SportsNet New York, Now Available!

[dishcomm]

Here's a response to my email to ceo@echostar.com....

Mr. Murdoch,
Thank you for your email. We are negotiating with SportNet New York and hope that a mutually beneficial arrangement can be achieved that delivers the Mets games at a fair price to all DISH Network subscribers in the territory. We are also working on MASN for the Nationals and SportTime Ohio for the Indians.


Sincerely,
David Laslo
Executive Office of DISH Network
CEO Escalations


-----Original Message-----
From: Bob Murdoch
Sent: Thursday, March 16, 2006 12:58 PM
To: CEO
Subject: SportsNet NY-david

I’m a Mets fan living in Central NJ who subscribes to the Extra Innings package. Although we are supposed to get every out of market baseball game, plus our home team games, we are currently blacked out from all Yankee and Met games as you don’t carry YES or SportsNet New York (SNY). Also, all Phillies, Nationals. Indians, and Padres games will not have their home feeds available as I’m told that you don’t carry their networks as well.

Unfortunately, I just extended my commitment when I upgraded to a 622, so my options are limited, but I HIGHLY suggest and formally request that you add at least SportsNet NY. FoxSports NY and MSG are now useless to me as I could care less about Hockey or Basketball.

PLEASE don’t cede any more New York/New Jersey/Connecticut area baseball fans to cable or DirecTV. As I currently pay about $200 a month in programming fees, I don’t care about an extra $1.60 a month if you have to raise our rates. Please find a way to get this deal done as soon as possible, but definitely by opening day.

Robert Murdoch,


note: I deleted phone numbers and email addresses.....

Basically this is Dish's way of telling you to go fly a kite....
I think I'm going to get a DTV receiver, I have a dish mounted aready and get the EI thru DTV..Actually I astill have my old DTV equipt as well..OR I may just get an FTA reciever and that's that...I own my equipt and do not have a contract with Dish..
None of the RSA's will agree to a la carte..That's a given.....
My prediction is SNY, the new Indians channel and that new DC RSA will never be part of Dish's lineup....Dish does not care about what people want to watch. Well not entirely anyway..Trsut me In listening to Charlie, he would drop ESPN like a hot potato if he could get away with it..He bitches about them all the time..
San Diego and Philly are cable only....
Charlie will only add channnels to the lineup that will make him a specific minimum porfit..What I find irritating about the Charlie chats is how they chest thump about al these new channels they have added..Let me tell you, they havne't added anything but small niche channels..G4 tv, the freakin tennis channel..Spike?..What are these things, some kind of joke?.

 

[Juan]

Basically this is Dish's way of telling you to go fly a kite....
I think I'm going to get a DTV receiver, I have a dish mounted aready and get the EI thru DTV..Actually I astill have my old DTV equipt as well..OR I may just get an FTA reciever and that's that...I own my equipt and do not have a contract with Dish..
None of the RSA's will agree to a la carte..That's a given.....
My prediction is SNY, the new Indians channel and that new DC RSA will never be part of Dish's lineup....Dish does not care about what people want to watch. Well not entirely anyway..Trsut me In listening to Charlie, he would drop ESPN like a hot potato if he could get away with it..He bitches about them all the time..
San Diego and Philly are cable only....
Charlie will only add channnels to the lineup that will make him a specific minimum porfit..What I find irritating about the Charlie chats is how they chest thump about al these new channels they have added..Let me tell you, they havne't added anything but small niche channels..G4 tv, the freakin tennis channel..Spike?..What are these things, some kind of joke?.

ummm D* dosent have a deal with the indians or mets channel (yet) either

 

[dishcomm]

ummm D* dosent have a deal with the indians or mets channel (yet) either

Did not know that..I had heard from others that was the case...
Ther seems to be a trend toward teams creating their own channels..It is entirely possible that in the furtre the only viable Sports package will be the NFL Ticket..That is, if thses teams and their specialty channels charge more money that sat co's are willing to pay.....Could happen,no?

I was going to get the EI pack but if the Mets games aren't on it becasue of SNY, for get it.....I'm not going to pay the ful price of $159 and not get the entire product..That's not very consumer friendly...

 

[BobMurdoch]

You can see the Mets games IF they carry the other team's RSN and IF you aren't in a zip code CLAIMED by the team you want.

 

[JerseyGuy]

Anybody heard anymore news? April 3rd will be here before you know it.

 

[JonUrban]

This is the area that SNY would be blacked out for MLB EI

Just because your zip code is claimed, it does not mean you "get"!
For example, I live in Eastern CT, which is clearly territory claimed by the Mets here (and Yankees as well). However, Dish Network does not allow me to get Fox Sports New York or MSG. If they carried YES, they would probably not give it to me either. They have pigeon holed me as a "Boston" fan. The only way I was able to watch the Mets last year was to get a Direct TV receiver and subscribe to Direct TV!

For some reason, D* lets us Eastern CT subscribers get the NY sports stations while E* does not. The whole thing sucks, you should be able to PAY and get what team you want, every game.

 

[dishcomm]

Just because your zip code is claimed, it does not mean you "get"!
For example, I live in Eastern CT, which is clearly territory claimed by the Mets here (and Yankees as well). However, Dish Network does not allow me to get Fox Sports New York or MSG. If they carried YES, they would probably not give it to me either. They have pigeon holed me as a "Boston" fan. The only way I was able to watch the Mets last year was to get a Direct TV receiver and subscribe to Direct TV!

For some reason, D* lets us Eastern CT subscribers get the NY sports stations while E* does not. The whole thing sucks, you should be able to PAY and get what team you want, every game.

The last sentence of your post sums it all up..I agree 100%....

 

[jrbdmb]

Dish's old contract with MSG and FSNY did not provide Mets games to subs in eastern CT. Guessing this was to keep the total price of the contract down. Dish has done this in many areas (can't get the Indians in NW Pennsylvania, missing several teams in Las Vegas, etc.). This could be one of the sticking points with SNY (SNY wants the channel provided to all of CT, Dish says no).

 

[JonUrban]

Dish's old contract with MSG and FSNY did not provide Mets games to subs in eastern CT. Guessing this was to keep the total price of the contract down. Dish has done this in many areas (can't get the Indians in NW Pennsylvania, missing several teams in Las Vegas, etc.). This could be one of the sticking points with SNY (SNY wants the channel provided to all of CT, Dish says no).

They should be forced to provide it if that area is designated territory. OR - if they do not allow it, then the blackouts for that area and those teams affected should be waived if the viewer buys the MEI package.

It's not fair in that the games are blacked out because they are "in territory" games, (i.e. games you should be able to get them in your local package), yet, because of decisions made by "others", they are in fact not.

As I said before, the whole deal with "sports claimed territories" is a joke.

 

[brew718]

WOW, what a mistake I made. As soon as my commitment with D*
is over, I'm GONE!!!!!

 

[dishcomm]

They should be forced to provide it if that area is designated territory. OR - if they do not allow it, then the blackouts for that area and those teams affected should be waived if the viewer buys the MEI package.

It's not fair in that the games are blacked out because they are "in territory" games, (i.e. games you should be able to get them in your local package), yet, because of decisions made by "others", they are in fact not.

As I said before, the whole deal with "sports claimed territories" is a joke.

in response to your last sentence...Could not agreee more...
I do not knw why the teams various territories are so large..As I pointed out earlier There are 4 teams which claim the Charlotte area as their territory..ATL,CIN,DC and BAL.....ATL is the closest, a 3-4 hour drive....DC is 7 hrs ,BAL and CIN are 8 hrs by car......All Braves game are on tv so that doesn't matter..CINand BAL games are shown here as part of the FOX RSN coverage on Thurs nites DC games are not..
NO games of the above mentioned teams are shown on EI....
BAsed on thsi I am not going to buy the EI package..Too many blacked out games..I am a Mets fan so I would be missing out on at least 30 games..Tyhat is assuming the home games on SNY are covered by EI....I 'll take a ppek at eh free preview on EI to see what's what..
For all of you Dish subs in the Mets territory, you're SOL...imagine that no NYC baseball for DN subs......That's just plain wrong.....those of you in eastern CT?....That's really wrong....You have no chance of seeing a Mets game.....
This entire mess has to be fixed..

 

[ccash]

Any News?

Anything new here? This is the only thing holding up my 622 upgrade. I would like to get in before the April 1 rush.

 

[dishcomm]

Anything new here? This is the only thing holding up my 622 upgrade. I would like to get in before the April 1 rush.

even if you order now for a 622, the wait will be signficant..
My advice is to wait for the free EI preview and see what happens..In looking at the Mets sched..they open on tuesday 4/4..That game is on ESPN at 1:10...The rest of the week, all games are on SNY......So see if DN picks them up..If they don't, there is your answer. For now anyway..
It is possible SNY may be added to the DN lineup later in the season....
but the Mets and Yankees will still be blacked out on the EI pack anayway....

 

[BobMurdoch]

The ESPN game will be blacked out in the Areas they claim as their home areas...... Meaning New Yorkers will have no local baseball PERIOD unless it is on the broadcast networks.

 

[Lucky]

even if you order now for a 622, the wait will be signficant..
My advice is to wait for the free EI preview and see what happens..In looking at the Mets sched..they open on tuesday 4/4..That game is on ESPN at 1:10...The rest of the week, all games are on SNY......So see if DN picks them up..If they don't, there is your answer. For now anyway..
It is possible SNY may be added to the DN lineup later in the season....
but the Mets and Yankees will still be blacked out on the EI pack anayway....

They actually open up on Monday April 3. I know I have season tickets, and will be at Shea for the opener.

 

[GaryPen]

The main problem with EI on Dish, is that it is tied to the RSN's that Dish carries, including the reduced coverage areas that Dish uses to save money with the popular RSN's.

Simply put, the EI package should be independant. If a sub is putting down that kind of money, a good portion of which goes to MLB, then MLB should should guarantee that EI includes ALL televised games of ALL teams for ALL subs, regardless of provider or location. PERIOD.

Of course, what a company should do, and what they actually do, are so seldom the same.

 

[JohnH]

SNY has been assigned a channel number(438) on E*, but that does not mean it will be carried.

STO(431) also.

 

[BobMurdoch]

STO is Sports Time Ohio (The new Indians channel)....

The engineers are just getting ready in case the execs ever tell them to flip the switch.

YES was uplinked for a while but was never visible to subscribers so don't get excited just yet......

 

[Lucky]

Doesn't this uplink mean at least we have a chance of seeing SNY by opening day ? Give me a little hope here, please.

 

[JohnH]

There is always a chance until it don't happen or they just plain say we ain't going to do.