation, $29 bucks off your programing package for 12 months, $14 bucks for the next 12 months, and if you get a friend to refer you another $10 off per month for you and your friend, Free Starz and Showtime for 3 months, and 3 Months free of the extra HD pack (Smithsonian, Palladia, Discovery CI, MGM, Hallmark Movie HD, HDnet Movies, and Universal HD).
Good Luck with whatever you decide,
John