The New York Television Sports Scene – What a Joke

[Anthony2]

It breaks down like this:

Cablevision
Fox Sports – Islanders, Devils
MSG - Rangers, Knicks

Yankees
YES Network – Yankees, Nets

Mets, Time Warner, Comcast
SportsNet New York – Mets

So now each cable/satellite provider must negotiate with four RSNs (3 different owners); each one trying to convince you that they are worth their weight in gold. Once upon a time the Mets, Yankees and Nets feel under Cablevision’s RSNs. Not today. Yet, the cost of Fox and MSG go up, not down. How does that work? Subscribers now have to bear the burden of an additional two RSNs who feel they can charge a premium due to the caliber of their teams. I know, in a perfect world, the market would dictate the RSNs worth. However, in this setup, the market has little to say. Dish could not negotiate a fair agreement for YES, so no YES. The same may happen with SNY. All other cable/satellite providers put up less of a fight either because they are afraid of losing subscribers or they own the RSN already, therefore, not much to fight over. Bottom line for NY sports fans – your screwed by paying too much to see your teams or your screwed by not paying and seeing nothing. Way to go TEAMS.

 

[Juan]

Its 5pm..any Updates On The Mets/cablevision Situation?

 

[Anthony2]

MetsBlog says still no SNY on Channel 60 as of 5:05

 

[liquidnw]

It breaks down like this:

Cablevision
Fox Sports – Islanders, Devils
MSG - Rangers, Knicks

Yankees
YES Network – Yankees, Nets

Mets, Time Warner, Comcast
SportsNet New York – Mets

So now each cable/satellite provider must negotiate with four RSNs (3 different owners); each one trying to convince you that they are worth their weight in gold. Once upon a time the Mets, Yankees and Nets feel under Cablevision’s RSNs. Not today. Yet, the cost of Fox and MSG go up, not down. How does that work? Subscribers now have to bear the burden of an additional two RSNs who feel they can charge a premium due to the caliber of their teams. I know, in a perfect world, the market would dictate the RSNs worth. However, in this setup, the market has little to say. Dish could not negotiate a fair agreement for YES, so no YES. The same may happen with SNY. All other cable/satellite providers put up less of a fight either because they are afraid of losing subscribers or they own the RSN already, therefore, not much to fight over. Bottom line for NY sports fans – your screwed by paying too much to see your teams or your screwed by not paying and seeing nothing. Way to go TEAMS.

IF your talking about the escalation of prices for RSNs you must look clearly at cv. For years MSG was the model and envy of all RSNs having two of HIghest ratings teams in the yankess and knicks. So they milked it and raised the prices which of ocourse others followed. They rasised market prices higher then the "YES network followed the trend and set it even higher but the whole trend was started by cv.
It it amazing to me that int he past few years they lost the Yanks,Nets and now Mets but some how they continue to get more for there networks. I think its above 4 bucks now for MSG & FSNY.

 

[BobMurdoch]

In a perfect world we could only order the ones we wanted, but when they used to do that Sportschannel (then the Mets home) used to cost $10 a month from Cablevision as an a la carte channel. Few signed up so they went away from that model.

Unless Congress makes them stop, the program providers will always demand that they be carried in Expanded Basic. If they don't get that, they don't sign (I still can't believe that YES can afford to leave a million eyeballs unavailable to them or that Major League Baseball sells them a package when they don't carry every available network).

This is what happens though when distributors (Comcast, Time Warner) own the content as well. Consumers will pay through the nose or do without (but they'll be happy to point out that you can subscribe to THEIR service to see your favorite teams)