New York Times

Supreme Court Declines Tennis Channel Appeal

February 24, 2014, 9:05 pm

By EDWARD WYATT

The Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear an appeal from the Tennis Channel in its dispute with Comcast over placement on the company’s cable channel lineup.

But the issue could be headed for a rematch of sorts. Comcast is trying to merge with Time Warner Cable, and one of the issues that federal antitrust will be examining is whether a bigger Comcast would be so dominant that it could wield undue influence over programmers.

The decision by the Supreme Court came without comment, as is common. The hearing was requested after a federal appeals court ruled in May that the Federal Communications Commission had erred when it ordered Comcast to include the Tennis Channel in its basic cable lineup.

That is the tier where it offers sports channels that it owns, namely the Golf Channel and NBC Sports network.

Instead, the Tennis Channel was placed by Comcast among the premium sports tier of cable channels, to which only a few million of Comcast’s roughly 22 million customers subscribe. The Tennis Channel said that was unfair discrimination because Comcast was favoring its own channels over those of competitors, a violation of F.C.C. regulations.

Both an administrative law judge and the F.C.C. agreed and in 2012 ordered Comcast to end the discrimination. Comcast appealed the F.C.C.’s ruling to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, which ruled unanimously in Comcast’s favor.

The court said that the Tennis Channel failed to show that Comcast received any benefit from its action.

“We are pleased that the finding by the lower court that Comcast did not discriminate against Tennis Channel will stand,” said Sena Fitzmaurice, a Comcast spokeswoman. “We continue to make Tennis Channel available to tennis fans across the country in terms with our longstanding contract.”

In a statement, the Tennis Channel said it was disappointed but not necessarily surprised. “There remain a number of available options for tennis Channel in the case, and we are considering our next steps in light of these options,” the company said.