Sports Columnist Calls Blackout a ‘Boondoggle;’ ESPN Carrying Giants Today, but Not in Hawaii

10/1 Update: The MLB Network is offering Padres-Giants and D'backs-Dodgers today. If the Hawaii blackout continues as expected, fans here -- especially Giants fans -- will once again be denied the thrill of watching their playoffs-bound team.

Dave Reardon devotes his entire column in the Honolulu Star-Advertiser today to the MLB-condoned and abetted video blackout of some West Coast teams’ games in Hawaii. Chief among them as the season winds down is the San Francisco Giants.

Reardon’s column had one minor error (selling out a ballpark has nothing to do with the blackout, which is constant), but for the most part, he’s right on the money with this observation:

“Ignorance is one thing,” he writes. “Arrogance combined with indifference is another.”

For the record, those of us who are pushing MLB to lift the blackout have received no responses to the emails sent to MLB executives this week except for one that says essentially, “It’s not my job and I’ll forward it to someone whose job it is.” Problem is, that someone hasn’t done anything to solve the problem on behalf of Hawaii baseball fans.

Giants Not on ESPN Here*

According to ESPN’s Sports Center this morning, the network is carrying tonight’s Giants-Diamondbacks game, and ESPN’s Scores website notes the same today. But not in Hawaii. No, we get Marlins-Braves at 10:30 a.m. and then no other ESPN game coverage the rest of the day.

The indifference to Giants fans in Hawaii and baseball fans in general here continues.

* It turns out you can see ESPN's coverage of the Giants at various watering holes, like Murphy's on Merchant Street, but if you are at home, you're outta luck.

Hawaii -- a Paradise? No, It’s MLB’s Wilderness!

Speaking of blackouts, that's what the Honolulu Star-Advertiser is doing to news about the recent NLRB ruling affecting Times Supermarkets. Read about it here.

If you don’t think the infamous “MLB Blackout of Hawaii” is a classic Catch 22, consider this: Hawaii is in the home territory of several West Coast baseball teams even though we’re separated from those teams’ ballparks by more than 2,000 miles of deep blue sea. You can read the details of Major League Baseball’s indifference to the lack of video coverage of those teams in Hawaii in the post immediately below. Today’s post highlights two of the voices crying in our wilderness for justice from Major League Baseball.

Phil Kinnicutt

This Boston Red Sox fan’s blood boils every time his team plays the Oakland A’s because it means he can’t watch the Sox from his home in Hawaii. (Photo shows Phil with daughter Leiana at Fenway Park this month.) Maybe he should move to North Dakota, where he’d have access to all Sox games. Here’s what Phil said in an email to MLB headquarters earlier this week:

"You have an exciting pennant race going on in the National League West between the San Francisco Giants and the San Diego Padres, but what does that mean for Hawaii baseball fans? Hawaii fans are out of luck even though both teams claim Hawaii as home TV territory! Thanks to the two-year blackout of Giants games in Hawaii caused by the impasse between the rights owner and Time Warner Cable, even if a major network like FOX or ESPN or TBS or MLB Network decides to carry a Giants - Padres game nationally during the final week of the regular season, the Giants blackout will trump the national network coverage no matter where the game is played. Hawaii is out of luck! Although the Padres have granted a waiver to the TV blackout that applies to their situation, the Padres games are not carried in Hawaii by Oceanic Time Warner so it doesn't matter. We will not see any of their games unless a major network carries a non-Giants game during the final week. The Giants are blacked out period. No waiver. No coverage. Nothing. Zero. Not a pretty picture for an entire State claimed as home territory by six west coast teams, but served by only two. And MLB seems to just stand by in the wings. Isn't it time to do something about this situation?"

Jim Loomis

Another blood-boiling Red Sox fan, Jim lives on the slopes of Haleakala on Maui, but the elevation doesn’t help his reception of Sox games. They’re blacked out whenever the opposition is the A’s, but Jim also wants to watch West Coast teams – especially now, when the Giants and Padres both have a shot at making the post-season. Jim’s a train buff, and he's used his website to record a few choice words today about Major League Baseball, including these:

"For more than two years the team owners have been unable to agree with the cable companies on the financial terms that would permit the games to be carried here. Apparently they’re no longer even trying. And – what the hell – the season’s almost over anyway, so why bother? Why bother? Well, for one thing, because we’re not able to watch the concluding games of the season being played by the San Francisco Giants who are in the thick of the pennant race with a skinny one-game lead over the San Diego Padres. For three years, a handful of baseball fans in Hawaii have been pleading our case … to team owners, to broadcasters, and to Major League Baseball. You know what the bottom line is here? No one gives a rat's ass – not the ball clubs, not the broadcasters, and most especially not Major League Baseball. No one. So, instead of watching the Giants-Diamondbacks game this afternoon – it’s blacked out here, you see – I’ll put on my authentic $35 Boston Red Sox baseball cap and spend that time spreading horse poop on our pasture. And isn’t that just perfect!"

Jim’s more than a little fired up by this at this West Coast blackout, and he’s a Red Sox fan. You can imagine what the host of this blog – a Giants fan – is feeling about now. None of us can watch these two West Coast teams fight for a post-season spot. Are you reading this, MLB executives? Can you possibly imagine what you’re doing to your fan base? You’re alienating us, and if you’re doing it to us, you’re undoubtedly doing it to fans all over the country.

Is anybody at MLB assigned to think about “issues management?” You’d better, because you have an issue building up to unmanageable proportions. “Paradise” or not, baseball fans in Hawaii are mad as hell, and we’re determined not to take it anymore.

Do the right thing, MLB. End this blackout now!

(Email addresses of senior MLB executives can be found at the end of the post immediately below.)

Hawaii Baseball Fans Cry ‘Foul’ over Blackout of West Coast Teams' Games; MLB Condones It

• If you're looking for the Times Supermarkets NLRB ruling, click here.

Hawaii fans of West Coast baseball teams -- and all the teams that play those teams -- have been fighting mad for all of the 2009 and 2010 seasons because of the infamous “MLB Blackout of Hawaii.” For several seasons through 2008, we enjoyed watching West Coast teams on the cable, satellite and broadcast channels available to us, as well as online at MLB.com. Then, starting in April last year, we suddenly couldn’t do that anymore – even though we had paid MLB and the cable/satellite companies for the privilege.

Major League Baseball began imposing a blackout on those teams’ games in Hawaii because, apparently, the suits at the various broadcast and cable-cast outfits with rights to the teams' games can’t get around to cutting a deal to carry those teams on their outlets here. Consequently, and because of some misguided thinking, MLB never allows Hawaii fans access to those games on MLB.com. Games almost always are also blacked out on regional and national networks like TBS, the Fox Saturday Game of the Week and even on ESPN on occasion.

Fans spent all last year and right up to today, the last Monday of the 2010 regular season, getting nowhere with MLB executives, Comcast, Oceanic Time-Warner, several baseball teams' management (notably the Giants) and maybe other intermediaries who've helped orchestrate the blackout. MLB’s top executives have been the biggest disappointment, either ignoring our emails and letters altogether or writing back with brush-offs on the theme of “it’s not my job.”

What about the fans!? What about MLB executives recognizing a public relations disaster and fixing it? Are we being unreasonable? The newspaper columnists we’ve contacted don’t think so. As Scott Ostler of the San Francisco Chronicle wrote last September, this blackout is inexplicable except for the fact that it’s being driven by “knuckleheads.” Ferd Lewis of the Honolulu Star-Advertiser wrote last April that Hawaii fans are suffering from too much love. Every West Coast team considers the islands to be in its “home television territory.” That might make some sense on the mainland, but it’s ludicrous when the closest MLB game is more than 2,000 miles from our homes. Click here to read Scott’s column and here for Ferd’s.

We’re finally putting this issue online here at Comma`aina News. Two West Coast teams are battling to the wire in the National League West, so this seems like a good time. Will writing about it here on an obscure website do any good? Probably not, but MLB can’t hurt us any more than it already has.

Email Addresses: If you want to register your opinion with MLB's headquarters staff, you can start with Chief Operating Officer Bob DuPuy, whose email address is bob.dupuy@mlb.com (we've given up writing the Commissioner). Here are others you can copy on your email: chris.tully@mlb.com - john.mchalejr@mlb.com - allan.selig@mlb.com - rob.manfred@mlb.com

Blackouts in Hawaii Black Eye for MLB

Sports columnist Ferd Lewis reflects on what it's like in Hawaii to be wanted too much.

By Ferd Lewis
April 18, 2010
Baseball fans in Hawai'i, we are wanted.

Right up and down the West Coast. The San Francisco Giants want us. The Oakland Athletics, too. Not to mention the Los Angeles Dodgers and the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim.

All have claimed us and designated these islands as part of their "home markets" for broadcast purposes. Few areas in the country are apparently so coveted.

But before feeling too good about it, recognize the situation for what it is, a form of second-class status that has done us no favors and diminished us in a way that defies geography and snickers at common sense.

Because with being part of the designated "home markets" for those teams comes the head-scratching restriction that home games not sold out 48 hours are blacked out on many cable outlets and channels here, including MLB Extra Innings and MLB.com.

"Unfortunately, games involving Giants, A's Dodgers and Angels remain on the black-out list," Lonnie Shupp, director of program services for Oceanic Time Warner Cable, wrote in an e-mail Friday in response to questions.

Never mind that unlike someone living smack dab in the middle of San Francisco or Los Angeles, when you reside here there is no hopping into a car or jumping on a bus to get to a Giants, Dodgers, A's or Angels game. We know, we've tried and it gets wet.

You'd think that being separated by 2,500 miles of Pacific Ocean might qualify for some sort of an exemption. But that would be to assume logic plays some part in all this. And, after two years of checking, be assured it plays very little.

Apparently only Seattle passed geography 101 because, Oceanic said, the Mariners a while ago lifted their blackout "as a test" and have, so far, not reinstated it.

Or, perhaps like somebody involved with the Giants some years ago there was what the San Francisco Chronicle termed an "in-house error" made and, unlike the Giants, not caught. Presumably the offending Giants' employee was sent to the deep minors.

A number of Hawai'i residents have repeatedly tried to make their case to the powers that be — MLB, the clubs, their rights holders, cable networks. In the process they have run into more walls than Ken Griffey Jr.; seen more fingers pointed and less action than a session of Congress.

And here we are wading into another season and still no relief in sight. "We have pleaded our case for years to MLB to no avail," Shupp wrote. "Sorry, it is difficult to understand and very frustrating."

In the meantime, baseball fans, be wary of MLB doing us any more favors.

Scott Ostler's Knucklehead of the Week: The MLB-Giants-MLB.com-Cable TV Axis of Evil

San Francisco Chronicle sports columnist Scott Ostler is always on the lookout for a stuffed shirt to deflate, and he's found quite a few of them mixed up in the "MLB Blackout of Hawaii." Here's what Scott wrote about the many Knuckleheads perpetuating this boneheaded PR disaster:

Scott Ostler, Chronicle Staff Writer
Saturday, September 12, 2009
(09-12) 20:46 PDT -- The Axis is putting the squeeze on Hawaii, shutting that state out of telecasts and Internet feeds of Giants' games.

It's very complicated, but in brief: Five teams (Giants, A's, Dodgers, Angels, Mariners), with approval of MLB, claim Hawaii as home territory for broadcast rights.

I'm not sure why those teams don't also claim Montana, which is actually closer.

Giants' rights-holder Comcast has not reached a deal with Hawaiian cable carriers to carry Giants' games, so the games are blacked out there. Also off-limits: MLB.com game feeds.

Why single out the Giants? Because they are popular in Hawaii, and because they have ignored SOS pleas from their fans on the islands.

In past years, Hawaiian subscribers to MLB.com got Giants' games. Unannounced, that stopped this season. A TV source tells me that those feeds were an in-house error that was detected and corrected this season.

It's all another example of big bidness screwing the fan. As in: NFL blackouts.

Hey, Hawaii: If the Giants make the playoffs, we'll send you results via postcard. Aloha!
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