Blazers: New Option to Comcast Coming This Season

Sarah Mensah, Chief Marketing Officer of the Blazers on 95.5 today responded to questions about the Comcast situation.

Starts at 4:30 into the podcast.

""We aren't planning to go into this next season without an option for fans. .. Look for us to have a different situation as we go into this next season with Comcast, no matter what. ... I think we are exploring a multitude of different possibilities for what it could be ... not ready to really talk about what specifically is on the table, but I think fans should rest assured we're not going to go into the season again this coming year with the same situation where there aren't any options."

So what options could they have that fit within their Comcast contract? Comcast is paying them $12M per year and started a network around the Blazers, so whatever they do I doubt they will jeopardize that relationship. This sounds like something over and above that.

A pay-per-view deal with the satellite companies? They may have reserved the right to do something like that if Comcast couldn't sell CSNNW to the satellite companies within a specified number of years?

I doubt they can put more games on KGW (because of the Comcast contract and because NBC wouldn't want its prime time preempted more), and I doubt they can sell duplicate broadcast rights to other established networks (because of the KGW and Comcast contracts).

Would the Blazers be willing to subsidize a Comcast/DirecTV deal?

Perhaps they could lift the NBA TV blackout restrictions in areas not covered by Comcast?

Back to the Fox theater? No, they tore that down. :)

What options do you see?

over 2 years ago BlazerFanSince1970 21 comments 1 recs |

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The Blazers

do have an opt out with the Comcast but are unlikely to get 12 mil a year elsewhere. I am not sure about pay-per-view or CSN becoming part of a premium sports package.

by Escrote on Aug 30, 2009 10:18 PM PDT reply actions

Anything less than DISH and DirectTV coverage is not going to be well received

Although the satellites now have the ability to provide restricted coverage to select subscribers (they know where you live) so perhaps those in Oregon and SW Washington areas blacked out of League Pass might get pay-per-view restricted to them.

by lee3022 on Aug 30, 2009 10:30 PM PDT reply actions

Pressuring Comcast to make a deal

Basically, is the only thing I could see. The Blazers AND Comcast both benefit, besides the $12M to the Blazers, from having the Blazers as the flagship of CSN-NW, its a valuable property and gets people to watch the channel.

"Good evening Blazer fans, wherever you may be!"-Bill Schonely

by skywaker9 on Aug 30, 2009 11:42 PM PDT reply actions

Its not as valuable as we think

Comcast still has not turned a profit on the channel…they clearly overpaid for it. The sponsorship just isnt there, which is why we see at least 12 Spirit Mountain commercials a night.

Senior Asian ambassador of Blazers Edge

by Philthyanimal on Aug 31, 2009 7:18 PM PDT up reply actions

My first thought when I saw this

Was some sort of online pay-per-view like the Summer League games.

You can measure skill and talent with your eyes, but productivity is shown through statistics.

by austinpwnz on Aug 31, 2009 2:52 AM PDT reply actions

BS!

Comcast and the blazers marketing department have been giving us the run around for such a long time, I can’t believe anything they say.

Sternocleidomastoid is by far the coolest muscle name.
That and Gracilis.

by GoBlaze22 on Aug 31, 2009 3:32 AM PDT reply actions 1 recs

ding ding ding!

by levelhed on Aug 31, 2009 7:32 AM PDT up reply actions

I hope the Blazers are serious

But I’m sick of hearing that a deal will get done. They’ve said that from the beginning, what, 2 years ago? Ridiculous……she would have been better off not saying anything until it was done.

Witty Unpredictable Talent and Natural Game

by iDea on Aug 31, 2009 8:29 AM PDT reply actions

I'm feeling very encouraged by this report.

Finally, I believe something is going to happen.

Pay-for-View? Deal me in.
Lift blackout area on NBA League Pass? Deal me in.
Blazers subsidize Direct TV? Beautiful.

The following by Sarah Mensah is a pretty strong statement:

…but I think fans should rest assured we’re not going to go into the season again this coming year with the same situation where there aren’t any options."

Oh lordy, I’m going to be able to watch most every Blazer game this year…..! just know it!! Excuse me a second while I go do a back-flip.

Brandon Roy just destroyed everything in his path. There's your rational analysis -- Dave

Also: COMCAST SUCKS!

by TwoDeep on Aug 31, 2009 8:40 AM PDT reply actions

That is a strong statement.

You don’t make that statement and raise expectations unless you are going to do something new. But whatever the Blazers do, there will still be fans complaining, and blaming Comcast. Pay-per-view – too expensive. Lift blackout in non-Comcast areas – still won’t switch to Comcast in Comcast areas. Subsidize a DirecTV deal (expensive, therefore unlikely) – won’t switch from Dish. Whatever the Blazers do, Comcast will still get blamed for bailing the Blazers out with a $120M ($12M/year) broadcasting deal, setting up a new network full of Blazer features, and making all the games available (unlike the $2.5M/year deal offered by FS-NW) to its customers, and Verizon FIOS customers, and nearly every other cable company’s customers. Only Charter, who doesn’t serve the Portland area, chooses not to carry CSN-NW.

Satellite customers should be asking why DirecTV doesn’t put CSN-NW in its Choice package instead of FS-NW? DirecTV treats Portland/Oregon like a suburb of Seattle. FS-NW is primarily Seattle-Washington-centric. It’s the Mariners, etc. CSN-NW is primarily Portland-Oregon-centric (Blazers, U of O, PSU, UP, teams). If DirecTV won’t provide both CSN-NW and FS-NW to Oregon zip codes in the Choice package, then they should move FS-NW to the Sports Pack ($12.99 a month) and provide Oregon customers with Oregon’s teams in the Choice package.

Chicago, the Bay Area, Boston, Washington DC, etc. all get their CSN regional network in the DirecTV Choice package, but Oregon fans get the Seattle-centric FS-NW instead. NY get 3 regional sports networks in their Choice package. Even Sacramento gets both Comcast Bay Area and Comcast California channels in their Choice package. Yet no one complains about how DirecTV treats Oregon customers? Somehow it’s Comcast’s fault that DirecTV thinks we are part of Seattle.

by BlazerFanSince1970 on Aug 31, 2009 1:55 PM PDT up reply actions 3 recs

I agree with you

the fact that Comcast did a deal with Verizon (who is really a very strong competitor) shows that they are willing and trying to sell the network to other providers, but they are not just going to give it away to be nice to fans, they need to recoup what they paid for the network. Why do people think that a company that paid millions of dollars for broadcast rights would just give them away? This is more about tense negotiations with Dish/Direct TV and Comcast Sportsnet.

I hope I can get a bunch of championships, like 15. " - Greg Oden

by mxpx5678 on Aug 31, 2009 3:31 PM PDT up reply actions

From my understanding,

DirecTV is indeed wanting to put CSN-NW in its Choice package. Evidently it’s Comcast’s greedy asking price that is preventing it from happening. I suspect they also fear that their Comcast cable customers would be switching to the satellite companies if they were able to broadcast all these additional Blazer games (that’s probably why their asking price is so high).

Say what you want about FS-NW. Three seasons ago, before Comcast entered the fray, I was delighted that I got to watch an extra 30 games or so (don’t really remember the number) on their channel. I know they are Seattle centric, but I loved them for their Blazer broadcasts. Now, with Comcast in the picture, all those games that were extra to the ones shown on KGW, TNT, and ESPN are completely unavailable to me. I’d be happy to subscribe to Comcast, but it’s not available in my area. I’d be happy to purchase NBA League Pass, but the Blazers games are blacked out in my area.

You are obviously very well versed on this entire subject. I appreciate all the information you presented and I am processing it one bit at a time (there are 8 bits in a byte so you can see that my processing approach is dragging me down). But because they took away 30 Blazer games that I used to be able to watch, for now anyway I’m standing by my mantra and my signature, i.e. “Comast Sucks”.

Brandon Roy just destroyed everything in his path. There's your rational analysis -- Dave

Also: COMCAST SUCKS!

by TwoDeep on Aug 31, 2009 6:04 PM PDT up reply actions

instead of comcast being greedy how about directv being cheap?

sure they both are looking after their bottom line and not our happiness, but all providers here except the main sattelite providers have signed on…a deal has been made in all other nba markets with csn and the sattellites except for this one. Who is exactly to blame? All of em.

Senior Asian ambassador of Blazers Edge

by Philthyanimal on Aug 31, 2009 7:24 PM PDT up reply actions

"Evidently it’s Comcast’s greedy asking price that is preventing it from happening"

Do you think that their price for CSN-NW is more than the price DirecTV already pays for Comcast-Chicago, or Comcast Bay Area, or Comcast California, or Comcast Boston, or Comcast Washington DC? Like I said above Sacremento is even getting two Comcast channels (Bay Area and California) from DirecTV.

Since Comcast already sells all of these other channels to DirecTV, and sells it to their key competitor Verizon, and sells CSN-NW to a bunch of cable companies, why would they have decided to be unreasonably greedy with DirecTV on this one Comcast channel? I think people forget that Comcast already has all of these other deals in place with DirecTV.

If you have evidence that proves Comcast wants a lot more for Comcast-NW than its other channels, then I would agree they are being greedy. None of us knows what Comcast wants from DirecTV, but some people are sure they are being greedy.

But perhaps DirecTV just figures since Comcast takes all the heat and if they aren’t losing any more customers to Comcast or Dish because of it, why pay anything for CSN-NW? It’s just a hit to their bottom line.

Why don’t they move FS-NW (Mariners and Seahawks) to their separate sports package ($12.95) and substitute CSN-NW (Blazers) in Oregon? Obviously, they have computed they make more money with the Mariners and the Seahawks, and they own Fox Sports Northwest.

Perhaps you didn’t know that. News Corp owned DirecTV and Fox Sports Northwest. Then both were owned by Liberty Media in a stock swap with News Corp. Then they were spun off as Liberty Entertainment Inc which owns DirecTV and Fox Sports Northwest. So perhaps you can see the incentive for DirecTV to include Fox Sports Northwest and not CSN-NW in their Choice viewing package. Of course, that must be Comcast’s fault for not buying DirecTV.

by BlazerFanSince1970 on Aug 31, 2009 7:28 PM PDT up reply actions

This logic cuts both ways

You can’t say, “Comcast did a deal in other markets, so their price isn’t too high.”

The obvious answer is, “DirecTV did a deal in other markets, so they aren’t too cheap.”

Either one party is being greedy, or the other party is being cheap, or there is some other reason a deal isn’t being done. But the fact that a deal was done in other markets doesn’t really shed any light on who is at fault here.

"if Nate has Roy or Miller in the game at all times, that stagnation will turn into conflagration" -- two4larue

by jscot on Sep 1, 2009 2:54 AM PDT up reply actions

You ignore who owns Fox Sports NW, and Verizon's deal for CSN-NW.

DirecTV and Fox Sports NW are both owned by LEI. FS-NW is included on DirecTV, but CSN-NW is not.

DirecTV and Fox Sports Pittsburgh are both owned by LEI. In Pittsburgh, DirecTV includes Fox Sports Pittsburgh, but not Comcast Philadelphia.

Conversely, in Indianapolis, Fox Sports Midwest and Fox Sports Cincinnati are not owned by LEI, and DirecTV includes Comcast Chicago plus Fox Sports Midwest and Fox Sports Cincinnati.

In Sacramento, where there is no Fox Sports channel, DirecTV provides two Comcast channels (Bay Area and California).

Evidently, the Comcast channels are not too expensive unless DirecTV’s parent LEI owns a competing Fox Sports channel.

Finally, Verizon FIOS is a hot competitor to Comcast (I get a call from Verizon asking me to switch about once a week) and Verizon made a deal with Comcast. Why would Comcast be willing to make a better deal with Verizon than what they would be willing to make with DirecTV?

by BlazerFanSince1970 on Sep 1, 2009 12:22 PM PDT up reply actions