The New York Yankees’ sudden-death playoff against the Minnesota Twins is in danger of being blacked out for 3.1 million metro-area households.
Disney, whose ESPN channel will broadcast the game, has granted Optimum owner Altice USA an extra day to break deadlocked negotiations over retransmission fees and sports-programming costs before it pulls programming from the cable operator.
But moving the deadline to 5 p.m. on Sunday from midnight Saturday — in deference to Yom Kippur — doesn’t guarantee that Altice subscribers will be able to watch the Yankees’ do-or-die contest next Tuesday, on Oct. 3.
Some sources describe the talks as fluid, but others say neither side has budged from its original position on how much Altice should pay to carry ABC, the Disney Channel and ESPN.