Cont'd - NHL makes 12-year/$5.2 billion Canadian TV deal w/ Sportsnet, CBC, TSN out

[JBIZ14]

Sportsnet is said to now have a major influence on scheduling so if they create a smaller CI package they're going to just schedule Canadian teams on Tues/Thurs when they're blacked out so if you're out of market you'll need it to see games.

Honestly, odds are people just stream more in the long run and Sportsnet loses a lot of money and we all lose.

Im assuming a smaller CI package to unblock the Canucks on SPAC would be cheaper then paying to watch 10 games across the league every night.

 

[Wings13]

Anybody have any idea when the regional contracts are up for the 7 Canadian teams?

 

[DyerMaker66*]

I hope this leads TSN to start marketing NLL like they did with the NHL.

 

[BiggestLeafsFanEVER*]

Personally I don't care about the extra coverage just because we already get Centre Ice. One thing is that even though Sportsnet is bad a lot of the US stations are even worse (not including NBC) so I'd rather watch extra games on Sportsnet and avoid the US stuff.

I like TSN so I'm sorry hockey won't be on it next year. I will wait to complain until I see what changes sportsnet makes. Unless the people running it are Pejorative Slured they must have figured out TSN does a way better job so hopefully they will just try to hire the TSN employees. If they keep everything exactly the same then get ready for me to complain a lot. But I'll just wait and see.

Same thing with HNIC, i'll wait to see how it is before I complain. They would definitely do the world a favour if Rogers used its new control to fire Hughson, Healy, and Stock.

It is unfortunate to think that a Canadian institution that's been around forever will be wiped out after four years because of Rogers of all companies.

 

[JLP]

Delete this if it breaks the rules but at first glance this seems another expression of Bettman's ongoing strategy to leech Canadian cash. How does boxing out the national broadcaster respect the home of hockey?

 

[DyerMaker66*]

Hughson rocks, gtfoh.

 

[JBIZ14]

Personally I don't care about the extra coverage just because we already get Centre Ice. One thing is that even though Sportsnet is bad a lot of the US stations are even worse (not including NBC) so I'd rather watch extra games on Sportsnet and avoid the US stuff.

I like TSN so I'm sorry hockey won't be on it next year. I will wait to complain until I see what changes sportsnet makes. Unless the people running it are Pejorative Slured they must have figured out TSN does a way better job so hopefully they will just try to hire the TSN employees. If they keep everything exactly the same then get ready for me to complain a lot. But I'll just wait and see.

Same thing with HNIC, i'll wait to see how it is before I complain. They would definitely do the world a favour if Rogers used its new control to fire Hughson, Healy, and Stock.

It is unfortunate to think that a Canadian institution that's been around forever will be wiped out after four years because of Rogers of all companies.

How about they send Hughson back to Vancouver and in return send you guys Lee? K?

 

[Caeldan]

I think really though, what's going to be the biggest pain is that Rogers owns the GCL and CI rights in addition to the general national TV rights.

So they have full content distribution control now, which is bad for consumers - especially when it comes to a company like Rogers.

 

[DyerMaker66*]

How about they send Hughson back to Vancouver and in return send you guys Lee? K?

I'll take both of 'em over Bowen, Cole, Emerick or Neale.

 

[BiggestLeafsFanEVER*]

How about they send Hughson back to Vancouver and in return send you guys Lee? K?

No Vancouver can have them both.

So ITT people were saying TSN gets some of the Leafs regional games anyway? Maybe they'll just get regional stuff.

I was thinking how ESPN is the US is obsessed with covering football even tho I don't think it even shows many games. Maybe TSN will be like that?

I mean the NHL can't actually stop TSN for having "trade deadline madness" can they? It's more about TSN getting information to share. With the draft they can talk about it...and then maybe direct people to the NHL website to watch it instead of sportsnet

 

[thom]

Please no one get angry but everyone who calls CBC an great canadian institution is a political comment.Thats the same thing if I call Rush Limbeau a great institution.Yes I watched HNIC in both english and French Yes I grew up watching the friendly Giant and Mr Dressup but these could have survived in private industry.All habs games for nearly 50 yrs were on radio-canada and cbc french but life goes on.Now you have Tva like it or not but at least my taxes are not being used for something I dont support

 

[Caeldan]

On the contrary, with the regional blackouts going away this might be the fall of the last wall stopping me from cancelling cable and going streaming/downloading only for my TV needs. The only thing that was keeping me from cancelling cable was the lack of quality/legal live sports options. If I can just subscribe to GCL without fear of regional blackouts, cable can kiss my ...

With more national broadcasts - it means that GCL has less games to show though. The blackouts are due to nationally available games. Whether they change it to be intended for in-market viewers or not is a different story (and if you're an in-market viewer currently you aren't actually the intended audience for the product) - but for the out of market viewer, increased numbers of national games (or exclusivities) is bad because it creates more blackouts.

 

[Nihiliste]

At first when I thought CBC still owned HNIC, and Gamecenter/CI were still options I was ok with Bell losing out to Rogers. I suppose it would have been the same situation with Bell but as someone who rarely watches on TV all I really care about is that GCL doesn't get more blackouts, which unfortunately, I think it probably will, and that playoff coverage remains extensive and affordable, which hopefully it will. I don't want to buy 4 more sportsnet channels to be able to watch all of the playoff games.

Also, based on my experiences with them as a phone company, Rogers is the devil. Them having absolute control over all content and distribution for the next 12 years doesn't bode well for the average consumer.

My biggest hope is that they would introduce a version of GCL that allows you to watch all of the games, including the playoffs. As someone who travels all the time that would be awesome and I would be willing to pay more for it than I am now.

 

[JLP]

Please no one get angry but everyone who calls CBC an great canadian institution is a political comment.Thats the same thing if I call Rush Limbeau a great institution.Yes I watched HNIC in both english and French Yes I grew up watching the friendly Giant and Mr Dressup but these could have survived in private industry.All habs games for nearly 50 yrs were on radio-canada and cbc french but life goes on.Now you have Tva like it or not but at least my taxes are not being used for something I dont support

No it is completely different. The CBC is a crown corporation and Canada's national broadcaster. Rush Limbaugh is a radio talk show host.

 

[New User Name]

I find this interesting

To put this deal in perspective, the 10-year agreement between NBC and the NHL is only $2 billion — less than half of what Rogers is paying. Consequently, Canada’s seven-team NHL presence makes up 70 per cent of the NHL’s television revenue

http://www.thestar.com/sports/2013/11/26/rogers_nhl_deal_10_things_you_should_know.html

 

[Mansfield]

this sucks, was never a fan of sportsnet. Oh well, not gonna get cable anyway

 

[thom]

Jlp thats my point its my taxes being used for tv shows I hate and a poltical agenda I dont agree with.My solution is the American Formula which is KCTS which gets a large portion of their money from public donations.By the way is a good station.Cbc I understand is supported by many canadiens but not me.

 

[saskganesh]

Please no one get angry but everyone who calls CBC an great canadian institution is a political comment.Thats the same thing if I call Rush Limbeau a great institution.Yes I watched HNIC in both english and French Yes I grew up watching the friendly Giant and Mr Dressup but these could have survived in private industry.All habs games for nearly 50 yrs were on radio-canada and cbc french but life goes on.Now you have Tva like it or not but at least my taxes are not being used for something I dont support

Which means you're OK then with Canadian taxpayer owned property (HNIC) being used for free by a profit-making monopoly?

You'll save taxes, but you'll be spending more out of pocket.

EDit: actually you won't save taxes. It will be spent on something else.

 

[Kyle McMahon]

On the contrary, with the regional blackouts going away this might be the fall of the last wall stopping me from cancelling cable and going streaming/downloading only for my TV needs. The only thing that was keeping me from cancelling cable was the lack of quality/legal live sports options. If I can just subscribe to GCL without fear of regional blackouts, cable can kiss my ...

Just the opposite. Any national game is going to be blacked out on CI/GameCenter, unless they change this rule. With TSN, there were only two channels they could put games on nationally to screw you over. Sportsnet has many more, so expect far more CI/GC blackouts.

 

[pucky]

A Sportsnet show almost made me puke. Some 'Tim and Sid' show with the one guy telling cable subscribers to 'shut up' if they are concerned about it being a monopoly and their bill possibly going up.

I think the inevitable effect to all this is an INCREASE in subscription fees. Whether it is cable bill increase (most likely) or pay-per-view hockey (possible).

Second, I suspect sportsnet/Rogers thinks that the CBC will not have their NHL deal for long. If the Cdn economy gets into enough trouble and the public investment has to be curtailed, HNIC may lose their coverage benefits. Whenever hockey on the CBC becomes reduced, Rogers is the sole benefactor. Rogers is a monopoly not just in this dept. but any future situation, they are the only winners.

Imho, the hockey fan loses, big time.

 

[3 Minute Minor]

There's 18 pages of a lot of posts so I'm not reading everything to see if this was asked.

So when I first woke up and dug into this story, I was pretty excited to hear how fan friendly this deal was going to be and reading 'no more regional blackouts' was music to my eyes. The more I read, the more I thought I was tricked by some over hype. From what I understand the national broadcasts on Wed/Sat/Sun will allow fans the opportunity to see their Canadian based team play on one of the many Sportsnet channels every time they play on those nights which is excellent news, don't get me wrong. My issue is, Saturday & Wednesday were already covered by TSN & CBC for me and my team plays on Sunday about 5 times a year. Mon/Tue/Thur/Fri games add up to about 48% of my favorite teams schedule. Are all those games now going to be on Sportsnet but blacked out? So yes, I might get to see my team a handful more times per year on national broadcasts but really does this change a damn thing? Seems like they're pushing a lot of sunshines & rainbows before fans realize they're still blacking out your team more often than not if you're out of market.

Hopefully someone can tell me I'm misunderstanding lol

 

[pucky]

I think really though, what's going to be the biggest pain is that Rogers owns the GCL and CI rights in addition to the general national TV rights.

So they have full content distribution control now, which is bad for consumers - especially when it comes to a company like Rogers.

Agreed!

 

[tbcwpg]

On the contrary, with the regional blackouts going away this might be the fall of the last wall stopping me from cancelling cable and going streaming/downloading only for my TV needs. The only thing that was keeping me from cancelling cable was the lack of quality/legal live sports options. If I can just subscribe to GCL without fear of regional blackouts, cable can kiss my ...

Regional blackouts are not going away. They will still be around on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays.

 

[Kyle McMahon]

Which means you're OK then with Canadian taxpayer owned property (HNIC) being used for free by a profit-making monopoly?

You'll save taxes, but you'll be spending more out of pocket.

EDit: actually you won't save taxes. It will be spent on something else.

Great point.

Anyone in here with a legal background that can comment on the plausibility of Rogers being hit with an anti-trust lawsuit for this blatant monopolization?

 

[pucky]

There's 18 pages of a lot of posts so I'm not reading everything to see if this was asked.

So when I first woke up and dug into this story, I was pretty excited to hear how fan friendly this deal was going to be and reading 'no more regional blackouts' was music to my eyes. The more I read, the more I thought I was tricked by some over hype. From what I understand the national broadcasts on Wed/Sat/Sun will allow fans the opportunity to see their Canadian based team play on one of the many Sportsnet channels every time they play on those nights which is excellent news, don't get me wrong. My issue is, Saturday & Wednesday were already covered by TSN & CBC for me and my team plays on Sunday about 5 times a year. Mon/Tue/Thur/Fri games add up to about 48% of my favorite teams schedule. Are all those games now going to be on Sportsnet but blacked out? So yes, I might get to see my team a handful more times per year on national broadcasts but really does this change a damn thing? Seems like they're pushing a lot of sunshines & rainbows before fans realize they're still blacking out your team more often than not if you're out of market.

Hopefully someone can tell me I'm misunderstanding lol

Bettman and I think one commentator claim this problem is over. What they didn't say is how. I wonder if they will just make it pay per view. If you want the blackout lifted, you have to pay?