Well, my favorite national columnist Stewart Mandel has brought the plight of Cal (and the Pac-10’s) TV coverage into the national spotlight by answering a question about it in his weekly Q&A column:

Why is Cal the only top-10 team that won’t be on TV this weekend when it plays Washington State? –Chris, Lincoln, Cal

When I first saw this, I assumed Chris was complaining that Cal wasn’t on national TV. But no. Believe it or not, in an age of 700 cable channels, many of whom are foaming at the mouth to show even the most obscure live sporting event, a college football game between two Pac-10 schools, one of them 5-1, the other 4-2, will have not a single television camera present. And for that, Bears and Cougars fans can thank their fine conference leaders.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. As a sports entity, the Pac-10 is right up there with the Big Ten, SEC and everyone else. As businesses, however, the Big Ten and SEC are Wal-Mart and Target; the Pac-10 is the mom-and-pop shop down the street. The Pac-10’s bizarre loyalty to Fox Sports Net over ESPN (supposedly because of the better time slots) kills the conference’s exposure. This coming weekend, you’ll be able to watch as many as five Big Ten games from anywhere in the country. You’ll be able to watch three SEC games. You’ll even be able to watch Louisiana Monroe at Troy. Depending on your satellite package, you could theoretically watch 28 college football games. But you will not be able to watch the No. 10 team in the country play an important conference contest.

Thank you Stewart!  We need to get this issue brought up in the press more often. That’s the only type of pressure that’s going to get the Pac-10 to re-think their TV licensing.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, October 11th, 2006 at 10:10 am and is filed under Sports, Sports - Cal Football. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.