Lions-Redskins Game Officially Blacked Out

by Sean Yuille on Oct 23, 2008 1:58 PM EDT in Detroit Lions News

Since there are still around 5,000 tickets available for Sunday's game between the Lions and Redskins, the NFL denied a request that would have given the Lions 24 more hours to reach a sellout. That decision essentially ended the Lions' sellout streak, meaning the game will be blacked out locally. All 50 of the Lions' regular season games played at Ford Field in the past were sold out, which is surprising considering how mediocre the team has been during the stadium's existence.

What a blackout means is that if you live within 75 miles of Ford Field, you will not be able to watch Sunday's game on television. Instead, you will have to listen to it on the radio, track it online, or hope that someone is going to stream it on the Internet. There usually is at least one online stream out there, so I will be on the lookout on Sunday. The quality of the streams isn't usually very good, but they're better than nothing.

If I am able to find a stream, I will post a link to it on the game thread and will also attempt to give live updates. If I can't, then I will probably just listen to the game on the radio and will infrequently keep you aware of what is happening.

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Sports Bars

So even sports bars won’t have it, right?

by explosivo2k2 on Oct 23, 2008 3:09 PM EDT reply actions

i.e. Sunday Ticket

by explosivo2k2 on Oct 23, 2008 3:10 PM EDT up reply actions

Re: Sports Bars

Sunday ticket will show it but if you live within 75 miles of Detroit you wont be able to see it.

Whether it be this year, next year, or 50 years from now. The Detroit Lions will eventually win a Super Bowl............I f'n hope.

by BoscoHB on Oct 23, 2008 3:59 PM EDT reply actions

blackout...

If I’m not mistaken, the only thing affected by a blackout are people located 75 miles from the field/stations 75 miles from the field. This means that all sunday ticket subscribers will be able to see the game. It doesn’t effect sunday ticket, just like it doesn’t affect those of us on the westside of the state. Just the local carriers of the game, directv not being local, would be excluded. Correct me if I’m wrong, but there is hope (if thats what you want to call it) for those of you that live in the vicinity of ford field.

by lions_sucker on Oct 23, 2008 4:22 PM EDT reply actions

Nope, all hope is lost

A regular-season, Sunday afternoon home team game will be blacked out in a home team’s territory if the game fails to sell out at least 72 hours before the game. If it is blacked out on your local broadcast station, it will also be blacked out in your area on NFL SUNDAY TICKET.

http://www.directv.com/DTVAPP/global/contentPage.jsp?assetId=900046

by explosivo2k2 on Oct 23, 2008 4:24 PM EDT reply actions

That's pretty stupid

Then again, the blackout rule in general is dumb.

Check out Pride of Detroit, SB Nation's Lions Blog

by Sean Yuille on Oct 23, 2008 4:48 PM EDT up reply actions

I disagree

The blackout rule forces fan to buy tickets, if you want to watch the game, then go watch it in person. Ohh yeah, it’s also a bullshit business strategy the nfl is using to try to sell out games so yeah it is dumb lol

by sparto on Oct 23, 2008 6:29 PM EDT up reply actions

My thought is that if they weren't going in the first place, they won't go at all

Only people that are ridiculously die hard would likely buy tickets to watch them, and if they’re that big of a fan they probably would be there anyways.

Check out Pride of Detroit, SB Nation's Lions Blog

by Sean Yuille on Oct 23, 2008 10:27 PM EDT up reply actions