It looks like the channel may be dead out of the gate. For this channel to survive, they needed a winter partner and with the Blackhawks extending with NBCSCH, they will not have one. Clearly there is no way a Reinsdorf owned Bulls will join them.

Here is a question I will pose to the board, will the Cubs end up in a situation like the Dodgers where the largest TV provider in market will not pick up their channel? I have a hard time believing that Comcast will add a competing regional sports channel to their line-up, which if added would require additional subscriber fees that they either eat or pass on to their customers.

https://www.nba.com/bulls/news/nbc-spor ... blackhawks

Even YES in the NY market requires the Nets as a winter partner to ensure the channel remains viable with year round programming.

The Cubs launching their own channel may turn out to be the biggest self own by a local team since Einhorn's SportsVision or Wirtz's home TV blackout.

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“When I walked in this morning, and saw the flag was at half mast, I thought 'alright another bureaucrat ate it.'" - Ron Swanson

Daddy Joe will see just how much blood money this will cost him and force his heirs into something else to save face.

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There are only two examples of infinity: The universe and human stupidity and I'm not sure about the universe.

I will speculate that the original plan was that Sinclair was going to be successful in buying Channel 9, and then they'd tell Comcast that WGN and the Cubs channel were a package deal in the local WGN distribution zone, take it or leave it. No way that Comcast would offend the elderly by cutting off WGN and it's 14 hours of news per day.

But then Sinclair gets their agreement for WGN flushed, and now it's all much more tenuous.

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"When people want their version of the truth, they go find it, no matter how baseless their beliefs." -- Ken Rosenthal

No, the Cubs really needed to work that McDonough connection to get the Hawks for the winter. The Mets and SNY seem to get by without major-league winter programming, I think they just pick up spare UConn games and stuff, but that's a much bigger regional market, of course. (It's an interesting situation out there: MSG inherited the Islanders' mammoth TV deal and then snatched up the Devils basically to spite SNY and YES, but then often has nowhere to put one or both.) I'm still not bullish on the long-term future of SNY.



I can't say they will definitely end up in the Dodgers' situation, but they really seem to be on that path.

Fur Coat's hypothesis that Sinclair needed WGN to make the RSN deal work is an interesting one.

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Your speculation has merit.

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Yeah, what the Jewish guy posted is all fabricated bullshit. The Cubs will be proceeding with their own network and all is well. Nice try.

Kind of sad that GN won't have sports.

The Cubs will proceed with it, but it sounds like it will be a flop if Comcast won't pick it up and they have no content to fill half the year.

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“When I walked in this morning, and saw the flag was at half mast, I thought 'alright another bureaucrat ate it.'" - Ron Swanson

They might as well run a full-time video simulcast of the Score. You think Grobber's third-shift callers are weird? Wait until people watching at home can skype in!

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