Pritzker made the statement on MSNBC\u2019s \u201cThe Briefing with Jen Psaki,\u201d and his press office later released a statement adding Nexstar and Sinclair to the list.<\/p>\n
\u201cAn attack on the First Amendment of this magnitude is a five-alarm fire and we should all be treating it as such,\u201d the statement read. \u201cWhat\u2019s clear here is that Nexstar and Sinclair are capitulating to the president so he approves their mergers. Everything should be on the table.\u201d<\/p>\n
Free speech is certainly something to fight for, and Pritzker is right about the urgency of preserving our constitutional rights to say whatever we please without fear of reprisal. Speak up, speak out and protest, for sure. Cancel the Disney+ and Hulu streaming apps, forget about going on that Disney cruise or making a trip to Disney World or Disneyland.<\/p>\n
But I can\u2019t imagine viewers would stop watching their favorite teams and sports over Kimmel\u2019s plight, so perhaps we need to come up with another solution.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s easy for Pritzker to ask citizens to boycott Disney-owned ABC\/ESPN over the Kimmel controversy, and his concern over FCC interference on behalf of President Trump\u2019s fragile ego is justified.<\/p>\n
![\"Gov.](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/CTC-L-Chicago-Cubs-All-Star-Game-20_231945182.jpg\")
Gov. J.B. Pritzker speaks during a ceremony announcing Wrigley Field will host the 2027 All-Star Game on Aug. 1, 2025. (Eileen T. Meslar\/Chicago Tribune)<\/p>\n
Boycott \u201cDancing with the Stars?\u201d No problem. Give up \u201cGood Morning, America,\u201d which has turned into an infomercial for Hulu, Disney and ESPN shows? Easy enough.<\/p>\n
But boycott the Alabama-Georgia game Sept. 27 or the rematch of the Bears-Commanders \u201cHail Mary\u201d game<\/a> in October?<\/p>\n Will football fans tune out big games to support free speech?<\/p>\n As a longtime viewer of ABC and ESPN who loves and hates Disney\u2019s networks, I\u2019d have a difficult time saying goodbye to all the sports telecasts I enjoy watching.<\/p>\n Maybe Pritzker, who attended Duke and Northwestern, is not a college football fan. Who knows?<\/p>\n But we do know Pritzker is a Cubs fan. He mentioned it a few times during his Aug. 1 speech at Wrigley Field when the Cubs made their 2027 All-Star Game announcement.<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m grateful to the Cubs organization and to the Ricketts family, who have made spectacular upgrades to the ballpark and the neighborhood while preserving all that makes it special,\u201d he said. \u201cAs governor I\u2019m very proud to have worked with the general assembly to provide security enhancements, to bolster public safety around the park, and I\u2019m also a proud Cubs fan, so that made it especially easy.\u201d<\/p>\n After waiting for applause, Pritzker added: \u201cAnd I guess here is where I am supposed to say \u2018And I love the teams that people in Illinois across the state love.\u2019 But I\u2019m a Cubs fan.\u201d<\/p>\n While Pritzker didn\u2019t specifically mention the Cubs this week in his call for action, he assuredly knows Sinclair is the corporate co-owner of Marquee Sports, along with the Cubs.<\/p>\n John J. Kim \/ Chicago Tribune<\/p>\n Cubs Chairman Tom Ricketts talks about the Marquee Sports Network during the opening ceremony of the Cubs Convention on Jan. 18, 2020, at the Sheraton Grand in Chicago. (John J. Kim\/Chicago Tribune)<\/p>\n Sinclair owns the Diamond Sports Group, which owns 50% of Marquee. The Rickettses own the other half.<\/p>\n Marquee launched in 2020<\/a> at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic and televises every Cubs game that\u2019s not part of a national broadcast. Some years there\u2019s been little reason to watch, but this year was the exception, with the Cubs earning a National League wild-card spot, led by young stars such as Pete Crow-Armstrong and Cade Horton.<\/p>\n Cubs fans pay a significant monthly fee to watch them on a DTC app or a streamer or cable provider such as Comcast, which charges $20.25 per month for regional sports. Comcast announced in July that it would move Marquee into the \u201cultimate tier\u201d<\/a> of pricing after this season, meaning it will be an extra $20 per month starting in October.<\/p>\n Editorial: That was a lousy bit, Jimmy Kimmel. But there\u2019s no role here for government intervention.<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n No matter where they stand on Kimmel or the \u201cfree speech\u201d issue, many Cubs fans will be canceling Marquee anyway once the regular season ends Sept. 28. The network won\u2019t broadcast any of the team\u2019s postseason games, so there\u2019s no need to have it. They\u2019ll save a few hundred dollars by canceling it for five or six months and starting up again when the 2026 season begins in March. It\u2019s no different than NFL fans canceling Amazon Prime in January and renewing it in September when the next season of \u201cThursday Night Football\u201d begins.<\/p>\n Canceling Marquee means they\u2019ll miss Cubs reruns, betting shows, Bears postgame shows, Ian Happ\u2019s podcast and some other sports broadcasts. But Marquee is primarily a seasonal network that depends on Cubs games for viewers. The rest is just filler.<\/p>\n While Sinclair wants to punish Kimmel for jokes it found objectionable and even demanded an apology from him, it should be noted that Marquee knows a little about censorship.<\/a> In its third season in 2022, Marquee stopped the taping of a sports talk show called \u201cThe Reporters\u201d when one of the panelists was slightly critical of Cubs President Jed Hoyer.<\/p>\n In a discussion on the Cubs, WSCR-AM 670 morning host David Haugh said Hoyer \u201clacked\u201d transparency and asked if he was \u201ctethered to reality.\u201d ESPN-1000 personality Peggy Kusinski agreed with Haugh and called for more \u201chonesty\u201d from the Cubs brass. The show\u2019s producer abruptly stopped the taping, claiming they had some kind of technical difficulty.<\/p>\n Before they began taping again, the panelists were told not to revisit the \u201ctransparency\u201d angle. The original conversation criticizing Hoyer was cut from the show, which aired later.<\/p>\n Obviously a Cubs-owned network censoring criticism of a Cubs executive was problematic, even if Hoyer was not at all involved in the decision. But no one would\u2019ve known about the censorship if the story had not been leaked to the Tribune. After the Tribune reported the story, Marquee announced it would televise the show live to avoid a repeat. \u201cThe Reporters\u201d eventually was canceled because of lack of interest from viewers.<\/p>\n![\"Cubs](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/VWUIDEBR7NHKRJILHNRZTCWFDQ.jpg\")
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