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Out at Home: Why Most Nats Fans Can't See Their Team OUT AT HOME: WHY MOST NATS FANS CAN’T SEE THEIR TEAM ON TV HEARING BEFORE THE COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS SECOND SESSION APRIL 7, 2006 Serial No. 109–152 Printed for the use of the Committee on Government Reform ( Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/congress/index.html http://www.house.gov/reform U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE 28–227 PDF WASHINGTON : 2006 For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office Internet: bookstore.gpo.gov Phone: toll free (866) 512–1800; DC area (202) 512–1800 Fax: (202) 512–2250 Mail: Stop SSOP, Washington, DC 20402–0001 VerDate 11-MAY-2000 09:56 Aug 17, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00001 Fmt 5011 Sfmt 5011 D:\DOCS\28227.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1 COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM TOM DAVIS, Virginia, Chairman CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut HENRY A. WAXMAN, California DAN BURTON, Indiana TOM LANTOS, California ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida MAJOR R. OWENS, New York JOHN M. MCHUGH, New York EDOLPHUS TOWNS, New York JOHN L. MICA, Florida PAUL E. KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania GIL GUTKNECHT, Minnesota CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland STEVEN C. LATOURETTE, Ohio DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois CHRIS CANNON, Utah WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri JOHN J. DUNCAN, JR., Tennessee DIANE E. WATSON, California CANDICE S. MILLER, Michigan STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio CHRIS VAN HOLLEN, Maryland DARRELL E. ISSA, California LINDA T. SANCHEZ, California JON C. PORTER, Nevada C.A. DUTCH RUPPERSBERGER, Maryland KENNY MARCHANT, Texas BRIAN HIGGINS, New York LYNN A. WESTMORELAND, Georgia ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of PATRICK T. MCHENRY, North Carolina Columbia CHARLES W. DENT, Pennsylvania ——— VIRGINIA FOXX, North Carolina BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont JEAN SCHMIDT, Ohio (Independent) ——— ——— DAVID MARIN, Staff Director LAWRENCE HALLORAN, Deputy Staff Director TERESA AUSTIN, Chief Clerk PHIL BARNETT, Minority Chief of Staff/Chief Counsel (II) VerDate 11-MAY-2000 09:56 Aug 17, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00002 Fmt 5904 Sfmt 5904 D:\DOCS\28227.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1 C O N T E N T S Page Hearing held on April 7, 2006 ................................................................................ 1 Statement of: Dupuy, Robert A., president and chief operating officer, Major League Baseball; Peter G. Angelos, chairman and chief executive officer, Balti- more Orioles; David L. Cohen, executive vice president, Comcast Corp.; and Gary McCollum, vice president and regional manager, Cox North- ern Virginia ................................................................................................... 18 Angelos, Peter G. ....................................................................................... 42 Cohen, David L. ......................................................................................... 54 Dupuy, Robert A. ....................................................................................... 18 McCollum, Gary ......................................................................................... 176 Franchot, Peter V.R., Delegate, Maryland House of Delegates; Anthony Williams, Mayor, District of Columbia; Sean T. Connaughton, chair- man, Prince William County Board of Supervisors; Doug Duncan, Montgomery County executive; and Ian Koski, editor, Nationalspride.com ....................................................................................... 209 Connaughton, Sean T. ............................................................................... 216 Duncan, Doug ............................................................................................ 220 Franchot, Peter V.R. ................................................................................. 209 Koski, Ian ................................................................................................... 225 Williams, Anthony ..................................................................................... 214 Letters, statements, etc., submitted for the record by: Angelos, Peter G., chairman and chief executive officer, Baltimore Ori- oles, prepared statement of .......................................................................... 44 Burton, Hon. Dan, a Representative in Congress from the State of Indi- ana, prepared statement of .......................................................................... 10 Cohen, David L., executive vice president, Comcast Corp., prepared state- ment of ........................................................................................................... 57 Connaughton, Sean T., chairman, Prince William County Board of Super- visors, prepared statement of ....................................................................... 218 Davis, Chairman Tom, a Representative in Congress from the State of Virginia, prepared statement of ................................................................... 4 Duncan, Doug, Montgomery County executive, prepared statement of ....... 222 Dupuy, Robert A., president and chief operating officer, Major League Baseball: Washington Post article ............................................................................ 20 Prepared statement of ............................................................................... 23 Franchot, Peter V.R., Delegate, Maryland House of Delegates, prepared statement of ................................................................................................... 211 Issa, Hon. Darrell E., a Representative in Congress from the State of California, prepared statement of ................................................................ 17 Koski, Ian, editor, Nationalspride.com, prepared statement of .................... 228 McCollum, Gary, vice president and regional manager, Cox Northern Virginia, prepared statement of ................................................................... 178 (III) VerDate 11-MAY-2000 09:56 Aug 17, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00003 Fmt 5904 Sfmt 5904 D:\DOCS\28227.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1 VerDate 11-MAY-2000 09:56 Aug 17, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00004 Fmt 5904 Sfmt 5904 D:\DOCS\28227.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1 OUT AT HOME: WHY MOST NATS FANS CAN’T SEE THEIR TEAM ON TV FRIDAY, APRIL 7, 2006 HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM, Washington, DC. The committee met, pursuant to notice, in room 2154, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Tom Davis (chairman of the commit- tee) presiding. Present: Representatives Tom Davis, Burton, Issa, Cummings, Van Hollen, Ruppersberger, and Norton. Also present: Representative Moran. Staff present: David Marin, staff director; Keith Ausbrook, chief counsel; Jennifer Safavian, chief counsel for oversight and inves- tigations; Howie Denis, John Hunter, and Steve Castor, counsels; Rob White, communications director; Andrea LeBlanc, deputy di- rector of communications; Teresa Austin, chief clerk; Sarah D’Orsie, deputy clerk; Leneal Scott, computer systems manager; Brian Cohen, minority senior investigator and policy advisor; Kim Trinca, minority counsel; Earley Green, minority chief clerk; and Jean Gosa, minority assistant clerk. Chairman TOM DAVIS. Good afternoon. Welcome, and a quorum being present, the Committee on Government Reform will come to order. I want to welcome everybody to today’s hearing. Today, the committee will examine the dispute that is preventing the Wash- ington Nationals games from being widely available on cable tele- vision. Nationals fans deserve to understand why they can’t watch 75 percent of their team’s games on the region’s dominant cable provider—Comcast, with its 1.3 million subscribers. Being able to watch the Nats on TV has been a problem ever since the team came to Washington. Last season, before an agree- ment was reached with DirecTV, the lack of access to Nationals games was so bad that play-by-play man Mel Proctor actually gave out his cell phone number and asked anyone watching the game to call him. He got one call—from a technician in the production truck outside. As any fan knows, part of following your home team is watching the games on TV. For some, this means trying to watch every game. For others, it means flipping the ball game on at night to check the score. This past Wednesday night, if you flipped the game on in the ninth, you would have found the Nats down by one. Next thing you know, Ryan Zimmerman homers off Bill Wagner to tie the score, and then they go on to win the game in extra innings. Having all the games on TV means you can tune in when the Nats (1) VerDate 11-MAY-2000 09:56 Aug 17, 2006 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00005 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\28227.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1 2 are in the midst of a winning streak, when a superstar opponent is in town, or when you find out that a no-hitter is in progress. I can’t imagine how frustrated I would be if I found out Livan Her- nandez had a no-hitter going in the seventh and I couldn’t flip on the TV set to see it. Having all the games on TV allows folks to jump on the Nationals bandwagon, to have those water cooler con- versations, and to make the Nationals part of the fabric of the com- munity. If you air it, they will come. I am disappointed that the sophisticated businessmen involved in this dispute have failed to strike a deal. There should be enough money and good sense to make a deal work for everyone. The only people hurt by this dispute are the fans. I should also note at the outset that
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