Why I Am Ignoring USA-Canada Men's Ice Hockey...As Well As The Rest of the Winter Olympics

Today brings about the biggest international hockey game involving the USA in three decades.  And it will NOT be broadcast in the good old USA on free TV.  That's right.  The National Broadcasting Company, worldwide leaders in ladies' hygene products called douchebags, point out the the Olympics are dominated in the rating by women 18-49, especially in prime time, with "plausably live" broadcasts since 1992 that are even more "plausably live" on the West Coast and have ignored the triple dubs and ESPN for spoilers, is telecasting the game on MSNBC, which BTW was not forced upon them by Uncle Keith.  And what's NBC showing?  The most gayest event in the history of sports, ice dancing.  That's right, motherfucking ice dancing!

NHL officials, especially Gary Bettman, the league's commissioner, are furious, and are now officially considering pulling out of the next Winter Olympiad four years hence in Sofia, Russia.  Okay, NBC fucked up both Jay Leno and Conan O'Brien (soon coming to the Fox Broadcasting Company channel near you this September), get bashed on a regular basis by Billo the Clown, and now THIS?  Douchebags - wait, check that - douchenozzles indeed.  And J. Pierpont Comcast is taking over.

If I was Gary Bettman, I tell the head of the International Ice Hockey Federation to stick it four years from now.  Then I tell Comcast to go away when the NHL deals with NBC and Versus expire.  Finally, I open bidding for the OTA and cable contracts combined for ESPN on ABC ABC and ESPN, Fox and FX, and CBS and Spike TV (or any combo of these) hope one of them gets the next pair of Olympics following London.

Here's the Full Week 17 Schedule

Sunday, January 3rd (Games with playoff implications in italics; games that moved - only two - in Bold.)

CBS 1 PM Games
Indianapolis @ Buffalo
Jacksonville @ Cleveland
New England @ Houston 
Pittsburgh @ Miami (Losers will be automatically out)

Fox 1 PM Games
Atlanta @ Tampa Bay
Chicago @ Detroit
New Orleans @ Carolina
NY Giants @ Minnesota
San Francisco @ St. Louis

CBS 4:15 PM Games
Baltimore @ Oakland (Win and in Wild Card spot for BAL)
Kansas City @ Denver (Slim hopes for Denver)
Tennessee @ Seattle

FOX 4:15 PM Games
Green Bay @ Arizona (Could be Wild Card Round preview)
Philadelphia @ Dallas (Winner gets NFC East title)
Washington @ San Diego

NBC Sunday Night Football 8:20 PM Game
Cincinnati @ NY Jets (Win and in Wild Card spot for NYJ)


All times Eastern.  Check with the506.com for what games will be on in your area.

When It Comes to the Flexing of Sunday Night Games, The NFL Does Not Care For Playoff Implications...

Hope you enjoyed Brett Favre's loss to Carolina Sunday (12/20), and you like next week's (12/27) Cowboys blowout of the Deadskins.

When the 2009 Schedule was placed onto the world wide everything all the way back in April, thirteen days notice is given to change the NBC Sunday Night Football game from Week 11 through 16.  So how many games were flexed out by Roger Goodell's lieutenants of television?

One.  That was when the Patriots-Dolphins game was swapped out for Favre-Cardinals way back on December 6th.  And now, with the push to Miami Gardens underway for Super Bowl XLIV, the NFL and their Sunday TV partners - Fox, CBS and NBC - ought to learn from the mistakes of not swapping out Minnesota-Carolina for a sexier, playoff-inducing game like Bengals-Chargers, or not showing a cringe worthy nation the apocalypse called Dallas at Washington and rather show an unbeaten Colts team against a hanging-by-a-thread-as-far-as-the-postseason-goes Jets team.

Nope, Goodell cares about ratings.  We have been lied to again by the National Football League, and wether we like it or not, we will have to live with this for another four years.  Take a look at this week's Fox schedule...please.  Seattle at Green Bay and Carolina at New York Giants are the only games with playoff implications, while the rest of the slate - Tampa Bay at New Orleans, St. Louis at Arizona and the Gordon Forbes Memorial Negative-Star Pillow Fight of the Week Detroit at San Francisco - have about as many playoff backstories as Amy Winehouse visiting Alcoholics Anonymous.

The reason the "flex" scheduling was introduced was to prop up NBC's Sunday Night game late in the season.  It was also inducing to both CBS and Fox to help prop up their ratings for early contests.  When it was announced that Cowboys-Redskins would stay where it was, there were screams of disbelief at both 30 Rock in New York and at Fox Sports' offices in LaLaLand, and for different reasons. NBC was shocked that they were keeping that game, and Fox was as angry as a midget wrestler on a Red Bull bender that their schedule was that weak.  Meanwhile at Black Rock, CBS was ROTFLTMFAsO that they were now placing Broncos-Eagles in the 4:15 PM ET slot.

As they used to say "It's all about the Benjamins"...and we're the ones getting screwed royally.