You should be able to get a great initial deal and even get the NFL Sunday Ticket for free. The fight comes when your initial deal ends but I have had good luck keeping my bill reasonable.
Considering they include Sunday Ticket at no extra charge (according to their web site), anyone should definitely get it free.
Are you actually implying that CSNH was EVER specifically quoted as willing to come down from their original asking price? At ALL? I think you are looking at this completely backward. You say the carriers were not willing to 'negotiate'. Is that just another way of saying the carriers were not willing to pay CSNH's original outrageously overpriced demanded fee? Because if so, that's NOT what a 'negotiation' is. A 'negotiation' involves BOTH sides being willing to compromise, and we have, to my knowledge, never received any indication at all that CSNH's ownership was ever willing to compromise on their original demanded price. And if that's the case, and they never budged at all, then how can you possibly accuse the carriers of not being willing to negotiate? It's preposterous. That's why, after all this nonsense is over and done with, will we ever get to see the actual truth of what really transpired, on both sides?
I would love to see your evidence that the management of CSNH was not willing to compromise at all, and the other providers were? Thanks in advance for showing us that information it will help out all of these conversations immensely.
Dish was on record saying they weren't interested at any price. I am not sure how you negotiate around a lack of interest. The other providers wanted to put it on a sports tier. The problem with that is that less than half of the subscribers buy the sports tier. Therefore, such an arrangement wouldn't be profitable unless you really jacked up the price. When you talk about coming down from the asking price, maybe an agreement could have been reached and maybe it couldn't. Because of the standing agreements with FSSW, even reducing the price for CSN by a third (roughly $2.30) would have resulted in close to $5 a month for RSNs over a five state region. The providers decided they did not want blanket coverage for two RSNs in this region. Even if CSN had agreed to a reduced rate and the providers agreed to carry it at a reduced rate, the product would have changed. If they had reduced to around $2.30, that puts it on par with FSSW. In order to be profitable, CSN would have had to change the network programming to resemble FSSW. Most of the layoffs would have happened and most of he additional coverage gone. Otherwise, at that price, it would have lost money.
I'm saying this; the carriers were not going to change their thinking. They were not going to pay for CSN-H anywhere near what it would take to make it profitable, especially if they did not get it put on a premium tier. CSN-H (specifically the Astros) were not going to take a deal that did not project to make them profitable. More so the Astros, to be profitable required a higher price than the Rockets or Comcast because of the nature of baseball's television rules. So with veto power they were not going to accept a deal that was not profitable for them. Now with a little reading comprehension you should be able to see that I am saying neither side was ever going to negotiate to a middle ground. the carriers because they didn't have to and the CSN-H side because the Astros were not going to take a deal where they lost money (which was their right under the provisions of their partnership). In essence my opinion is that this was never going to work from the beginning. Comcast brought a deal to the teams that was completely unrealistic. There was no way they were going to get the profits they expressed when they entered into the original partnership. The Astros and the Rockets , who some people seem to forget are a part of this too, saw the pie in the sky and jumped right in. However, because of the differences in revenue sharing between teams in the NBA and MLB the Rockets had more leeway to take deals with lower profitability and still be on the high end of TV deals in their league. The Astros couldn't and because they had veto power didn't have to.
So would I. Despite the fact that you know very well that we have had NO official information come out of this mess, I understand your sentiment. There is a very wide gulf of opinion on all of this, that's clear. There is only one way this will ever be resolved for people to have closure and peace of mind about it, and that is for all of the 'negotiations', all offers, all official responses to all offers, everything, to be made public. Until and unless that happens, people really need to understand that their opinions - mine included - are purely speculation. And that would be an extremely unhealthy thing for this fan base going forward, for such divisive speculation to be allowed to fester indefinitely.
It won't when the games are on for everyone, 99% of the people won't give a rats hind end about this anymore.
Oh *I* will - I'm STILL pissed about CD passing of Rashard Lewis, and I still have never heard any official answer about that stupid decision. So this mess will linger, at least for some of us. After getting so unfairly screwed, we as fans deserve the truth at least.
I've stuck with Dish throughout all of this simply because it was such a pain in the Karl Malone to switch. But if this Root network comes around and Dish is the lone holdout amongst the carriers - for whatever reason - I'M OUT. Hello DTV. I will not suffer through a 3rd year of not being able to watch my Rockets on my TV.
YES! And Otis was WIDE OPEN under the basket!! All he had to do was pass it to Otis for an easy dunk and we win the series! Instead, the Sonics Karl'd us yet again..
David Barron reporting confirmation hearing has been moved from 10/2 to 10/6. Anticipating a 3 day hearing.
I havent priced it out in the last year or so, but when I switched to Direct right before this mess started(just my luck I switch from Comcast to Dtv and then this happened) and Direct was cheaper than Dish for similar packages. Besides, Ive used Dish at my sisters and imo it just isnt as good as Direct.
I'm about at 99% sure I will switch. I've looked at it and at least for a year it will be a good bit cheaper. It would also mean an upgrade in equipment because with Dish you have to really call and complain to get better equipment. I have been with them for 10 or so years and they still want me to pay $200 to get the hopper over what I have now. I'm just holding out for a bit longer to make sure the channel is transferring over so I can assure I have the right package to get it when it drops.
