Sports Business Daily’s John Lombardo and John Ourand have an exclusive that Fox Sports 1 won’t even get to take a swing at landing a portion of the next NBA TV deal.

The NBA and its network partners expect to reach an agreement in principle on new long-term media deals by the start of the regular season, according to sources on all sides of the discussions.

Talks have progressed so rapidly that details are emerging on a massive agreement that would see the league’s annual rights fee more than double, with ESPN and Turner combining to pay more than $2 billion per year on average. One source said ESPN already has committed to pay “well over” $1 billion per year, and Turner is not far behind for a media rights extension that would kick in with the 2016-17 season.

As part of the current eight-year deals that end in June 2016, ESPN pays $485 million per year and Turner pays $445 million per year on average, bringing the league’s total take at just less than $1 billion per year.

But that figure would be dwarfed in a new deal that several sources pegged as an eight-year pact, though one source with knowledge of the talks said it ultimately could end up running nine years.

A final deal might not be signed or announced before the new season, but talks with ESPN and Turner are advanced enough that sources said there is little chance the NBA will carve out a third package for another network, like Fox Sports or NBC Sports. ESPN, in particular, has been adamant during negotiations that the NBA not develop a new package to sell to a competitive sports network, sources said.

The deal is huge for ESPN and especially Turner, which has its sports identity linked to the NBA. And it is a big blow for Fox Sports 1. The new network needed the cache of the NBA to enable it to reach another level.

And let’s not forget the owners and players. It’s a very good day for them.

My latest column for the Chicago Tribune looks at what’s new on the TV front for the NFL this year.

You also can access the column via my Twitter feed at @Sherman_Report.

From the column:

*******

The new NFL season also means some new faces and lineup changes on the TV front. Here is a scouting report:

Transition: Even after Tony Gonzalez played his final game for the Atlanta Falcons and signed on as the new analyst for CBS’ “NFL Today,” he still had some teams calling him to see if he would come back for an 18^th season.

Gonzalez declined. He insists his football interaction now will be talking about the game, not playing. He is done trying to chase the elusive ring.

“I don’t even want to play anymore,” Gonzalez said. “I’ve had my fill…My body feels good. I’m going to like being warm and cozy in the studio.”

The future Hall of Fame tight end was the biggest name on the free agent TV market this year. CBS moved quickly, hoping his popularity as a player will transition over to its revamped pregame show.

Out are Dan Marino and Shannon Sharpe. Besides Gonzalez, former New York Jets’ linebacker Bart Scott also joins a cast that includes holdovers Boomer Esiason, Bill Cowher and James Brown.

Many former players struggle with the critical element when they move from the field to the studio. They are reticent to knock players who they recently played with or against.

Gonzalez said that won’t be a problem for him. He can’t wait to let loose.

“Honestly, (being able to criticize) probably will be the best thing about this,” Gonzalez said. “I get a chance to be honest. As a player, you’re not always honest, nor should you be. When you get a microphone in your face asking about the team, you always played the game. You don’t want to put out bulletin board material. I’m looking forward to going out there and giving my true opinion now.”

I can remember time in the 80s when I used to arrange my schedule so I could watch Saturday of the U.S. Open. So many great players: McEnroe, Borg, Connors, Navratilova, Evert, Becker…

The day featured the men’s semis and the women’s finals, called by the great Pat Summerall and Tony Trabert. Must see TV.

Last year, CBS did a tribute to Summerall’s work at the U.S. Open.

Obviously, time marches on, and an era in sports TV will end this week. Richard Sandomir of the New York Times has a nice piece on CBS’ final U.S. Open.

When the United States Tennis Championships became the U.S. Open in 1968, CBS Sports televised the tournament from the Forest Hills section of Queens, with Bud Collins and Jack Kramer calling matches that featured Arthur Ashe’s milestone victory in the men’s final.

That was the start of a long tradition at CBS. No other broadcaster has shown the Open, the same distinction that holds for CBS and the Masters golf tournament, partners since 1956. But while the CBS-Masters relationship looks as if it will go on as long as golf exists, the CBS-United States Open connection will end after the men’s final is played Monday afternoon.

Next year, the network will compete against the tennis tournament with football, a virtual guarantee of substantially higher ratings. On the two Saturdays of the Open, the network will probably add a Southeastern Conference game, and on the final Sunday, it will do its best to carry a second N.F.L. game to create a doubleheader.

 ESPN will take over coverage of the Open, merging what CBS carried with what the network has been carrying since 2009. For all that, ESPN is paying $825 million over 11 years, perhaps half of it tied to snapping up the men’s and women’s semifinals and finals.

“ESPN will do a terrific job producing it,” said Sean McManus, the chairman of CBS Sports, “and maybe someday in the future, it will come back to CBS.”

Did all it take was for Cubs fans to get whiff of the future in Jorge Soler, Javier Baez and Kyle Hendricks to get them to watch their games again?

With the three young players leading the way, the Cubs’ 6-3 victory over Milwaukee did a 3.20 rating on Comcast SportsNet Wednesday. That means an estimated 115,000 homes tuned into an otherwise meaningless September game for the Cubs.

The rating was the second highest of the year on CSN for a Cubs game, trailing only the Cubs-White Sox game on May 5, which did a 3.37. The 3.20 rating also was more than double the 1.5 season average for the Cubs on CSN.

The game peaked at a 4.1 rating (143,000). Overall, thanks to the Cubs, CSN was the third highest-rated network in the Chicago market during primetime (7-10 p.m.).

The rating bodes well for the Cubs, who still are in negotiations for the WGN-9 component of their TV deal. It shows that their ratings will soar if they become competitive again.

Pam Oliver wrote a first-person account of her job change/demotion at Fox Sports for Essence magazine. She didn’t hold back and this passage likely will make some headlines.

Once the changes were announced, people started talking. Some asked, “Do you think it had something to do with your race?” No. I definitely do not. Others asked, “Does it have something to do with your age?” Well, maybe. The business is very demographic-oriented. As one executive said to me, Fox Sports will look radically different in the coming years. I assume that means they want to look younger. It’s not difficult to notice that the new on-air people there are all young, blond and “hot.” That’s not to say that Erin isn’t capable. I think she’s very capable. She’s also popular on Twitter and social media, so I can see how that would also make her highly sought after. Still, covering the NFL is a big deal. Stations like ABC and NBC entrust their programming to veterans. So when people talk about all networks making a turn to a particular type of girl on the sidelines, it doesn’t hold water.

Earlier Oliver, 53, wrote of Andrews and seeing the writing on the wall:

Even before my bosses told me what was going on, there had been rumblings that my days as a sideline reporter were coming to an end. Two years earlier, Fox Sports had hired Erin Andrews, a high-profile side-line reporter from ESPN, and I knew they hadn’t brought her on just to be a benchwarmer. Colleagues, and even coaches and players, would come up to me and say things like, “Boy, you’re handling this well. You’re really a class act.” But I let the rumors roll off my back. Without official confirmation about a change in my position, I decided I was going to do my work like I always had. Still, I was humiliated.

Oliver concluded by taking the high road:

At times I’m ashamed of how tragic I was making things out to be. It’s just a job change. I’m not out on the streets. I’m not unemployed. Everybody wins: Fox gets its coveted reporter in the lead role and I get to do my sideline job for my twentieth and final year. I’m also looking forward to developing stories that interest me and delivering long-form pieces for FS1. That kind of work is like being in reporter heaven.

It is what it is. Male sports announcers go on forever in this business.

It appears to be a different story for women. There is a shelf life for them. Once it expires, someone new is brought in.

I would expect it will happen to Erin Andrews too.

With Green Bay kicking off the new season in Seattle tonight, it seems appropriate to pull out a Ray Nitschke card from the collection.

If ever there was a last name to match a football player, it was Nitschke. Mean, tenacious, and the soul of Lombardi’s great defenses. Also, an Illinois alum. So he has that going for him.

This quote from Nitschke defined his career:

“It was the character of the Packers, man. We played for sixty minutes. We let it all hang out. There was no tomorrow for us. We got the adrenaline flowing, and we just let it go, man.”

Mike Tirico always is extremely thoughtful in everything he does during a telecast. That goes 10-fold for the Washington nickname controversy.

Yesterday during an ESPN teleconference, he spoke candidly about his views on the Washington nickname issue:

*******

We broadcast a Washington preseason game and then ESPN released a network policy I think it was five days after that game.  So what I followed from that broadcast was my approach, which I had vetted in a conversation with my bosses on site, Jay and Jed Drake, our senior managing person on MNF with us there on site.

There are a bunch of issues here.  I just saw surveys today on SportsCenter, what fans think, what players think.  That doesn’t really matter to me.  I think the most significant issue is what do Native Americans think of the name?  Those people who in my opinion can only truly gauge the impact of (what) using the term really is.  I’ve connected with Syracuse in my college days and early workdays. The Oneida Nation which has been very vocal on this issue and is just a few miles from the campus of Syracuse.  I’ve been aware of the sensitivity of Native Americans and things that are perceived by many Native American communities as slurs for a couple decades now.

In general to me, broadcasting a game is a bit different than working in studio.  When you’re in the studio you’re talking about a team for a pretty limited length of time.  Calling a game for three and a half hours, you might make hundreds of references to it by first name of the city or by nickname.  Also I think to factor in here too all the networks, you broadcast a home game from D.C., from Landover, technically, the word Redskins is painted in the end zone, really the logo with the head dress is in the middle of the field, so by not saying it are you lessening the impact of the nickname?  It’s there in front of you.  I don’t think we’re going to in a computer graphic way blur that out.

There are also contractual issues here with the league.  We have an obligation to use the names and the marks of the teams.  The league sells us the right to do the games and we sign up as part of that as well.  Here’s the bottom line for me.  I have my own personal feelings on the name.  I think it’s time for Dan Snyder and the league together truly take a long look at making a change.

But if I’m there to document the game, and that’s what I’m paid to do and charged with, the body of the game broadcast to me is not the forum or the place to pass judgment on this issue while dancing around 2nd and 5 at the 35 yard line.  I think that’s a little unfair.  So I’m going to do what I did in the preseason game.  The appropriate approach to me is minimize the use of the nickname but not completely avoid it.  I think that’s the approach I’m going to take.  We have Washington twice in early October and late October, and I’m sure this thing will play out in very formal ways over this year and years to come.

Update:

Looks like somebody at FIU came to their senses.

From Michelle Kaufman of the Miami Herald:

After denying access to Miami Herald beat writer David J. Neal for the football team’s opening game last Saturday, Florida International University has decided to credential him for the remainder of the season, according to Paul Dodson, the school’s assistant athletic director for media relations.

“The FIU sports program is an important part of our coverage,“ said Miami Herald Executive Editor Aminda Marqués Gonzalez. “We’re glad we were able to reach a quick resolution.”

******

I wanted to play catch up on this.

If you follow sports media, you probably heard that the Miami Herald declined to staff Florida International’s football game Saturday after the school declined David Neal, the paper’s beat writer, a seat in the press box.

Talk about insane. The school should send out limos to pick up reporters.

The details are here in this story in the Herald:

No explanation was given by FIU, but Neal’s access to FIU coaches and athletes had been dwindling for months, to the point where he was no longer permitted to attend football practice or conduct interviews. Last week, when Neal attempted to write a story on the FIU women’s soccer team, he was told no one was allowed to talk to him.

“It’s unprecedented for any local team to refuse to credential our beat reporter without reason,” Miami Herald Executive Editor Aminda Marqués Gonzalez said of the four pro and two college teams the Herald covers on a regular basis. “The team does not get to choose who covers the program.”

FIU’s response in part:

We did not issue a media credential to the Herald’s beat reporter because of concerns we have brought up to the Herald’s reporter and editors over the past few years about the reporter’s interactions with our student athletes, coaches, and staff and the nature of the resulting coverage. He is not banned from FIU or FIU Stadium. He just does not have additional access beyond that of the public.

However, it doesn’t say whether Neal would be allowed to buy concessions or use the bathrooms.

The paper responded by using a wire service story off of Saturday’s game.

Butch Ward, writing for Poynter.org, thought the newspaper made the wrong decision:

This is just one fight in the escalating offensive against allowing journalists to cover news.

And forgive me if I don’t sense we’re winning.

The Obama administration has limited access by photojournalists and other reporters to White House events and to the President. Local governments and police refuse to speak with reporters whose work they dislike. Candidates restrict reporters to “press areas,” ensuring that conversations with the public are not overheard. Professional and collegiate sports teams have steadily made it more difficult to cover live events.

Many of those who control access have decided that thanks to technology, they need news organizations less and less to deliver their messages. So as they steadily build their capacity and expertise for communicating directly to the public, they grow bolder about telling journalists to take a walk.

Later Ward writes:

We work for the public. And that’s why, when one of those entities tries to manage our coverage by denying us access, we need to ask:

What does the public want us to do?

In my experience, the public is a harsh employer. Aware of an increasing number of options for getting information, the public is likely to say:

Just get the story.

In theory, Ward is right. However, we’re not talking about the White House. We’re talking about a sports program that barely is on the radar in Miami, let alone anywhere else.

In this case, they need the coverage more than the paper needs to cover them. The newspaper can’t allow itself to be bullied. From what I’ve read, Neal was just doing his job. If it made FIU uncomfortable, then he must have been doing a very good job.

The Herald shouldn’t cave here. Neal, and only Neal, should cover the next FIU game for the paper.