[NU Sports] Tim Doyle joins BTN as bball analyst

[Joe Thiegs]

Comcast's duplicity in this is really shameful.  As the BTN e-mail I
received that announced the new basketball analyst trio included the
following (invoking the fair use copyright exception, here):

"Comcast To Launch 'Oregon Sports Network' on Expanded Basic Cable
Comcast SportsNet Northwest Costs Operators $2 per month

PORTLAND - Promising to bring more local sports programming to Oregon sports
fans than ever, Comcast SportsNet Northwest launches November 1. The channel
will broadcast Portland Trail Blazers' and Oregon Ducks' basketball games as
well as coverage of local college sports like soccer, track and hockey that
"otherwise might not be televised," according to The Oregonian.

>From a programming perspective, there are striking similarities between the
Comcast network and the Big Ten Network. 

"This is going to be Oregon's sports network. We really want to try and
become a fabric of Oregon sports," executive vice president of Comcast
sports programming David Manougian told The Oregonian on Oct. 18.

Those are the similarities. For Big Ten fans, here are the unfortunate
differences. 

According to Sports Business Journal, Comcast will charge operators $2, more
than double the Big Ten Network's rate, and will place the network on
expanded basic cable. Comcast has refused the Big Ten's proposal to be on
expanded basic saying they must "protect" customers who aren't sports fans."

I do really feel sorry for those who for one reason or another can't bring
themselves to switch over to Dish Network or DirecTV.  If I could only keep
ten channels--heck, probably even five channels--outside of the locals, BTN
definitely would be one of them (along with the Food Network, Comedy
Central, The Discovery Channel, ESPN, and a handful of others).  I love it .
. . and not just for the football and basketball!

-Joe

-----Original Message-----
From: nwu-sports-bounces at tssi.com [mailto:nwu-sports-bounces at tssi.com] On
Behalf Of SjT (Stephen J. Truog)
Sent: Friday, October 26, 2007 1:36 PM
To: nwu-sports at tssi.com
Subject: Re: [NU Sports] Tim Doyle joins BTN as bball analyst

> The Big Ten Network men's basketball studio team
> joining Dave Revsine (is he
> an NU guy too?) will be Gene Keady, former tOSU star
> Jimmy Jackson, and
> Timmy Doyle.  Good for NU!
>  
It's nice to see an NU presence at the network - and
I'm sure there are tons more behind the cameras as
well.

It'll be nice (well, maybe not :) ) to see more than
the annual one "let's do PSU vs. NU so we get both out
of the way at once" ESPN2 mid Saturday hoops game this
year.

Hopefully the push of hoops fans in Indiana, Illinois
and Michigan will get some deal worked out for the BTN
on cable. I think everyone's getting sick of the games
these megacorps are playing - Comcast is flooding the
Phoenix market with ads to call and demand that "The
Mountain" be part of the basic package ... Arizona
doesn't even have a Mountain West team! Surely they
can't demand Phoenix do what they refuse to do in a
state that actually HAS one or two schools on the
network!:)

Oh well - I know it sucks for a lot of the midwest at
this time and hopefully that gets changed soon with
all these media games. But as a Cats fan in Arizona,
this may well be the best thing to come along since
sliced cheese (that's the Wisconsin version and I've
never been much for bread :) ).

Big game this weekend - GO CATS!!!
-SjT

* * * * * * * * *
STEPHEN J. TRUOG
sjtruog at yahoo.com
GO CATS!!!

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