Barring a two-minute drill that would impress even Tom Brady, former Adelphia and Comcast cable television subscribers will be tackled for a loss this weekend.

Today is the Federal Communications Commission-imposed deadline for both the NFL Network and Time Warner Inc., to negotiate a deal that would keep NFL Network broadcasts on Time Warner’s cable systems nationwide, including those in Maine recently purchased from Adelphia.

“They’re dead as can be, unfortunately,” said NFL Network spokesman Seth Palansky. “They’ve told us that as of midnight Friday, they will be dropping us from their systems.”

The NFL Network airs eight NFL games, several college football games, and programming such as NFL On-Demand, a highlights package providing a 15-minute recap of each NFL game each week.

Time Warner, the nation’s second-largest cable company, and the nearly 3-year-old NFL Network have lined up in contentious talks and public relations campaigns the last two months over how NFL Network would be carried on Time Warner’s cable systems and for how much.

Time Warner is currently the only one of the top six cable or satellite TV providers not carrying NFL Network. “I can’t tell you on the record why that is,” Palansky said. “I can say I believe they don’t think there are enough football fans out there and they don’t understand the value of NFL content.”

The top six, in order are Comcast, DirecTV, Time Warner, Dish Network, Cox Communications and Adelphia.

When Time Warner informed the NFL Network it would be dropping it from Adelphia and Comcast systems it had acquired this fall, NFL Network complained to the FCC and asked for a stay of Time Warner’s action. The FCC issued a ruling Aug. 7 that because Time Warner failed to notify subscribers 30 days before dropping the network, it was forcing Time Warner to continue carrying the network and provide a window for further negotiations until Sept. 15.

An e-mail from Time Warner spokesman Mark Harrad to Bloomberg news services said he expects his company to delete NFL Network from the lineup if Time Warner doesn’t have an “agreement it can live with.” That doesn’t bode well since Palansky says there have been no negotiations with the New York-based cable provider since the FCC ruling.

“We did send a proposal 10 days ago, but have not heard back,” Palansky said. “In general, we’ve asked for the equivalent of one movie ticket per subscriber per year for us to be included on their most broadly distributed tier, or basic tier. We also ask for high-definition feed of the channel and video-on-demand with 15-minute versions of each game.”

Attempts to reach Mike Edgecomb and Shelley Winchenbach, Time Warner’s government relations representatives in Maine, on Wednesday and Thursday were unsuccessful.

Time Warner maintains on its Web site and on a secondary site it has set up specifically to address the dispute (nflgetreal.com) that NFL Network is asking for $137 million, a 250 percent increase in its carrier fee. That works out to an extra 70 to 90 cents a month per customer.

“That information is false,” said Palansky, whose network is launching its own Web site (iwantmynflnetwork.com) to counter Time Warner claims. “The one big missing thing here is we give them ad time on our network with several minutes per hour and 300 hours per year of commercial time on our network. This allows them to offset the movie ticket price we charge them.”

Time Warner also contends the NFL Network wants its customers to pay a price greater than some of the most popular cable networks despite the fact it “is not one of the top 25 cable networks, according to independent cable rating systems.”

Palansky said his network is also willing to keep things as-is in former Adelphia markets like Bangor.

“We have no problem if they continue carrying our network under the existing Adelphia contract, which runs for I believe the next four years,” he said. “But they don’t want to do that, we surmise, because that would cause a lot of dissatisfaction among their regional systems if one’s getting us cheaper than the other is.”

An estimated 1.4 million Time Warner customers and NFL Network subscribers nationwide will lose NFL Network if a new deal isn’t reached.

Palansky says the network currently reaches more than 40 million homes via cable and satellite companies. He added that 103,000 cable subscribers have contacted the NFL to complain about Time Warner’s decision to drop the network.

Time Warner Cable spokesman Mark Harrad told CNNMoney.com that the number of telephone calls Time Warner got in early August – less than 8,000 from former Adelphia and Comcast subscribers and 88 total cancellations – show the demand for the network is limited.

One particular sticking point for Time Warner is the NFL Network’s desire to be included in its lower-tier cable package. Time Warner is willing to carry the network, but as a premium channel and-or as part of its sports package that customers pay extra for. Time Warner contends that the NFL Network’s extra cost should be passed on to customers willing to pay it, not across the board to all its customers, whether they watch the channel or not.

“We think that is fair for sports fans and for those who are not. Time Warner Cable offers a digital sports package in most markets,” Time Warner’s Web site announces.

“The downside is it’s just costing consumers too much money for the network in that kind of deal versus having it available on a lower tier,” said Palansky, who admitted the downside for NFL Network was less commercial revenue. “Sure, it affects our ad rates because we wouldn’t have as many subscribers in an upper-tier fashion as we would in a lower tier.”

Another complication is the NFL’s decision to run eight late-season Thursday and Saturday games, starting with a Thanksgiving night Denver-Kansas City clash, exclusively on the NFL Network. Although that move has spurred some cable operators to offer it to more of their subscribers (CNN reported that the number of homes reached by NFL Network went from 30 million in January to 41 million last month), it has also priced some operators out of the market.

Andrew Neff can be reached at 990-8205, 1-800-310-8600 or at aneff@bangordailynews.net