TV contracts starting to trickle in
We heard about the Colorado St. game getting picked up by CSTV about a month agon and now we have the preliminary ABC/ESPN/ESPN2 schedule for the Bears. The short answer for the Bears is that both the Tennessee game and the USC game will now be at 5:00 PM and that the Tennessee game will definitely be on ABC. It’s being incorrectly reported in certain cirlces that the USC game will be on ABC as well. While that is the likely case, it could still be on any of ABC/ESPN/ESPN2. I suspect that’s what will happen if Cal or USC loses 3 or 4 games by the time the November matchup rolls around.
While we’re on the topic of TV coverage, since I’m sure I get a ton of readers from the Cal Athletic Office (har har), this whole “we’ll let you know the game time and channel 12 days, or in the worst case 6 days out” really sucks as a ticket holder. I’ve got small kids that I take to the games and it makes life a lot easier to know what the game times are ahead of time. I’ll take them to any game between noon and 5:00 PM for the start, but the late FSN 7:00 PM games are just too late for a 3 year old. It would really be nice if you guys got rid of the whole “exclusive time blocks” crud that requires all of the game time manipulation.
Similarly, if I knew a road game wasn’t going to be televised more than a week or two in advance, I’d be tempted to arrange travel plans to go see the game in person. But with that little warning, it’s much more difficult, particularly for places like Oregon where getting tickets can be difficult.
The reality is that there are enough channels these days for every Pac-10 game to be on every week. There is no excuse for TV contracts that make it impossible for that to happen and require us fans to constantly be adjusting for changing game times and which cable/satalite package we need to watch all of the games.