Bad enough that DirecTV chose to cut ties with the singing, dancing sensation Jeff Garlin (above) for their NFL Sunday Ticker commercials. As the Fanhouse’s Michael David Smith explains, those with DirecTV high def receivers are experiencing a slight delay while attempting to flip channels.

Three seconds doesn’t sound like much until you’re sitting there on a Sunday afternoon wanting to scroll quickly between games. If you’ve got Frank Gore and Brian Westbrook on your fantasy team, and the 49ers and the Eagles are both in the red zone, three seconds will seem like an eternity as you try to flip back and forth to see both of them score. And 10 seconds? Taking 10 seconds to change channels can be the difference between seeing and missing a Devin Hester kickoff return touchdown. Why on earth should any Bears fan pay for Sunday Ticket if he’s going to miss Devin Hester score a touchdown while he frantically presses the buttons on his remote control?

I’ve been a Sunday Ticket subscriber for two years, and any time anyone has asked me if I recommend DirecTV, I offer an enthusiastic yes. I can no longer say that. Until DirecTV gets this problem fixed, people who buy Sunday Ticket in HD are buying an inferior product.

Without sounding cavalier about the glitch Smith describes, I’d argue that Sunday Ticket is the greatest single technological achievement since Marlon Brando’s invention of velcro. Were it not for this glorious innovation, I might have actually experienced something approaching human contact the last several Autumn weekends. “Inferior product”? Inferior to what? As Smith himself points out, Sunday Ticket is the only game in town if you want out of market telecasts.

There’s only one answer I can think of that makes sense. I’ll have to purchase another DirecTV high definition receiver and a second bigass TV screen that blocks out what little sunlight I have left.

In Milwaukee, a preseason Packers game garnered nearly three times more viewers than a Brewers contest with pennant race implications. I guess Brewers fans are getting sick and tired of Carlos Villaneuva’s hemming and hawing about retirement.