The Great Canadian Sports Attendance, Marketing and TV Ratings Thread

[thurmas]

Word coming out Ron Maclean will be dropped this summer as ratings of HNIC have nose dived and tons of complaints of how they are failing to connect with younger viewers. They list Kevin Bieska as the only bright spot. I agree their broadcasts now are so incredibly low energy and lack any sort of charisma or fun characters it feels like a bankers meeting watching their intermissions way to analytical and no fun at all.

[TimB09]

Originally Posted by thurmas

Word coming out Ron Maclean will be dropped this summer as ratings of HNIC have nose dived and tons of complaints of how they are failing to connect with younger viewers. They list Kevin Bieska as the only bright spot. I agree their broadcasts now are so incredibly low energy and lack any sort of charisma or fun characters it feels like a bankers meeting watching their intermissions way to analytical and no fun at all.

Just keep Elliotte on as I love his insider talks.

[TimB09]

Originally Posted by EpicPonyTime

If not Genius, then Tannenbaum for sure will be urging them to. The CFL needs to put their product on the market and see if anyone else wants to bid for it. If they just opt for TSN again, they're going to get more of the same: a low value deal and increasingly poor coverage.

Would going with TSN and, say, YouTube, work? Everyone can access YouTube.

Maybe I'm wrong but they do a live MLB game a week so would the CFL work with that? Talk about exposure.

[MonctonRad]

Originally Posted by thurmas

Word coming out Ron Maclean will be dropped this summer as ratings of HNIC have nose dived and tons of complaints of how they are failing to connect with younger viewers. They list Kevin Bieska as the only bright spot. I agree their broadcasts now are so incredibly low energy and lack any sort of charisma or fun characters it feels like a bankers meeting watching their intermissions way to analytical and no fun at all.

If you want to spice things up, bring back Don Cherry!

[thurmas]

Originally Posted by MonctonRad

If you want to spice things up, bring back Don Cherry!

Ugh he's 4000 years old now might as well get creepy pierre Mcguire and his monsters wham bam a double dion good grief.

[esquire]

Ron MacLean seemed to work fine as Don Cherry's keeper but ever since Grapes left there is no longer a point to having him around. Now he's the one making all of the out of touch Grandpa Simpson comments but without Cherry's humour and charm.

Rogers seems to have inherited the CBC Sports tendency to put the most lifelessly stiff people in their broadcast booths and panels. Maybe individually they aren't bad, but put them together and it's just flat. People gripe about CFL on TSN but I think those people forgot about what it was like in the CFL on CBC days. TSN's coverage is pure adrenaline next to what CBC pumped out.

[thurmas]

I joke but in all seriousness I would take pierre Mcguire over the dullsville crew HNIC has right now.

[esquire]

^ I should say that not all of the HNIC PxP crews are bad. Chris Cuthbert is perfect, but then it goes downhill from there.

[Acajack]

I generally watch the two French networks because I find the talking heads more fun and entertaining (though not necessarily better at analysis).

But when I've watched the coverage in English I do like Elliotte Friedman and also that new Kevin Bieska guy is good too.

[esquire]

^ Those are basically the two bright lights of HNIC's studio. Everyone else I can do without. Brian Burke brought some entertainment value too but he's back in the league now.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by esquire

^ Those are basically the two bright lights of HNIC's studio. Everyone else I can do without. Brian Burke brought some entertainment value too but he's back in the league now.

I don't think Bieska has the right skills and profile set to replace MacLean but Friedman probably could. Though if you put him in the host's chair then you deprive yourself of much of the analysis he brings to the show.

[TownGuy]

It's a shame TSN didn't win the rights. Their intermission panel is a great mix of analysis and entertainment with James Duthie leading the way. Sportsnet has always sucked in comparison.

[EpicPonyTime]

Originally Posted by TimB09

Would going with TSN and, say, YouTube, work? Everyone can access YouTube.

Maybe I'm wrong but they do a live MLB game a week so would the CFL work with that? Talk about exposure.

Honestly it couldn't hurt. TSN Direct being the only way to stream a CFL game is horrible.

[blueandgoldguy]

Originally Posted by thurmas

Tsn losing these mls tv rights makes them even look weaker. I am not really sure its a partner that has good long term potential with cable cutting i do wonder if the folks at genius sports might urge the CFL to explore new TV partners. I believe tsn was paying the 3 canadian mls teams 4.5 million a year for tv rights

I heard the MLS tv rights were practically worthless as most of the Canadian teams games could be measured in the tens of thousands outside the handful of big matches and Montreal's which were a bit more respectful when factoring in the french audience.

Heard rumours that TSN/Sportsnet were broadcasting games for practically free with a possible agreement to pay a share of advertising revenues dependent on ratings.

[Djeffery]

Originally Posted by TownGuy

It's a shame TSN didn't win the rights. Their intermission panel is a great mix of analysis and entertainment with James Duthie leading the way. Sportsnet has always sucked in comparison.

Funny too that Duthie was the only TSN on air personality that Sportsnet originally tried to hire back when they got the NHL rights. I wonder what his contract status is now and if he might be persuaded. I doubt it, but you never know.

[jonny24]

Originally Posted by EpicPonyTime

Honestly it couldn't hurt. TSN Direct being the only way to stream a CFL game is horrible.

Is it any different than DAZN or something? Login, click the video, watch the game. I'm pretty sure it even has an integrated Chromecast button.

*Live, of course. their On-demand is a joke with no sorting or categorizing.

[elly63]

Originally Posted by blueandgoldguy

I heard the MLS tv rights were practically worthless as most of the Canadian teams games could be measured in the tens of thousands outside the handful of big matches and Montreal's which were a bit more respectful when factoring in the french audience.

They were averaging about 38k one year, almost more people in the stands than the viewing audience. TSN was looking at dropping them. That was around the time CFL was getting 500/600k+ I believe the year TFC won the championship they were averaging something like 90k. Usually to break into the top 20 for weekly sports ratings you had to draw 100k viewers.

[thurmas]

With MLB, NFL and now MLS using more streaming services with Amazon and Apple the traditional Canadian sports TV provider is still stuck in the past. I don't like TSN or Sportsnet long term future's as innovation is the last thing they know anything about

[elly63]

But how different is a streaming service than TSN? Likely even worse. The best thing that clown at MLSE, Christmas Tree could do is get the league on CTV.

[Hackslack]

Originally Posted by elly63

They were averaging about 38k one year, almost more people in the stands than the viewing audience. TSN was looking at dropping them. That was around the time CFL was getting 500/600k+ I believe the year TFC won the championship they were averaging something like 90k. Usually to break into the top 20 for weekly sports ratings you had to draw 100k viewers.

Averaging 90k viewers during their most successful season, and somehow Forbes has TFC valued as the 5th most valuable franchise in MLS at $400 million