Chris Graham: ACC Network has one less subscriber

The ACC Network and me are now a thing of the past. I’ve finally cut the cord, following another frustrating night trying to tune in and not being able to.

Last night, trying to watch UVA-VCU baseball – don’t @ me; yes, I know, there are literally millions of better things to waste your time doing than watching mid-week college baseball – I hit an odd technology wall.

OK, see, I am a Comcast Xfinity subscriber, because I like the million channels, though unfortunately, a couple years into its history, ACC Network isn’t among them.

Which is why I also was (notice there: “was”) paying $64.99 a month for YouTubeTV, because YouTubeTV has the ACC Network among its offerings.

I also have an ESPN+ subscription, not for me to be able to use, but for my wife, who uses ESPN+ to tune in to hear me broadcasting VMI baseball and soccer for the 25-30 times a year that I get a live mic to do that.

Poor girl.

Had to sit through seven hours of me doing a doubleheader a couple of weeks ago.

And last night, she’s having to bear me wanting to be entertained by more random college baseball, when we could be catching up on “The Crown.”

I digress.

This is the setup for my issues last night.

The UVA-VCU baseball game was on ACCNX, the ACC Network’s version of ESPN+.

How to log on to be able to watch was the first, and ultimately insurmountable, challenge.

My initial effort was to try the ESPN app on my phone, which got me nowhere.

Because of the ESPN+ subscription, the app kept telling me that my TV provider doesn’t carry ACC Network, and that if I’d like to rectify that situation, I needed to pester said TV provider, because my TV provider is a bunch of doodyheads, or something to that effect.

OK, gotcha. Next logical step seemed to be to try to go to my ESPN app settings to change TV providers, since I do have a TV provider that carries ACC Network, and I pay them $64.99 a month to be able to watch that one channel.

Every time I tried this, and I tried for a lot longer than the average person would, by an order of magnitude, I got back to square zero.

The ESPN app wouldn’t give me an option to change TV providers.

Ugh.

So next, I went to my TV’s Amazon FireStick, to try that ESPN app.

Same troubleshooting, to the same effect.

I was able, later, to get a preview of the game on my phone’s ESPN app when I logged out of my home wireless network, but it ran out after 10 minutes, with another message about contacting my TV provider to get them to stop being doodyheads.

They’re all doodyheads, if you ask me.

I’ve canceled YouTubeTV, which means, no more ACC Network for me.

Seriously, if I can’t watch a bad mid-week college baseball game on a whim, what’s the point of having this ACC Network thing the rest of the spring and into the summer?

Thanks, but I’ve had enough “Packer and Durham” and docs about Coach K and Notre Dame to last me to the next pandemic.

My wife, suffering through this with me last night, offered a most astute observation on what we were experiencing.

If two rather tech-savvy people are having these issues and giving up, how many other people who aren’t willing to pay extra for a second TV subscription and have to navigate a maze of mobile apps and Firesticks and Roku are ESPN  and the ACC losing out on?

The answer, in my case: one more.

I’m done, and honestly, even when we get back to football season, I’m not sure it’s worth it.

Basically, if ESPN and the ACC can’t figure out how to get me the network, I don’t need their network.

Story by Chris Graham