Great news for the Argos.

https://www.forbes.com/teams/toronto.../#22b03b1b5133

The Jays' franchise value has increased to $1.5BUSD, up from $1.4B last year. They are 16th in MLB team value rankings.

Operating income was $-16M in 2018.
Revenues were down slightly to $265M.
Player expenses remained high at $178M.

The Jays continues to operate with 0% debt. According to Forbes the team brought in $10M in 2018 from concerts and other events at Rogers Centre.

$1.5B makes the Jays the second most valuable sports team in Canada after the Raptors ($1.675B) and just above the Leafs ($1.45B).

^ I'm surprised that the Raptors rank number one. Seems like it was not that long ago they were in the Jays' and Leafs' shadows to some extent.

NBA team values have been insane since the Clippers sold for $2B, and perceived future value and revenue capture are pretty high.

Leafs/Bruins Game 1: 1.552M (CBC) / 1.350M (SN) / 2.9M (TOTAL)
Flames/Avs Game 1: 589K (CBC) / 611K (SN) / 1.2M (TOTAL)
Jets/Blues Game 1: 1.043M (SN)
Penguins/Islanders Game 1: 713K (CBC)
Knights/Sharks Game 1: 471K (SN)
Jackets/Lightning Game 1: 320K (SN360)
Jays/Red Sox: 306K (SNONE)
Caps/Hurricanes Game 1: 151K (SN)

https://brioux.tv/2019/04/numbers-in...anley-cup-run/

So where does "the league" get this $7M from? Is the league not just a compilation of private owners and publicly operated teams? Would those 8 groups agree to take on the risk of taking on $1M, or possibly more, each to save the Montreal franchise? Have there not been 4 separate bankruptcies in the last 25 years (twice each in Ottawa and Montreal)? And the league survived those.

I imagine the league acting on behalf of the owners could get a reasonably low-interest loan from a financial institution that would be paid off over the course of the few years. If they feel confident in the prospective ownership, the $1 million expense per team would probably be worth it given the alternative of reverting back to an 8-team league and the bad optics that entails.

A potential name change is not imminent for CFL’s Edmonton Eskimos

https://www.sportsnet.ca/football/cf...onton-eskimos/

This comes a few days after McGill announced it would be dropping the Redmen name effective immediately.

^ Seems inevitable to me that the Eskimos are going to change their name. Doing it on a gradual basis the way they're doing it in Edmonton is a reasonable way to proceed.

I undertstand Redskins being offensive, or Red Men, but I’m not sure how Eskimos can be deemed offensive, especially with the long history and pride of the franchise and its fan base. I feel it more or less celebrates the people or culture, the same way Fighting Irish.

Does that make me racist, in today’s definition of the term?

The odd thing to me is deciding that one name is deemed inappropriate so the name they've supposedly chosen to succeed it is...essentially the embodiment of the people that came to North America and subjugated the local population (the British Empire).

Why not rename the team the Elks? They keep the EE moniker, honour past tradition, and animals can't complain about their likeness being used. :hmmm:

The name Eskimo in and of itself is viewed as derogatory by some (most?) Inuit and Yupik. The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms (1982) shifted from using Eskimo to Inuit.

https://www.adn.com/alaska-news/arti...rs/2014/06/27/

Not sure if it's racist, but Eskimo is certainly considered inappropriate and inaccurate by a lot of people.

By today's standards it's certainly worse than the McGill Redmen, who were actually named for British soldiers who wore red coats, as opposed to indigenous people.

Personally, I've already gone on the record that I think having sports teams named for groups of people (indigenous or otherwise) is actually a *compliment*, but the predominant thinking has evolved away from that notion. What can I say.

Wouldn't the plural of Elk still be "Elk"?

:hmmm:

:shrug:

FWIW, as far as I understand it, the name "Empire" has nothing to do with the British Empire... it is purely self-referential.

Both Empire and Elks are what I'd consider to be good-not-great substitutes for Eskimos. I guess there aren't that many great team names that start with E? If you want to go back to the 90s thing they could be the EDMONTON EDGE, but after that the options drop off fast.

There is Edmonton Energy, but that sounds like a Lingerie Football League team name.

Oh, of course, but I hope you understand my bemusement in moving away from a name that's inappropriate to a name which can also be viewed as being inappropriate, or at least a bit ironic.

I think the league comparable you're looking for is the Arena Football League, to be a bit more kosher. :tup: :haha:

I don't think it matters about the history and pride of the franchise and its fan base. That shouldn't play a factor.

This right here tells us that it was deemed inappropriate enough that it's changed in the Constitution of Canada. So they should get on board with that.

The Redskins really should change their name as well since it's VERY obviously describing the looks of a race. The Cleveland Indians finally retired the Chief Wahoo logo - although they made the announcement long before it was retired, ensuring they could sell as much merchandise as possible. Pretty scummy.

Edmonton Extreme, Edmonton Edge, Edmonton Energy... all perfect names for 1990s roller hockey or arena football teams!

What if they weren't stuck to the EE thing? I mean, they could just keep the logo and make it a single E instead. Then they could call the team the Green and Gold which is basically the team's second name after Eskimos, and the tradition would remain more or less intact.

If "Empire" is inappropriate for what it evokes then maybe having a big city in that location named for a place in England (Edmonton), is inappropriate too.

Depends on how far you want to go down the rabbit hole, you know? ;)

I won't be taking us there personally. Just reporting on the view from the bridge.

In this current climate of outrage, it shouldn't be the public who seem the Edmonton Eskimo name offensive. If the football team consults and has a dialogue with the Inuit community and they are okay with the name they can carry on. If the Inuit community prefers a change, then explore changing it. The Eskimos should not bend to general public pressure which borders on madness these days over every little thing.

^ I've read reports over the years that have suggested there are mixed feelings about it in the Inuit community, it's not really a slam dunk like Redskins which probably just about every Indigenous person hates. Some like it and take it as a point of pride, some are offended.

But really, pressure will only continue to mount until change inevitably happens. The Eskimos might as well make the change gracefully before it becomes an embarrassment like the Washington Redskins.

I think if ever the issue were to become "public", the outcome would be a foregone conclusion. These days it doesn't take long for these things to become a lightning rod and they almost always tilt in the same direction. The day the "Eskimos" name becomes an issue is the day its goose is cooked.

Agreed.

A main problem I have with SJW's is that they are professional protesters. This is what they do for a living. Once they get redress for one particular perceived wrong, they will move on to the next one, and then another one, until eventually their pious moral outrage gets focussed on the most trivial of issues.

It is important not to feed their outsized and misdirected moral outrage. You'll only encourage them.........

Elk, elks, elkenkind

OK, I think I've got it...

I give you

THE EDMONTON ERADICATORS

https://media.giphy.com/media/MzTqj5...facebook_s.jpg

(Apologies to all the young people who have no idea what I'm talking about)

AMEN! I was going to bold a few words above, but everything in it is bang on.

The problem I have is this is only going to be temporary, political correctness has only a few more good years in it and then its gone, and then we'll have lost a large amount of history, and culture and for what.

Brace yourself for when the pendulum swings back!

CBC Sports and MEDIAPRO Canada announced today a partnership that will see live coverage of 20 games throughout the 2019 season of Canada’s new tier-one men’s professional soccer league, the Canadian Premier League (CPL), on CBC Sports platforms. CBC will be the exclusive free-to-air television broadcast home for 10 Canadian Premier League games, offering 10 live key events throughout the season. An additional 10 games will be available via free live streaming coverage at cbcsports.ca, the CBC Gem streaming service, and via the CBC Sports app for iOS and Android devices. All games will be produced by MEDIAPRO.

The first game kicks off at 1 p.m. ET (10 a.m. PT) on Saturday, April 27 at Tim Hortons Field in Hamilton, Ontario, as Forge FC (Hamilton) hosts Ontario rivals York9 FC (York Region), and Canadians can tune in to catch all the action of the beautiful game on CBC and the CBC Gem streaming service. The full schedule of games included in the partnership is below.

https://s3.amazonaws.com/cpl-network...091549/CBC.png

https://canpl.ca/article/cbc-sports-...-of-cpl-season

I wish the CPL well, but it's noteworthy how the CBC continues to rely on "cheapie" sports properties.

It makes sense for CBC to be involved in covering Canadian sports that tend to be ignored by the big media companies. TSN and SN are practically built on the model of having the big eyeball-drawing sports properties like NHL, NFL, CFL, MLB, etc. CBC would have a hard time outbidding them... might as well focus on the stuff being neglected by those networks.

I'd love to see CBC cover other things that seldom get national coverage these days like CHL/AHL hockey and U-Sports.

I can see that and I agree. The CBC needs to rebuild its sports division, especially when it comes to pro team sports.

CBC used to be so good. They had all the big pro stuff, HNIC, CFL, sometimes the Blue Jays/Expos depending on who held the rights. But they also crushed at amateur sports too, not just international level competition but even things like high school sports... something like regional broadcast TV coverage of a girls volleyball final like this would be damn near unimaginable today:

https://i.cbc.ca/1.5092746.155516878...vball-1986.jpg

These days they have retrenched into the smaller calibre stuff. There is a ton of stuff on the CBC Sports app, but I have to admit that I never check it even though it's on my phone... there is something about the ease of channel surfing that is impossible for apps to match. Apps are good if you are already a hardcore fan of something.

SRC, the French CBC, was much the same.

When I was growing up they had a program called Les Héros du Samedi, sandwiched in between the barrage of Saturday morning cartoons. It featured all sorts of sports: with one (seemingly) randomly-chosen event broadcast each week. IIRC the kids were generally teens or younger (often quite a bit younger). The idea wasn't about allowing you to follow a specific sport (one week could have hockey from Montreal, the next basketball from Quebec City, then skiing from the Laurentians, equestrian, figure skating, etc.) It was about giving the kids some exposure on TV. It was covered just like pro sports with pre and post-game interviews, their names on the screen and everything.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFLB8zbAZFw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bs_u8SBz2AY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UdiOE8bOins

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QyH_2lIEink

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8oAE3-1ua3g

^ Les Heros du Samedi is incredible, it's hard to imagine something like that existing today!

Yeah, it's hard to imagine network TV coverage that includes a two-person mobile team (in a car or on a motorcycle) for a cycling race run by 10-year-old kids!

Saturday, April 13, 2019:
Raptors & Magic (SN1) - 788K

Sunday, April 14, 2019:
Masters (CTV & TSN) - 1.15M

Monday, April 15, 2019:
WWE Raw (SN360) - 357K
Jays & Twins (SN1) - 259K

Wednesday, April 17, 2019:
Leafs & Bruins (CBC) - 2.03M
Flames & Avs (CBC) - 944K
Jays & Twins (SN1) - 248K
Preds & Stars (SN) - 217K

Numbers via @BillBriouxTV on Twitter.

Definitely hurts flames ratings due to such late start times, not only to capture eastern viewers but people in the west as well. To stay up to 11 to watch a hockey game in the middle of the week will hurt ratings no doubt

Hmmm? :)

Did you bookmark my golf/NASCAR comment or something? That was very quick.

The first round of the Masters had 293K on Thursday, equal to your standard Blue Jays regular season game in April. The Blue Jays televise 162ish games a year, versus one Masters First Round a year. :hmmm:

The difference between the Masters and the Raptors is that the Raptors are playing multiple games over multiple windows over multiple weeks this post season. The Masters only happens once a year. Sample sizes.

My comment about NASCAR was not unfounded, and although we don't have numbers for Canada we do have plenty of figures for the States. The race last weekend in Richmond, as an example, tied the lowest rating for a Cup Series race on broadcast TV since at least 2000. [Source] It's on an incredible decline. Races the past few weeks garnerning 2.5M viewers south of the border used to have 6M viewers a few years ago. Broadcasts of some of their races have halved over the past half decade, and their crowds are worse.

Figures like this are why NASCAR is attempting to change its schedule, change its playoff format, and in general doing whatever it can to right its ship.

No, I just remembered it because it was a stupid comment and I wasn`t even considering NASCAR. Don`t worry, no one can take your title of fastest googler in the west (information relevant or not) :)

How was it a stupid comment, though? The ratings for this year's Masters were without question bolstered by Tiger, but one bump doesn't make up for what has been a steady decline in interest.

There is only one Masters, but there are a tonne of golf tournaments throughout the year on TSN/CTV and some people watch on US channels. Despite an early morning start, the Masters drew an audience of 1.15 million on TSN/CTV and nearly 11 million on CBS in the US. Replay drew another 4 million in the afternoon.

Golf's aging tv demographic is a problem, but when Tiger is competing for a title going into the weekend, the link to increased tv ratings is undeniable. One of the primary reasons and perhaps the most important factor in declining golf ratings the past half decade or longer has been the absence of Woods and the decline in his game. With his recent resurgence casual golf fans are more likely to tune in.

If golf does not have another Tiger-like player emerge in the next half-decade then its likely it will revert to a familar status of the 80s and early 90s when Jack Nicklaus was in decline and no suitable heir to the throne emerged...merely a series of good to excellent golfers that were with overhyped by the media or never lived up to the hype.

Jordan Spieth looked like the heir apparent a few years ago, winning 11 tournaments and 4 majors by the time he was 24, but has struggled mightily since then. If he can become dominant and fulfill his potential, golf just might have their next big thing and ratings should remain decent for the next 10 - 15 years.

Speaking of NASCAR, what is going on over there? I never paid much attention to it, but it seemed like in the mid 90s it went through explosive growth with new tracks, new events and lots of money. By Y2K it was practically ubiquitous in the United States, and there was even a bit of a Canadian fanbase emerging from what I recall at the time. Then maybe about a decade ago it started losing steam and now it's back to where it was in the 80s, as a bit of a niche regional sport. The sudden rise and fall of NASCAR was pretty dramatic.

The uptick is certainly thanks to Tiger and for the Canadian numbers I think some can come down to Conners qualifying at the last minute and making the cut. Weir's been golfing for years but hasn't really been very relevant since he won his Masters, at least IMO. Conners probably moved the needle a bit.

Probably. As you've mentioned the PGA has tried to get younger players more in the spotlight (McIlroy, Spieth) in the absence of Tiger to varying degrees of success. Anecdotally a lot of people I know who were watching the Masters were watching for Tiger - not because they like golf. If he drives the needle then so be it, but eventually the sport has to do something to be compelling once he finally does retire. At least they've moved more towards on-screen technologies such as ball tracking.

A good question and one that probably doesn't have a simple answer. As mentioned, the tracks are monotonous, the drivers boring and plain featuring the same rotating cast of winners, and a points/scoring system which NASCAR has tried to implement and change with limited success. It's not the glory days of the 90s when Earnhardt was wiping guys out and Gordon was cruising to victory. It's so much more....tame, compared to what it used to be.

I don't generally think it's an overarching issue with motorsports as a whole. IndyCar still does well, and F1 is seeing some of its best American figures ever (and the Montreal GP routinely does well and is a favourite on the international calendar). F1 is routinely at the forefront of new technologies and I think that may be something that NASCAR is lacking in.

NASCAR had a lot of success because of the personalities in the drivers seats. Like JHikka alluded to, Dale Earnhardt, Jeff Gordon, and even the lesser guys like Dale Jarrett, Mark Martin, the Wallace brothers, Dale Earnhardt Jr., drew a big following because of their personas. The Will Farrell movie, Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby sort of epitomized what made NASCAR a draw - the personalities of all these racers from the deep south with their southern drawl just going at it with each other. In elementary school I had NASCAR bedsheets, just like John Tavares had Toronto Maple Leafs sheets :haha: and my Halloween costume in grade 2 was a Mark Martin racing uniform. I even had the games for PS1 and Xbox later on.

Despite all of that, I couldn't tell you the name of one NASCAR driver today if my life depended on it.

The joke about watching guys turn left for 4 hours rings true. It's just not entertaining. They've tried different points and standings systems to little avail. The issue is just that there aren't any real compelling story lines.

Look at other sports: the NBA is a real life soap opera. This player disses that player, or Drake says X about some jackarse playing for Philly or Detroit and bam, you have a story line. In golf, everyone wants to see if Tiger can make a run at Jack Nicklaus' 18 majors. The PGA did a decent job of marketing McIlroy, Spieth, Dustin Johnson, Ricky Fowler, and a few others as the new guys on the block and tried to really make a big deal out of who was going to dominate the rest, and it was kind of compelling. With Tiger, there was a 50/50 chance he'd win every tournament it seemed, but then it became really interesting to see what would happen (I'm a golf fan). The NFL is a circus that culminates with a gameday every Sunday afternoon and offers a great college drinking excuse on Thursdays (I was in law school when they started Thursday nighters, and man were those ever fun nights). MLB and NHL remain the most focused on the actual on field/ice product I think.

NASCAR has become stagnant. The tracks are almost all the same or similar (ie: left turns) and there aren't any real compelling storylines for the average Joe to feel compelled to tune in. In sports, your competing for the entertainment dollar and if you aren't appealing to the casual fan you aren't going to succeed. It's why the NHL struggles in non-traditional markets and why baseball stadiums sit 75% empty when the team struggles.

Sportsnet PR
@sportsnetpr
Think Canada was pumped to see #VladJr make his @MLB debut? An average of 909,500 Canadians tuned in to watch the @BlueJays on Friday, making it the most-watched game this season. Overall, the #BlueJays series win over the #Athletics reached 4 million fans across Canada

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The Jays' game on Saturday registered an average of 643K viewers.