Chargers avoid blackout – Game to be televised locally

Photo from 'susa' via Picasa

Good news to all you Charger fans!  The Chargers have officially announced that this Sunday’s game against the Baltimore Ravens will be televised locally. The game had been in danger on being blacked out in the San Diego area due to roughly 1,000 tickets not being sold.

Local KFMB Channel 8/CBS and KCBS in Los Angeles will carry the game.  Dick Enberg and Dan Fouts will commentators. The game is at Qualcomm Stadium on Sunday at 1:15 pm. Some tickets are still available, so check out the Chargers website or ticketmaster to get yours.

The Chargers had been working all week to sell the remaining tickets, and did not sound optimistic about doing so earlier in the week. As recently as Tuesday, there were 2,500 tickets remaining. They did, however, request a 24 hour deadline extension from the NFL on Thursday, at which point they had 1,100 remaining. This enabled them to sell as many tickets as possible before Friday’s 1:15 pm deadline.

During the preseason, both of the Chargers home games had been blacked out and the Chargers have indicated that many of their regular season home games could be blacked out.

Blackouts could be an ongoing issue for the Chargers as well as other NFL teams this season, with ticket sales in some cities down considerably, likely the result of the country’s economic downturn.

Though there have been calls for the NFL to soften its stance this year on blackouts due to the circumstances, the league has steadfastly stuck to its longtime policy of not televising the game within a 75-mile radius of the game location if not enough tickets are sold.

Any future home game could be in jeopardy of getting blacked out, so buy your tickets if you want to help fellow Charger fans who cannot make it to the game. There are approximately 4,000 tickets still available to the Chargers -Dolphins game on Sept. 27.

The rest of the season’s line-up is as follows:

Sunday, 9/27 vs Miami Dolphins
Sunday, 10/4 at Pittsburgh Steelers
Monday, 10/9 vs Denver Broncos
Sunday, 10/25 at Kansas City Chiefs
Sunday, 11/01 vs Oakland Raiders
Sunday, 11/08 at New York Giants
Sunday, 11/15 vs Philadelphia Eagles
Sunday, 11/22 at Denver Broncos
Sunday, 11/29 vs Kansas City Chiefs
Sunday, 12/6 at Cleveland Browns
Sunday, 12/13 at Dallas Cowboys
Sunday, 12/20 vs Cincinnati Bengals
Friday, 12/25 at Tennessee Titans
Sunday, 1/3 vs Washington Redskins