Yankees, Nets games cut for local cable subscribers

Comcast subscribers hoping to watch the Brooklyn Nets play the Charlotte Hornets Wednesday evening were out of luck, as the cable company dropped the Yankees Entertainment and Sports Network on Tuesday.

The YES Network, which also shows New York Yankees baseball games and New York City Football Club soccer matches among other sporting events and shows, is available in eastern parts of Morris County including Morristown. About 61 percent of all New Jersey households are within the Comcast coverage area, according to the cable provider’s website.

In a statement on the YES Network’s website, the company said subscribers were given no advance notice before Comcast pulled the plug.

“Comcast's reputation for poor customer satisfaction is well known, but this surprise development represents a new low,” read the statement. “YES and Comcast reached an agreement in principle on the key points of a new contract many months ago, and YES continued to operate in good faith under that arrangement through the entire Yankees and NYCFC seasons and into the Nets season. Unfortunately, because YES will not yield to Comcast's demands for special treatment and anti-competitive terms, Comcast has decided to drop YES Network and its coverage of the NY Yankees, Brooklyn Nets and the New York City FC.”

YES, one of the country’s largest regional sports stations whose majority owner is 21st Century Fox, said the network was scheduled to air the 70 remaining games of the Nets season, and 125 Yankees regular season games in 2016.

Comcast reaches about 900,000 homes in New Jersey, New York, and Connecticut and said they could not reach a deal with YES on a price to air the station, specifically citing low viewership during Yankees games.

“YES Network carried approximately 130 baseball games this past season and well over 90 percent of our 900,000-plus customers who receive YES Network didn’t watch the equivalent of even one quarter of those games during the season, even while the Yankees were in the hunt for a playoff berth,” Comcast said in a statement.

“Viewership of the network in the baseball offseason is even lower. FOX and the Yankees are asking all of our customers to pay them hundreds of millions of dollars over the next several years to continue receiving the channel. The price FOX and the Yankees are requiring from our customers is not acceptable given the Network’s minimal viewership, which is why we have decided we can no longer justify continuing to carry the Network. YES simply does not present an appropriate price-value proposition for our customers.”

In a “Q & A” on the YES website, the network said its proposals for a new deal were reasonable.

“YES has been the dominant sports network in the New York/New Jersey/Connecticut area for most of the past 12 years, and its Yankees telecasts are often some of the most popular programming in the New York area,” read the statement. “In fact, YES is the most watched regional sports network in the country, and is consistently more popular than all of the sports networks that Comcast owns and operates. YES Network's proposals are not only reasonable, they are in line with agreements already secured with other major pay-TV providers within the marketplace.”

YES asked Comcast subscribers to go to http://keepyesnetwork.com to find other cable provides that carry the network in their area.

Negotiations have been ongoing since the carriage deal ended in the first quarter of 2015, and Comcast continued to carry YES as both sides worked to reach an agreement until this week.

Comcast did not comment when asked if negotiations were ongoing.

No other local cable companies, including Cablevision and Verizon Fios, are affected by the change in Morris County.

Staff Writer Michael Izzo: 973-428-6636; mizzo@GannettNJ.com