Actually, 9 million pieces of silver per season until 2010. Because what Notre Dame (and its $3.1 billion endowment) needs is more money. That has to be why it extended its contract with NBC today, because there's really no other reason.
I'm not exaggerating when I say (as I have before) that I hate the NBC contract with the white-hot intensity of a thousand suns. Having attended games for three years, I will tell you that standing (yes, standing) for 4+ hours in the cold, when the game should only take about 3 1/2 hours but for NBC's proclivity to show 400 promos for Good Morning, Miami, doesn't exactly inspire cheers. Hell, it makes you not even want to go to the games in the first place. It makes you sell your ticket to a fan of the visiting team who has probably never been to a game so s/he doesn't know how much it sucks. So you end up with half a stadium full of the other team's fans. Not so good for the Irish.
The second problem is that NBC dictates that all games kick off at 2:30 p.m. Ergo, no night games. A night game, especially against a rival like Michigan or BC, would be so much to Notre Dame's advantage: imagine 70,000 Irish fans (assuming 10,000 visiting fans) who have been tailgating all day. The House that Rockne built would be quaking.
Finally, NBC's announcers (Pat Hayden and Tom Hammond) are absolutely abominable. It's like they're watching the game of football for the very first time every single week. They don't know any of the players, elementary concepts like counter-trey running plays and play-action passing (they're constantly fooled) elude their grasp, and they ignore the action on the field when they give some lame human interest angle on the players. It's a nightmare.
But I'm glad that ND's making money. Really.
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