Post by Skaggs on Jul 31, 2004 6:51:58 GMT -5
Mets may be off the cable
Barring a deal, Fox Sports NY, MSG to leave Time Warner at midnight
By PETE DOUGHERTY, Staff writer
First published: Saturday, July 31, 2004
Barring an 11th-hour agreement, most Capital Region cable subscribers will be without two New York-based regional sports networks as of midnight tonight.
Time Warner, whose Albany division comprises most cable TV homes in the area, has not reached a contract agreement with the MSG and Fox Sports New York networks, which holds the rights to the Mets, Knicks, Islanders and the New Jersey Devils.
The contract expired Dec. 31, but the sides agreed to extend the relationship while negotiations continued in an effort to reach agreement on how much Time Warner should pay to carry the services. That contract extension concludes at the end of today.
The immediate impact would be felt by followers of the Mets, who have 100 games on the networks. The first telecast affected would be Tuesday night's game in Milwaukee on MSG.
Time Warner is promising a $1 rebate for every month the stations are not carried. Time Warner has taken out ads in the Times Union, notifying its customers of the impasse.
"We owe it to our customers to inform them that this, in fact, may happen, and also try to inform them of what's at stake here," Peter Taubkin, a vice president in Time Warner's Albany division, said Friday. "We've been asked to pay unreasonable rates for this programming that has, in fact, diminished in value."
The two regional sports networks, both owned by Cablevision, have lost rights to baseball's New York Yankees and the NBA's New Jersey Nets over the past three years and will lose the NHL's Devils after the 2005-06 season.
All three teams have aligned with the YES network, owned by a corporate conglomeration called YankeeNets LLC.
MSG and Fox Sports New York also will lose the Mets after next season. The team exercised a $54 million buyout clause last month and apparently will create its own network for the games.
A statement released by the networks indicates they are using the YES network rates as a guide in these negotiations. Time Warner, which has 2.2 million customers in the New York and New Jersey areas, pays nearly $2 per subscriber per month to YES.
"We have made fair and reasonable offers to Time Warner to continue carrying the services at rates that are significantly below those they've already agreed to pay the other regional sports network in our market, and they have rejected our offers," the statement read.
A source familiar with the negotiations said the networks are asking for slightly more than what Time Warner paid under the last contract, signed when the Yankees, Nets and Devils were still in the MSG/Fox cable fold. The MSG/Fox offer has several auxiliary channels, including high-definition television signals and interactive channels, according to the source.
A spokesman for MSG/Fox referred all questions to the information in the statement.
Taubkin said Time Warner has begun receiving calls about the likely elimination of the two networks and expects to get more once the networks are off the air.
"We've received supportive calls that say you can't give in to excessive demands," he said. "I understand, as a rabid sports fan, that any disruption of programming is not something that is going to be well-received."
All Times Union materials copyright 1996-2004, Capital Newspapers Division of The Hearst Corporation, Albany, N.Y
This story can be found on the Times Union website.
Barring a deal, Fox Sports NY, MSG to leave Time Warner at midnight
By PETE DOUGHERTY, Staff writer
First published: Saturday, July 31, 2004
Barring an 11th-hour agreement, most Capital Region cable subscribers will be without two New York-based regional sports networks as of midnight tonight.
Time Warner, whose Albany division comprises most cable TV homes in the area, has not reached a contract agreement with the MSG and Fox Sports New York networks, which holds the rights to the Mets, Knicks, Islanders and the New Jersey Devils.
The contract expired Dec. 31, but the sides agreed to extend the relationship while negotiations continued in an effort to reach agreement on how much Time Warner should pay to carry the services. That contract extension concludes at the end of today.
The immediate impact would be felt by followers of the Mets, who have 100 games on the networks. The first telecast affected would be Tuesday night's game in Milwaukee on MSG.
Time Warner is promising a $1 rebate for every month the stations are not carried. Time Warner has taken out ads in the Times Union, notifying its customers of the impasse.
"We owe it to our customers to inform them that this, in fact, may happen, and also try to inform them of what's at stake here," Peter Taubkin, a vice president in Time Warner's Albany division, said Friday. "We've been asked to pay unreasonable rates for this programming that has, in fact, diminished in value."
The two regional sports networks, both owned by Cablevision, have lost rights to baseball's New York Yankees and the NBA's New Jersey Nets over the past three years and will lose the NHL's Devils after the 2005-06 season.
All three teams have aligned with the YES network, owned by a corporate conglomeration called YankeeNets LLC.
MSG and Fox Sports New York also will lose the Mets after next season. The team exercised a $54 million buyout clause last month and apparently will create its own network for the games.
A statement released by the networks indicates they are using the YES network rates as a guide in these negotiations. Time Warner, which has 2.2 million customers in the New York and New Jersey areas, pays nearly $2 per subscriber per month to YES.
"We have made fair and reasonable offers to Time Warner to continue carrying the services at rates that are significantly below those they've already agreed to pay the other regional sports network in our market, and they have rejected our offers," the statement read.
A source familiar with the negotiations said the networks are asking for slightly more than what Time Warner paid under the last contract, signed when the Yankees, Nets and Devils were still in the MSG/Fox cable fold. The MSG/Fox offer has several auxiliary channels, including high-definition television signals and interactive channels, according to the source.
A spokesman for MSG/Fox referred all questions to the information in the statement.
Taubkin said Time Warner has begun receiving calls about the likely elimination of the two networks and expects to get more once the networks are off the air.
"We've received supportive calls that say you can't give in to excessive demands," he said. "I understand, as a rabid sports fan, that any disruption of programming is not something that is going to be well-received."
All Times Union materials copyright 1996-2004, Capital Newspapers Division of The Hearst Corporation, Albany, N.Y
This story can be found on the Times Union website.