Yeah we had it in the early 80’s, then about 84/85ish we had to upgrade to a new box with remote control, they scrambled everything, except the locals. I can’t remember the name of the new box.
Yes, you can continue watching your local team on your local RSN.
If you want to watch out of market games you will have to subscribe to either NHLCI on Directv, or the ESPN+ streaming service.
Unfortunately no, there is no way to make it default to an hour. I wish there was.
You could change your recording preferences to add an hour, however, this would add an hour to everything you record, not just sports.
The D* remotes can’t control power on/off for AVR’s, unless you set up HDMI-CEC.
I never understood why the remote could do volume up/down for an AVR but not send out a power on/off command when pressing on/off on the remote, yet it can for the TV.
Cool. You have to do what you have to do.
My discounts expire in October. If they give me another discount I’ll stick around another year, if they don’t, I’ll have to look into streaming.