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Comcast, Big Ten Network reach deal

Discussion in 'Sports and News' started by JBHawkEye, Jun 19, 2008.

  1. JBHawkEye

    JBHawkEye Well-Known Member

    The first of the Midwest cable giants comes to terms with the BTN:

    By LARRY LAGE
    AP Sports Writer
    ANN ARBOR, Mich. (AP) — Finally, the Big Ten Network and Comcast Corp. reached a deal.
    The BTN and the Philadelphia-based cable carrier announced a multiyear agreement Thursday that previews programming on expanded basic on Aug. 15 in states with Big Ten schools: Pennsylvania, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Wisconsin and Ohio. Comcast doesn’t have any subscribers in Iowa, the eighth Big Ten state.
    Outside these states, Comcast has the option to move the channel on its Sports Entertainment Package and other tiers. After the 2008-09 basketball season ends, Comcast has the option to shift the network to its digital service.
    Comcast has agreed to pay about 70 cents per subscriber to the Big Ten, which had sought $1.10.
    It’s the first major cable operator to agree to carry the network.
    The parties negotiated for more than a year — at times contentiously — with the Big Ten insisting it only would agree to a deal that put the new network on Comcast’s basic level of service at a price the company wasn’t willing to pay.
    Comcast has about 5 million customers with basic cable and 4 million with digital in Big Ten states. The sports network is owned by the Big Ten Conference and Fox Cable Networks.

     
  2. OnTheRiver

    OnTheRiver Active Member

    I'm in Indiana, subscribe to cable, and have had the BTN since its inception, via Insight.

    So congrats to those folks in Iowa and Illinois. Maybe now you'll get VH1, as well.
     
  3. JBHawkEye

    JBHawkEye Well-Known Member

    No congrats here yet. Mediacom is the big cable provider in Iowa, and they haven't added the network.

    They claimed they didn't want to raise their customers' rates for the alleged BTN rate of $1.10 per month — and then promptly knocked the expanded basic up $3 in January without adding any channels.
     
  4. Armchair_QB

    Armchair_QB Well-Known Member

    This will be good news in Wisconsin too.

    I was up there last fall and the Cheesehead Nation was close to rioting over missing Wisky football and hoops due to the BTN war and, more importantly, missing Packers games on the NFL Network due to a similar standoff.
     
  5. Oz

    Oz Well-Known Member

    As a Comcast customer, I'm curious to see whether I'll get it living outside Big 10/11 country.
     
  6. JBHawkEye

    JBHawkEye Well-Known Member

    Sounds like you'll get it on a digital tier.
     
  7. playthrough

    playthrough Moderator Staff Member

    Hoosier hoops fans could have not have been more apoplectic last year about not having BTN. Now they've got it just in time for a gutted team that will struggle to win 10 games.
     
  8. shotglass

    shotglass Guest

    I'd been waiting breathlessly to see me some Iowa-Minnesota field hockey ... which, incidentally, is about as exciting as the BTN's offerings get after the networks and the WWL get done picking the bones.
     
  9. Not as much help here as you think, Armchair. Charter and Time Warner are the cable beasts in this state. Not a lot of folk with Comcast.
     
  10. beefncheddar

    beefncheddar Guest

    Well, I've gotta say, the progress of this deal went just as you would expect with anything associated with Big Ten sports ... slow.
     
  11. Bubbler

    Bubbler Well-Known Member

    God does the Big Ten Network suck balls.

    I have it, I'm a Wisconsin fan, but I absolutely hate it. With the WGN-style Big Ten homerism from its broadcasters, to low-rent productions, to a promotion of the Big Ten's cult of personality propoganda campaign not unlike a Soviet re-education camp, it's just so off-putting.

    And I LIKE the Big Ten in general.
     
  12. poindexter

    poindexter Well-Known Member

    Rooting for the Big Ten network is like saying that Hitler was a victim.
     
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