Sabres to Have 15 National Broadcasts this Season

[LTS]

On 8/30/2023 at 6:52 PM, SwampD said:

There are no ads on Disney+.

ESPN+ only has ads when you first go to the channel. There is no pre or postgame because MSG sucks and won’t work out a deal with them. They also run their own promos during breaks, sometimes.

There are ads on Hulu,… I don’t mind them.

I’m out of town and it’s not even close to that amount.

$35/m - SlingTV for TNT games
$16/m - ESPN+ (w/ the Disney bundle)
$0/m - Antenna on the roof for ABC games (best picture of them all, but no pausing or watching later)

I remember a day when the current number of unavailable games to some people, was the total number that an out of town fan was maybe able to see. I have no problem with the current situation and haven’t for years.

The antenna.. forgot about that.  Although that may soon be a thing of the past as well.. with ATSC 3.0.  That said, for us "in town" folks.. we are screwed.  ESPN+ is not a viable option for most games.

41 minutes ago, ROC_exEMT said:

I think the 1st Spectrum box is free if you go that route unless you want the dvr package.  You can also get a Roku for $35-40 and the Spectrum App streams on that.

I didn't think they were ever free.  I suppose I could go convert my TVs to Roku.. or at least one of them.  That said, I've heard nasty things about Spectrum streaming quality.

12 minutes ago, Zamboni said:

I just heard that spectrum is blacking out ESPN right now.

I haven’t had a chance to check my TV to verify,

Welcome to the programming fee wars!  These are always done to coincide with the start of something important (college football) and all done to put the pressure on the carriers to accept higher carriage fees.  This all comes down to you, the consumer, paying more for television. 

A minor point though is that no one is blacking anyone out.  The carriage agreement expired and so Spectrum is no longer licensed to carry the channels.

 

[Buffalonill]

10 hours ago, SwampD said:

 I know I’m going to regret asking this, but what is gross?

Because most of the time they talk during the whole damn broadcast Joking about stuff .

And most of the time they have zero clue about the team

[Claude Balls]

1 hour ago, PASabreFan said:

Don't forget how he ruined young Ras before Donnie saved him. Why Ralph told him to do jumping jacks when the puck went over his head I'll never know.

Good call. He ruined pretty much everyone. Let the guys play to their strengths, don't force them to play differently. No shock Tage broke out once Meatballs took over. What baffles me is that Ralph brought Donnie aboard from what I recall. I could be wrong. It was a few years ago, and I can't even remember what I ate yesterday. 

[Taro T]

3 hours ago, LTS said:

The antenna.. forgot about that.  Although that may soon be a thing of the past as well.. with ATSC 3.0.  That said, for us "in town" folks.. we are screwed.  ESPN+ is not a viable option for most games.

I didn't think they were ever free.  I suppose I could go convert my TVs to Roku.. or at least one of them.  That said, I've heard nasty things about Spectrum streaming quality.

Welcome to the programming fee wars!  These are always done to coincide with the start of something important (college football) and all done to put the pressure on the carriers to accept higher carriage fees.  This all comes down to you, the consumer, paying more for television. 

A minor point though is that no one is blacking anyone out.  The carriage agreement expired and so Spectrum is no longer licensed to carry the channels.

 

It's not an option for day of watching, but pretty sure if you're willing to wait a day or 2 you can watch the game on ESPN+ even if you're in market.

Not exactly the same thing; and it's much better watching day of, but at least it is possible to watch the games there.  (At least the non-TNT games (and non-NHLN ones too?).)

[Radar]

I use Roku just to save the box charges from Spectrum for our four tv's. My cable plus internet is presently at $151/monthly. Expect that to go up about $40/month soon. When I consider the cost of internet plus streaming apps to get all we desire to watch I don't think I would save by cancelling the cable. Maybe I'm not up on this streaming. I'm a Mets fan (frustrating), Sabres fan. To get those games it's hard to find package that meets my needs for less than I pay now.

[LTS]

20 hours ago, Taro T said:

It's not an option for day of watching, but pretty sure if you're willing to wait a day or 2 you can watch the game on ESPN+ even if you're in market.

Not exactly the same thing; and it's much better watching day of, but at least it is possible to watch the games there.  (At least the non-TNT games (and non-NHLN ones too?).)

Yes, 48 hours later. But to me the purpose of something being live is to watch it when it happens.  Once I know the score and see 84 social media updates, etc. the purpose of watching is gone.

1 hour ago, Radar said:

I use Roku just to save the box charges from Spectrum for our four tv's. My cable plus internet is presently at $151/monthly. Expect that to go up about $40/month soon. When I consider the cost of internet plus streaming apps to get all we desire to watch I don't think I would save by cancelling the cable. Maybe I'm not up on this streaming. I'm a Mets fan (frustrating), Sabres fan. To get those games it's hard to find package that meets my needs for less than I pay now.

You really won't save money. In the end time based services all work on contracts with the content producers and those contracts aren't going to be much different from one service provider to another.  The service provider differentiators all boil down to the packages of channels they carry. For Sling they broke it up into two packages and NONE of them have local channels.  For Fubo they do not carry Turner networks.

It's all about finding the provider that has the right package. Of course the days of service providers are coming to an end with ESPN launching their standalone service soon. I am sure they are negotiating a very short contract with Spectrum or more expensive for longer term. ESPN is rumored to be launching standalone in 2024 I believe.

 

[ROC_exEMT]

On 9/1/2023 at 9:12 AM, LTS said:

I didn't think they were ever free.  I suppose I could go convert my TVs to Roku.. or at least one of them.  That said, I've heard nasty things about Spectrum streaming quality.

Welcome to the programming fee wars!  These are always done to coincide with the start of something important (college football) and all done to put the pressure on the carriers to accept higher carriage fees.  This all comes down to you, the consumer, paying more for television. 

A minor point though is that no one is blacking anyone out.  The carriage agreement expired and so Spectrum is no longer licensed to carry the channels.

 

I did think the 1st box was free but I dropped the boxes and went with streaming on our 2 tv's with Roku so possibly they changed their fee structure.  As for streaming quality - for me it's hit/miss.  Over the past few months I've had technicians out to the house numerous times.  I've been getting pixelation primarily on commercials - the worst being the Spectrum ads go figure.  I also have times where the video and audio get out of sync for a couple seconds.  Recently it's gotten better but I've done so much to my system I can't say what the issue is/was.  I got rid of the Spectrum wireless router (this saves me $5.00/mo) and put in a mesh system in the house, I've totally refreshed my tv back to factory defaults and then reprogrammed it, I've had technicians run all new wiring through the house up to my modem and router, they supposedly had the line crews out and they tested the tap at the pole.  And now just recently I was notified Spectrum is supposed to be "upgrading" their network to improve speed and stability and that perhaps my issues have been due to this upgrade.  Who knows.

 

On 9/2/2023 at 7:55 AM, Radar said:

I use Roku just to save the box charges from Spectrum for our four tv's. My cable plus internet is presently at $151/monthly. Expect that to go up about $40/month soon. When I consider the cost of internet plus streaming apps to get all we desire to watch I don't think I would save by cancelling the cable. Maybe I'm not up on this streaming. I'm a Mets fan (frustrating), Sabres fan. To get those games it's hard to find package that meets my needs for less than I pay now.

I was in the same boat.  My bill was just under $160 for cable and internet (500mbps) and was due to go up in September.  I called cust service and asked for their Retention Dept and was able to extend my current plan out another year with a $2.00 increase/mo. so I was happy with that.

 

And yes, ESPN and others are currently blacked out on Spectrum so no Cornhole Championships!!

Edited September 3, 2023 by ROC_exEMT