Even if Favre plays this year, he won’t be on my screen
I mentioned at the very end of yesterday's blog post that the NFL season was about to kick off and I left my readers with a resounding "uh-oh". The reason for the "uh-oh" is that my new antenna-only television setup is going to cripple my ability to watch my favorite NFL team, the Green Bay Packers.
You'd think I would be used to not seeing the Packers given that I have lived in Indiana now for almost 16 years. But don't forget during 12 of those years I had DIRECTV with the Sunday Ticket package that allowed me to see every single NFL game, not just the Packers.
So it's crunch time, what am I going to do? I wish I had a solution but all I really have are a bunch of compromises. They are compromises because there is no legal way to watch the NFL over the Internet unless you live outside of the United States. The only exception to this is the Sunday Night game on NBC, who recently announced they would stream the game over the Internet. Thanks, but I already get NBC on my antenna. That's the one night game I actually can watch.
Here's a quick list of ways I think I might be able to see the Packers this season:
- Pray every Sunday morning when the Indianapolis Colts and Green Bay Packers play at different times that my local affiliate will choose to air the Packers during the alternate time slot.
- Become really, really good friends with a neighbor that has DIRECTV with the Sunday Ticket.
- Head to a local sports bar and eat and drink reaaaaaaaaaaaaally slooooooooooow.
- Log on to the web site of a radio station that broadcasts the Packers game and listen to the audio stream of the game.
- Log on to www.nfl.com and watch the web-based, flash animated play-by-play on my computer.
- This last one may be my secret weapon. Purchase a Slingbox player and connect it to a television of a friend or family member in Wisconsin. I'll spare everyone the technical setup and description of a Slingbox player. Believe me, if this works, I'll blog about it!
If you have any other suggestions, please, please leave a comment and let me know. Favre or no Favre, the Packers are still my favorite team!
5 comments for this blog post so far...
August 05, 2008 at 12:30 pm
Michelle Hartz
I feel your pain. I live in Bloomington, and the only channel I can get in with my antenna is PBS.
My solution has been to have the nfl.com play by play up on the computer and the game on the radio (at least I’m a Colts fan and can listen to it on a local radio station). I think the NFL site will tell you what radio stations are broadcasting the game as well.
Perhaps I’ll see you at a sports bar sometime this upcoming season…
August 05, 2008 at 1:02 pm
Patric Welch
@Michelle I checked NFL.com and they make you pay to listen to the radio feed. I wonder if this means that local radio stations are not allowed to stream their local NFL content.
August 12, 2008 at 8:40 am
Erik Deckers
You can also get Sirius radio, which broadcasts all NFL games, with feeds from both home teams (i.e. listen to the Packers feed OR the Vikings feed on opening day).
Your local affilliate, Fox/WXIN, will only play Bears games, since we’re so close to Chicago. So no Pack there.
August 12, 2008 at 12:21 pm
Patric Welch
@Erik NFL.com also has a Field Pass for $30 that lets you listen to the radio feed as well. I was just about to buy it last night when I (after multiple attempts at others) finally found a radio station web site that allowed me to listen to their live feed of the Packers radio network. I’m not sure if I got to listen because it was a pre-season game or just because of good fortune. Guess I won’t know the answer to that until September.
August 12, 2008 at 1:22 pm
Erik Deckers
I know some radio stations will block out the NFL feeds during the regular season. I used to listen to some Cincinnati Bengals games, and found a few stations that did not broadcast.
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