Entercom Radio, parent of WEEI has decided to no longer stream its radio stations over the internet, including WEEI starting tomorrow. This message is on the WEEI web site:

“We regret that as of tommorow we will no longer be streaming our radio station on line. Due to many factors we’ve had to make the difficult decision that this is no longer a service we can provide. You may or may not be aware of the many legal issues surrounding the streaming of music online. To keep it succinct – there are many and they are complex. As we all move into this new digital age we have to collectively figure out the new rules so that artists, record labels and the industry that supports them, Radio, can all win. That solution has not been found yet. It’s likely in the coming months you will hear more of this issue as it appears on the agenda in our nation’s capital. If you wish to learn more, we suggest this web site as a good place to start — http://saveinternetradio.org ”

Glen Ordway talked about this a little this afternoon and said strongly that this is not the choice of WEEI, its staff, and talent. It is solely a decision made by Entercom. You can voice displeasure with this by sending E-mail either to the WEEI shows individually, and they will forward them to management or you can also send it to publicrelations@entercom.com

The issue is about royalites being paid to artists, so it mostly applies to stations that play copyrighted music all day. As a talk station, WEEI has none of these issues, yet Entercom is making the blanket decision to just shut off all its stations from streaming on the internet. Last year USA Today had an article on this battle over rights on Internet radio. At the time the article was written the big deal was about commercials. Stations got around that by taking out the commercials played during the breaks and inserting other material. (If you’ve listened to WEEI on-line at all in the last month you likely wince at the words “fun run”) Now it’s about other copyrighted material. Ordway thinks they can talk some sense to the Entercom bigwigs, so keep the e-mails coming to them. This is likely just the start of many battles by the entertainment business against the digital encoding of almost any media property.

Don’t know if it is just this connection, but the WEEI internet feed has been in and out all day, and inaccessable from here for most of the time. Eddie Andelman had Tony Maz, and he got a guy to propose to his girlfriend of a year and half in exchange for luxury box tickets to the Celtics game six tomorrow night. I don’t quite understand the optimism by the media members locally regarding the Celtics, Eddie and Tony both think the Celtics will game six, Dale Arnold said “I think they win game six….Home court is a big deal”. What reasons are there for optimism? What signs are out there that anything is going to change? The Nets have *dominated* the Celtics, who have been unable to prevent quick starts or make any game to game adjustments. None of these people are giving any reasons for their optimism, in fact, the lack of strategy talk on the air is pretty mystifying.

Peter Gammons came on for his weekly visit on the big show, and much of the conversation centered around Shea Hillenbrand and Alfonso Soriano — how impressive each of them is. How much improvement they both have made in their second season. A lot of gushing. He also mentioned that Dustin Hermanson could miss the entire season with his “groin pull”.

A late start today because there isn’t a whole lot the media can say for the performance of the Celtics last night. Is there a more grating color analyst than PJ Carlesimo? Wow. If ESPN/ABC offers him a job next season with their NBA telecasts, you can be sure he won’t be on the # two team, as he is now. A surprising lack of anger on the part of the Celtics is disturbing. All interviews and pieces in the paper just show a team resigned to it’s fate, a team still in shock and denial over how this has played out. Remember two weeks ago when the talk on all the sports shows was whether the Celtics were going to be able to give the Lakers any trouble in the finals? Now it looks like neither team might get to the championship round. Stern and company surely don’t mind which team comes out of the east for their NBC finals ratings, Boston, you got the tradition of the Celtics, if it’s the Nets, you got the huge New York Media market. They must be praying for the Lakers to come back and beat the Kings in the next two.

Geroge Kimball builds on the theme started by Gerry Callahan and mentioned here yesterday. He adds this point: “Any parent who keeps a 3-year-old up after midnight in order to use him as a press conference prop(which Kidd, as is his wont, did again last night) ought to be charged with child abuse.” Kimball concludes: “Kidd’s position is that he can take it whatever the Boston fans dish out, but that Joumana and T.J. shouldn’t be forced to witness the harassment.This from the man who punched his wife in front of the son he now wants to shield from people who might remind him of it. Just because TNT and NBC (and, apparently, the Post and the Daily News) appear to have forgotten what Kidd did doesn’t mean the rest of us should.”

Well said, George.

WEEI talk this morning is not much Celtics, but more Kidd talk and steroid talk. They did announce that Dale Arnold has signed a new deal to remain at WEEI with his midday show as well as continue to host the “NFL Sunday” show.

With the Red Sox also on an off day, NESN has the Paw Sox taking on the Yankees AAA club, the Columbus Clippers at 7:00. Hardly anything on the Primetime National TV sports schedule tonight. TBS has the Braves and Expos at 7:30. Troy O’Leary fans can try to get a glimpse of the former Red Sox outfielder on the Expos. ESPN is also replaying the disturbing “Outside the lines” feature about coaches and sexual abuse at 9:00.

Shaughnessy was among the panel on FSNE’s New England Sports Tonight. He said he was “stunned” that this Jose Offerman flap has been made such a big deal of. He said it’s like the Ben Affleck thing, it’s taken on a life of it’s own. He said he was calling him a piece of junk as a player, not a person. YET, he said if he had explained himself, he wouldn’t have used the terminology “piece of junk”. He then got pretty mad when Greg Dickerson asked him to explain himself. Shaughnessy snapped that it wasn’t about the fact that Offerman wouldn’t explain himself. He didn’t really make himself clear. He repeated again that if Offerman had explained himself, he would not have used the wording “piece of junk” to apply to him. It made it look pretty clear that it was in fact personal and just mean spirited on Shaughnessy’s part that led him to use the phrases he did.

Marty Tirrell was also on the show and said he “absolutely guaranteed that (Mark) McGwire was juiced” The others jumped on it immediately, Dickerson saying that this isn’t 1510 where you can just throw these things out there and no one hears them. A bold statement from Tirrell, who tried to water down the statement by saying he was including McGwire’s admitted Andro use, which is a derivative of steroids.

So here’s the Affleck/Merloni summary: Affleck called from an airplane and said it meant alot to him to clear this up. Merloni was calling from Skydome. Affleck: “Lou, I completely apologize…I was a knucklehead…shooting my mouth off…just was talking out of envy” Lou answered: “I appreciate it…I’m glad we got this cleared up.” Affleck then offered to do something to make it up, to do something for charity for him, said he was going to send him a copy of all his movies but then he read in the paper that Lou hates them all. (reference to Merloni’s quote in the paper) He didn’t imagine that anyone would even listen to what he had to say. He said he should’ve been smarter about it. McDonough said he didn’t stop him because he’s known him long enough to know that he was kidding about it all. Lou said he felt like he’d give a little jab back by putting down Ben’s movies. Lou said he’d check out the new movie and he thought it’d be ok. (laughs) Ben ended up saying he’d take Lou out to dinner and set him up with a supermodel or something. Lou said he’d put his boys on a leash and keep them from going after Ben. Ben ended up asking for a Merloni jersey. Lou laughed at that and said they’d set something up.

WWZN had S.I. writer Tom Verducci on this afternoon, who wrote the article “Totally Juiced” which appears in this weeks edition. He said many higher ups in baseball are glad this article is written, because it exposes things that the players union wants to keep buried. Reading the article is quite an eye-opener. Many believe that steroids are safe, even some who don’t take them. There are some who are opposed to them, but still take them because they think they *have* to just to keep up with those who do take them. His educated guess on the percentage of MLB players using is 40-50%.

WWZN is also going to have both Lou Merloni and Ben Affleck on after 5:00 to try to clear the air.

Jason Kidd has been the dominant topic on sports radio today. If you’re interested, The Smoking Gun has a copy of the police report from Kidd’s arrest last year. Bill Simmons called in to WWZN this afternoon, and says there wasn’t a group of people wearing shirts that said “Wife beater” on them, there was one person, painted in green and had it on his back. Simmons says this guy was embarrassed when he found out that Kidds wife was right there. He said some fans even bought TJ some soda and popcorn. He implied that she is lying about the attacks on TJ. He called her a self-promoter, and that she didn’t even know what the fans were chanting during the game, and had to ask a sportswriter after the game to find out it was “Wife Beater” Greg Dickerson on WEEI basically reported the same thing…that it wasn’t nearly as bad as it has been reported. Ron Borges acted all high and mighty and said he would never behave in such a manner, and certainly wouldn’t be an apologist for people who acted that way, which is what he implied Simmons was doing. Simmons lauded Callahan’s article in the Herald today, and Borges insists that it is not Kidds “fault that other people act like fools”. He derided this whole generation of fans who act this way, who do the Yankees chant. He said “Should this guy be flogged for the rest of his life?” Jackie MacMullan is “worried” about the Celtics chances the rest of the series.

Both stations have been playing the Hartford Whalers theme music over the past few weeks. It gets old quick.

Gerry Callahan shows that perhaps he isn’t so out of touch with reality by pulling no punches (no pun intended) in addressing the verbal “abuse” Jason Kidd and his family has been subjected to at the Fleetcenter. It was also a big topic on the Dennis and Callahan show, further emphasizing that Kidd has placed his wife and kids right into the spotlight, that they’re targets because he has put them front and center in his effort to put on the persona of a good “family man”. While certain fans behavior is despicible, Jason Kidd is ultimately responsible for the taunts and discomfort his family is going through right now. It’s because of HIS actions. An AP story published on ESPN.com has Kidd complaining about his treatment and how the fans in Boston should be more “classy”. Don’t send your family to the games, Jason, don’t make them public figures, targets by drunken fans by parading them out everywhere in front of any TV camera in the area.

Stan Grossfeld in the Globe today has a feature story on life in the Bullpen. The type of feature the Globe used to have all the time.

The Ben Affleck stint in the FOX25 booth Monday night was a topic on discussion on the talk circuit yesterday and continues to dominate today. Some players are reportedly upset by some of Affleck’s comments, while some fans just were annoyed that he was in there for five innings.

The Celtics and Nets game five from NJ can be seen on NBC tonight at 9:00. The Red Sox and Blue Jays from Toronto is on NESN at 7:00. ESPN has the Roger Clemens “SportsCentury” feature at 2:30 and game six of the NHL Western conference finals at 8:00. ESPN2 has a baseball doubleheader with the Cardinals and Jimy William’s Astros at 7:00 and the Diamondbacks and Giants at 10:00.

Last night’s Red Sox telecast on Fox25 had the potential to have very low ratings. The first hour or so went against the second half of the Celtics game, and the Sox jumped out to a fast lead. Ben Affleck joined Sean and Jerry in the booth and made the telecast a bit more entertaining. Some observations of what he had to say: (as posted by David Claborn in the Red Sox Newsgroup)

* He and brother Casey and Matt Damon are all over in England doing a play and all pissed b/c they can’t get any Sox games. Even better? He’s taking the rest of the summer off because he thinks this is the year and doesn’t want to miss anything. He didn’t explicitly say “this is the year”, but instead stuff like “i see this bunch of guys and, I dunno, …I think something special is going to happen this year” and etc.

* Castillo was hitless through 3 IP and Affleck said “I think Frank the Bank may get a no hitter tonight.” Hadn’t heard that not-to-appropriate nickname before. Which isn’t to down Frank -I think he’s playing above his
ability this year. He’s been a really nice pickup by DD, IMO.

* “sending you down to the minors was making a mockery of your career? Hitting .192 was making a mockery of your career, Lou. Do you think everyone from Framingham gets to play with the RedSox?”

* Ben was being pretty critical of everyone on the team in a good natured, Boston type of way. Except, that is for the studs. “Nomar Garciaparra is the one man I can think about marrying. He’s “something” (can’t remember the exact word used.) …and that goes for Pedro and Manny, too.”

* When Bryant Nelson got his first major league hit, all three guys broke out of the cynical/cutting joke mode and enjoyed the moment. Sean: “He’s floating a foot above the earth right now.” Jerry: “He’ll never forget it
for the rest of this life.” Ben said something nice, too, but I don’t know what it is.

* “you guys [Sean and Jerry] have a couple of obligatory comments you make each game: Hillenbrand has learned patience, and Trot’s no good against lefties.”

Would all Boston Media types who stated with absolute certainty that the Nets would not be able to recover from Saturday’s game three collapse please report to the Tobin bridge….

Like Manna from Heaven, after the tough loss yesterday by the Celtics, what appeared in the mail today? The new Patriots DVD “3 Games to Glory” It’s helping to make a tough morning a bit more pleasant. A full review will be posted here once a full viewing is done.

Anyone else tired of the incessant Jason Kidd worship going on during the NBC telecasts? The man can do no wrong. He gets perfect postion to draw charges, leads his team through the tough times and is a gentleman of the highest order. I think the broadcasters need to re-read the Sports Illustrated featuring Kidd that came out earlier in the season. While the cover painted a picture of the perfect family, all together in the bathtub, the article presented darker things. The one that stood out to me is how they built up about how Kidd’s son, TJ imitates everything his father does, right down to his dribble and free throw routine. Then they mentioned TJ hitting his mom in the face after she told him no….

Dan Shaughnessy revels in misery. He loves that Paul Pierce missed those free throws, and he hopes it ruins Pierce’s life and career. OK, maybe he didn’t say that *exactly* but you get the idea that that would be just fine with Dan. Somewhat amusing that WEEI’s Dale and Neumy are taking Shaugnessy to task on the air this morning for comments he made over the weekend calling Jose Offerman a “bowser” and making personal attacks at him for not executing a sacrifice bunt and then not wanting to talk about it. He claims he’s speaking for the fans.

Peter King gushes over CMGI field. (and lists the Pats at #4 for his favorites to win the SuperBowl)

As of 10:30 this morning, it was impossible to connect to WEEI’s live web stream through the link on its webpage. By going directly to the Streamaudio.com website, a connection was finally able to be made.

You can catch the Red Sox and Blue Jays from Toronto tonight at 7:00 on FOX25. NBC has Lakers/Kings game five from Sacremento tonight at 9:00