Media Notes

In DC, Barry Svrluga cites sources saying that Orioles Owner Peter Angelos, Comcast Chair & CEO Brian Roberts and COO Steve Burke met with MLB President & COO Bob DuPuy last week in Milwaukee “in an effort to get Nationals games on Comcast’s cable systems in the [DC] area.” One source said that Angelos “reiterated MASN’s willingness to allow an arbitrator to rule whether Comcast should carry Nationals games, and Comcast declined” (WASHINGTON POST, 5/17).

NBC’s NHL Coverage Receives Mixed Reviews

TWO OPINIONS: In Toronto, William Houston cites a “prominent sports announcer” as saying that NBC’s play-by-play coverage of the NHL “isn’t working and sends the wrong message to viewers.” Instead of “consistently calling the action” on the ice, the announcers “talk in general terms about the game, incorporating stories about the players and teams.” The announcer said, “It makes the game itself seem secondary when it should be the important news of the day. (Talking around the game) is a distraction” (GLOBE & MAIL, 5/17). But THE HOCKEY NEWS’ Stu Hackel, who previously served as NHL Dir of Broadcasting, writes the “biggest innovation to hit televised hockey in the [U.S.] in recent years is NBC’s ‘Inside The Glass.’” The feature, in which a commentator is stationed at ice-level between the benches, “ranks with TV replays, the telestrator and the overhead camera in providing a new dimension to understanding hockey at home” (THE HOCKEY NEWS, 5/16 issue).

NOTES: Fox Sports en Espanol “will cross the 10 million-subscriber plateau in June” with a new deal with DirecTV. The net will add 2 million more homes with DirecTV to the 880,000 subs it already has through the satellite service. News Corp. owns Fox Sports en Espanol and a stake in DirecTV (MULTICHANNEL.com, 5/16)....KQPN-AM in Memphis has signed a deal to broadcast as many as 113 of the MLB Cardinals’ remaining 123 regular-season games, as well as any postseason games. The games had been unavailable in Memphis, where the Cardinals’ Triple-A team plays, since moving from KMOX-AM, which can be received at night in Memphis (Memphis COMMERCIAL APPEAL, 5/17).