re: Whitlock: How a Gawker-Affiliated Website Made ESPN Politically Correct

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None of those things are in their control.

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If they aren't, they it's their own fault for not seeing these things when negotiating.

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The playoffs on NYE was because the Rose and Sugar wanted to remain in the afternoon and night slots on NYD.

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So what. These are two of the 3 biggest games of the year. They are bigger than Rose and Sugar bowl. They should be played on a Sunday or Monday or Thursday, the nights that give you the most viewers. I don't think anyone forced them to do it on NYE, that was their choice. They should have been played on the 2nd, which was a Monday, when everyone would be likely still off of work, but returning home for the holidays and what not and ready to get back to work the next day.

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The NFL gave the top prime time games to NBC, it's not like ESPN would pick Jaguars-Bengals over Cowboys-Giants

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Well they need to learn how to negotiate. This is where their arrogance comes into play where they just assume people will watch it b/c it's MNF.

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I don't feel like looking it up, but is the start time really later than it used to be? By 30 minutes MAYBE. Game length seems like more of an issue.

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The game time ESPN states is 8:30 eastern time. Kickoff is more like 8:50. A good bit of your demographic, 25-45 year old men, have put their kids to bed and aren't that far behind in going to bed themselves. 75% of the country lives on this side of the country. They should start an hour earlier. The vast majority of NFL fans live in the eastern time zone, yet it's close to 11pm when the 3rd quarter starts. Unless your team is playing, most people aren't staying up for that. They also have like 3 hours of pregame crap that no one watches that they think is important. The only reason the SNF pregame show has such great ratings is b/c it's a nice recap to the day since they show the highlights of all the sunday games.