Tribe News and Notes: September 2, 2012

The DiaTribe: A Lazy Sunday with Money in the Air

Paul talks this Sunday about the growth of local TV deals:

Well, in an attempt to answer my own months-old question, you can easily find out that YES has 14 million subscribers, with each subscriber paying $2 of their monthly cable bill directly to YES, which equates to $28M per month of guaranteed income for YES, or about $336M a year. Obviously, that doesn’t take into consideration ad revenue or any costs associated with broadcasting the games or any other content, but for as much hand-wringing as there was about the Angels getting $150M per year and the Rangers’ deal worth $80M just prior to that, it’s not hard to see that there’s is a shockingly growing disparity happening here, particularly as other large-market teams turn their population "advantages" into outrageous revenue streams that other teams can’t sniff, only based upon the number of TV sets in a particular city or region.

When we say large-market or small-market teams, this is essentially what we're referring to. Local TV deals are based on the number in the people in a market, and the more potential eyes there are, the more the networks are willing to pay to broadcast a team's games. While the Yankees are going to make more in ticket sales (both because of fan interest and relative wealth), the big disparity comes in the TV deals. All things being equal, the Cleveland market is going to bring in a fraction of the viewers that a New York or Dallas or Los Angeles market will bring, even if there's a lower percentage of viewers that are baseball fans. And with live TV seemingly as hot as anything in cable/satellite world, we're seeing large-market clubs getting contracts that are orders of magnitude more than their last deal.

Russ Canzler finally makes it to Progressive Field: Cleveland Indians Insider | cleveland.com

Here's how the three callups will be used.

Canzler:

Manager Manny Acta, said Canzler, had one message for him: "Get ready to have a lot of at-bats." Acta said Canzler will get most of those at-bats at first base and DH.

Neal:

Acta said Neal will play left and right field, especially against left-handers, because their three main outfielders, Michael Brantley, Shin-Soo Choo and Ezequiel Carrera, bat left-handed.

So with Derek Holland, a left-hander, starting for Texas today, Neal be in the lineup.

Barnes:

Acta said Neal will play left and right field, especially against left-handers, because their three main outfielders, Michael Brantley, Shin-Soo Choo and Ezequiel Carrera, bat left-handed.

Chisenhall set to start rehabbing arm in Minors | indians.com: News

Chisenhall will play with Columbus today and tomorrow, and then will join Akron for the playoffs after that. So it looks like he'll get at least a couple weeks' worth of at-bats before the season is over with.