SectionC3

That's an excellent point - pyhrric (sp) victory may be the phrase of the day by the time this mess is resolved.

Per subscriber per 15 markets per one affiliate only. Check out the math above. The numbers easily reach $50 million per year on a national level.

I don't like either TW or LIN. Your statement that I quote is an entirely inaccurate characterization of what I have said. First, the issue is not over "a penny to carry a major broadcast affiliate." It's slightly less than a penny per subscriber PER DAY, which amounts to a vast sum of money per subscriber base PER YEAR as discussed in my prior post and will be referenced below. Anyone who can't comprehend how that money adds up is likely to blame for the national economic crisis in which we're now mired. Second, this is a national question involving tens of millions of dollars and future negotiations with other local broadcast affiliates in other markets. In other words, the question isn't about today's Bills/Cardinals game, it's about whether TW is forced to pay for programming that is broadcast over the air by these affiliates. I'm not taking sides; just pointing out the facts. The way for consumers to deal with this problem is to ditch Time Warner and, for those of you who meter, ignore Channel 4. Enough canceled ad buys will surely soften LIN's position (remember, LIN pulled its programming from TW). Likewise, although it will probably take a little while longer, enough new FIOS and DISH users should cause TW to think about its approach to this negotiation.

I'd say the losses started already. TW has invested man hours and probably about 2 cents per unit in those TV antennas they're giving away. The subscriber base here will surely shrink, as evinced by what I hear are solid phone banks at FIOS and the local dish outlet. Will the base shrink enough to significantly damage TW stock? Beats me. Channel 4 and the LIN affiliates are going to get killed if this drags on. If I was an advertiser and had the contractual right, I'd cancel everything on that station after today's game until this gets resolved. They may have even lost buys for the game. We as a society are too lazy to deal with the pain in the *ss that the ears are, and too spoiled to put up with the cr*ppy picture when another show of equal quality is on the 100+ channel options at our disposal. I don't blame TW for pushing this issue, but from LIN's perspective . . . there has to be a smarter way to do this.

That is more than likely the case for just about every channel we get on TW. Some of the big boys get a couple of bucks a month or close to it - ESPN is in the $3/month range, CNN is probably up there too. Point is, Musial put the figure at less than a penny a day. $2.50 per year per subscriber is therefore a very, very reasonable estimate (approx. .7 cents a day per subscriber). Check my next post for the some of the downside for both of the big boys in this dispute.

I just hooked up the rabbit ears TW handed out yesterday. This is a memo to Chris Musial and the folks at Time Warner: 1. TW: if you're going to give away rabbit ears to help your customers receive today's game, try giving away a device that ACTUALLY WORKS. The picture with the piece of cr*p you gave me is awful. 2. Chris Musial: Bad news there, buddy. What stinks for you is that the picture of your station is HORRIBLE. Odds are pretty good that unless this mess gets resolved, I'll watch your station for a total of roughly six hours between now and November 23. Sure, I can go somewhere else and see the Bills/Dolphins and Bills/Pats games in HD - such as a sports bar, or the home of a friend with a dish. But, I'm not going to do that to watch Don Postles, CSI Miami, 60 Minutes, your wake-up program or any other show on your station. So, the gist of it is, when your ratings book starts (I believe it's soon, if you're not there already), you're out of luck, my friend. (You didn't even think about the issue of whether I might watch your soon to be formerly highly rated wake up show on my bedroom TV, for which I do not have rabbit ears, because I put that set on the living room TV!) Basically, then, as soon as I settle in a house in the Southtowns, I'm getting FIOS (TW, you lose). Between now and then, and probably for a good while after once my new viewing habits are hardened, I won't watch Channel 4 outside of 1p to 4p on Bills Sundays (Channel 4, you lose too). Big risk, no reward for either side. I know you're reading this, too.

That brings us to the crux of this dispute. We're talking major dollars here, as evinced by the willingness of TW to give away rabbit ears that retail in the $10-ish neighborhood. Assume for the sake of argument that Chris Musial is accurately stating that LIN wants about $.01 per day per subscriber for Channel 4. Call it $2.50 per year per subscriber. Now, assume that there are about 100,000 cable subscribers in this market. The figure might be a little low, but it makes it easier to run the numbers. We're talking about $250,000 per year for Channel 4. Again, probably a low figure, but it's round. Next, multiply that figure by 4 (Channel 4 plus Channels 2, 7 and 29 [sorry, UPN and other lesser networks]). All of a sudden, you're at $1,000,000 per year for Buffalo, which is probably not even a top-50 market anymore. (52 or 53, if memory serves). The additional local network signals are added to the analysis because those stations will more likely than not want treatment equal to that afforded Channel 4. Finally, multiply that $1,000,000 figure by, say, 100, for the top 100 markets in the country. Again, the numbers a probably low, but that local $250,000 dispute with Channel 4 easily morphs into a national $100,000,000 dispute with local over-the-air providers. This is about big dollars and might not get solved until external pressures (i.e., 4's ratings plummet b/c customers are too lazy or not loyal enough to use the ears, or LIN/CBS/other network parents get skittish about going into a ratings period off of a dominant cable provider). This analysis assumes that TW is in all of the top 100 markets. Even if TW is in only 50 of those markets, $50,000,000 is still a lot of jack and worth the giveaway of a few rabbit ears.

That's more in line with the story I heard. Something about wearing headphones at halftime, Meathead asked him to take them off and get his act together, Moulds called Meathead an MFer or some variation thereof, Meathead wanted to suspend Moulds for four games, Ralph said no, etc.

My understanding is that it's on for today.

Your post reminded me of 51-3. That must have been a long day. Seriously, far be it for any fan of the Oakland Raiders to taunt another city about possibly losing its team. Why wish the pain you went through on others?

He whacked Garrard today like Garrard was his girlfriend. The kid had a lot working against him in the offseason. It looks like he turned a lot of it around, and if he did, good for him and congratulations.

You're entitled to your opinion. There are people who go through a lot more than Tom Brady - believe me, I'm mindful of that. Still, though, to wish suffering upon another just isn't the right thing to do.

I hate to see someone, anyone get hurt. It's not that it's Tom Brady; it's that it's a human being who probably has several months of grueling physical therapy ahead of him that certainly cannot be fun. That said, football season just got a lot more interesting. Your remark about "HERO Pollard number 49" was really, really funny.

I agree - great post, great bet, great passion for the Bills, but take the guaranteed money and pay part of the mortgage -

FWIW, I suspect that one, if not both, of Catalana's sources are players.

I did a little digging. Peters appears to be in the area. No idea what the reporting/contract status may be.

I heard the call, as I had GR on for a few minutes while Shredd & Ragan were in a break. Rarely do I listen to PM drive on GR, and the treatment of your call (and the Bledsoe call that occurred right around the time you were on) is a big reason why. One of the hosts thinks he's smarter than he really is, the other is horribly miscast as a radio personality and utterly unlistenable.

Maybe somebody else, perhaps Bill in NYC, can back me up on this but . . . when Eric King was here, that guy was an automatic first down every time he stepped on the field. Sitting in the stands provides a little bit of a different perspective than what you see on TV, and I swear every time I saw King come off of the sideline (I think he wore #29), I'd joke with my dad that we knew where the ball was going and by and large, we were right.

Maybe they just messed up. Kind of like with Mike Williams. They did, however, get it right when they re-upped with Peters a few years ago.

If this is true, and it may well be, one of two things happened: (1) Parker dropped the ball on behalf of Peters and should be fired; or (2) Peters knowingly signed a contract that he knew any move to left tackle would render unfavorable. If Peters is unhappy with the escalator and either he or his agent "knew" Peters would be moved to left tackle during the life of that agreement, one of only Peters or Parker is to blame. The reality of the situation is that Peters traded additional years on a contract (this one) for a greater immediate payment than his prior agreement would have provided. Had he "played out" his original contract, he'd be much closer to earning the extraordinary contract he desires. This was part of the risk in taking the additional "up front" money in this contract, and now he has to take his medicine. Too bad.

I think I posted this somewhere on the board before, but . . . Back in the day (approx. 1990-ish), one of the local media outlets did a study that found that Buffalo/Niagara would be a top-10 market if the Golden Horseshoe was included in market population totals. Canadian audiences aren't "rated," so all of the folks in Fort Erie, Niagara Falls, St. Catharines, Hamilton, etc. aren't included in the measure of Buffalo's market size. Combine the 1 million or so people in Erie and Niagara Counties with the roughly 1 million or so people in Monroe and Ontario Counties and those in the Horseshoe on this side of Hamilton and you're approaching a fairly substantial population total. The folks on the Canadian side can probably tweak the numbers, but my understanding is that Hamilton has a population of 600,000+, Niagara Falls is around 100,000, and St. Catharines is in the neighborhood of 100,000. Once TO is added to the mix, the Buffalo/Niagara market becomes, even 15 years after the study I mentioned, huge - but not necessarily for American TV purposes.

Sort of. The guilty plea can and will be used against him in the civil case; here, he wants to avoid any admission as to intoxication so he doesn't imperil his insurance coverage. This isn't a huge case since the extent of P's injuries (at least at this juncture) appear to be limited to 7 stitches in her leg. So, she'll have a scar, meet threshold and after some posturing and bluster settle the case. I don't think this case is worth very much - beauty is in the eye of the beholder, though, and since many potential jurors post on the board, I'm interested to hear what a scar of at most five inches on a fat, single, 20-something female's leg is worth. (Before anyone jumps all over me for the fat comment, scars are worth more on attractive females - it's a fact of life).

the title says it all

What I think you're saying is that he has no obligation to speak and it's in his best interests to keep his yap shut.

Your little birdie has no idea what he's talking about. Don't get your hopes up. This isn't happening.