Owners discuss blackout solution

[Chip R]

http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/news;_yl...yhoo&type=lgns

[Sea Ray]

Such a change makes sense. The system is nuts right now.

I've noticed that Extra Innings is now broadcasting a lot of games twice, one from the home team's TV station and one from the away team. Seems like a wasted effort to me. Anyone know what's behind the change?

[Unassisted]

No Reds games are carried on broadcast TV, so this would mean that no Reds games would be blacked out in Reds country. Wow.

I would still have trouble getting Reds vs. Astros games on MLB.TV, since the Astros are carried on my local broadcast TV. Not an improvement for me, but I can still catch those games on cable.

[flyer85]

I would call it a blackout improvement

[GAC]

Originally Posted by flyer85

I would call it a blackout improvement

Yeah really.

Why torture us anymore! They need to black out more games! :

[Unassisted]

The most curious thing to me in the article is DuPuy's assertion that the rules have been in place for 42 years and they only recently realized that there was a problem with them. Should we infer that MLB HQ only pays attention to problems when members of Congress point them out?

[KronoRed]

Originally Posted by Unassisted

Should we infer that MLB HQ only pays attention to problems when members of Congress point them out?

Does seem like it, at least the job gets done..in the end.

[jmcclain19]

The blackout of Saturday afternoon games on Fox, which is part of MLB’s nearly $700 million annually in TV contracts, will remain.

Awesome - thanks MLB for ensuring that most people can't watch their teams games on one of the two weekend days.

Just wait until the Sat night games are blacked out because of the MLB Network's Sat Night Special starting next year.

[remdog]

Originally Posted by Sea Ray

I've noticed that Extra Innings is now broadcasting a lot of games twice, one from the home team's TV station and one from the away team. Seems like a wasted effort to me. Anyone know what's behind the change?

I don't know why the change but I like it. As I mentioned in the game thread on Wednesday, it enabled me to turn off Thom Brennaman and his complete drivel and lack of interest in what was happening in the game and listen to the Milwaukee announcers who were talking about the play on the field.

I'm paying a pretty good chunk of change to see these games. I'm not interested in tuning in to a Jerry Lewis Telethon.

Rem

[traderumor]

So, this should clear up things like the Pirates being blacked out around here, but really doesn't do anything to solve me being able to watch the Reds if I am on business travel out of market.

[Unassisted]

http://mlb.mlb.com/content/printer_f...3/c3302623.jsp

DuPuy's plan would end TV blackouts
08/13/2008 7:52 PM ET
By Anthony Castrovince / MLB.com

WASHINGTON -- Baseball's current rules on territorial television blackouts were drawn up in the 1960s, long before the dawn of MLB.TV and the Extra Innings package.

Those rules have become archaic, and Bob DuPuy, MLB's president and chief operating officer, presented a plan to MLB's executive council on Wednesday that would alter them considerably for the 2009 season.

DuPuy doesn't expect action to be taken until the final quarterly meetings of MLB's owners, which will take place in November. For now, he has presented a plan in which blackouts would be lifted in the areas in which no local broadcast operator carries the games of a specific MLB team.

"If a market is underserved," DuPuy said, "and a club is not broadcasting, either over the air or through cable, or attempting to do so, it would be opened up to the out-of-market packages."

Currently, in cities on the periphery of MLB's individual territories, blackouts are commonplace. As an example, none of the teams from cities within a four-hour drive of Las Vegas -- Los Angeles, Oakland, Phoenix, San Francisco and San Diego -- regularly have their games broadcast there. Yet games played by those teams are blacked out in Vegas.

That wouldn't be the case under DuPuy's plan. That plan, however, is not ready for a vote, because DuPuy is still collecting TV contract information from each of the 30 clubs.

"I didn't expect any action to be taken [Wednesday]," DuPuy said. "There didn't appear to be any opposition moving forward."

[Unassisted]

In August, they were discussing it. Now they're tabling discussion of it.

http://www.bizofbaseball.com/index.p...ials&Itemid=39

Blackout Policy to Remain Through MLB Network Launch

Written by Maury Brown
Thursday, 20 November 2008 20:38

Blackout Blues
Baseball fans, prepare for more frustration.

MLB owners, yet again, tabled restructuring the local and regional television territories for the league at today's quarterly owners meetings in New York, and in doing so, leaves an arcane and convoluted system in place just before the MLB Network launches on January 1.

The commissioner’s office has proposed an adjustment that will involve clubs losing a territory or market if they do not broadcast within it. Currently, markets such as Las Vegas sees six clubs claiming the television territory, including the A’s, Giants, Padres, Angels, Dodgers, and Diamondbacks.

The issue will not be broached again until the next quarterly meetings by the owners in January.

Unless the league makes a provision, the ranks of those that will be faced with the “blackout blues” will grow exponentially as the new television network for the league reaches 50 million homes next season. MLB Network plans on broadcasting 26 games each season.

MLB should have been more proactive before the economy began its slide.

In waiting on addressing the issue, the club owners are surely pushing to retain television market space as the possibility of local revenue decline looms on the horizon of the 2009 season based on an ever-gloomy economic forecast.

The blackout policy, one of continued consumer frustration since MLB Extra Innings was hatched, has been pushed back year after year, despite a chorus of angry phone calls, letters, and emails to the league asking how, for example, the Seattle Mariners consider all of Montana their “local” broadcast territory.

Now, the chorus will surely raise to an ear-splitting cacophony of confusing calls and aggravated viewers. The old adage, you can pay me now, or pay me later, seems to ring true for the moment based on the owners’ in-action on the blackout issue.

If the owners, yet again, table the issue in January, then the odds will continue to dwindle for a fair and equitable system that allows as many baseball fans as possible to enjoy MLB's product. Limiting your product to the masses is a backward way of thinking.

[kaldaniels]

Originally Posted by Sea Ray

Such a change makes sense. The system is nuts right now.

I've noticed that Extra Innings is now broadcasting a lot of games twice, one from the home team's TV station and one from the away team. Seems like a wasted effort to me. Anyone know what's behind the change?

I think the fact that they do that is awesome...its not like extra innings is forcing announcers to announce more, thus wasting effort. They are just throwing up an extra feed of the game on one of many unused channels. It gives fans a greater variety/their choice of announcers.

[Ltlabner]

Let's piss off customers and limit who can buy our product.

Brilliant.

[KronoRed]

Not surprised they tabled it, owners love it, who cares what the fans think?