Do you like the NHL being 4th in the 'Big 4' or do you wish it was more popular?

[DudeWhereIsMakar]

I could care less, but without question hockey deserves more attention.

But I'm the one fan who can live without the violence and hitting, which tends to be what gets the American fans intrigued.

But find hockey cards are on the same tier as baseball cards, but I don't recall Football and Baseball cards having that same kind of attention.

 

[McDonald19]

The game itself have been fantastic the last 5 years or so the problem is the NHL is terrible at marketing its game and its stars!!

That’s debatable. Physicality and emotion has been removed from the sport. I think it would be easier to market hockey if there were rivalries.

 

[CupsOverCash]

I dont like the mass media these days. Im glad its at the back of the pack. They can mess with the NFL and NBA for all I care.

 

[Ridge1982]

can't believe NFL is so popular.... terrible gameplay, and very few minutes of actually play. in a 3 hour broadcast

and horrible people play the game as well, criminals and overall crap people.

it must be a tradition thing

The NFL sucks for a variety of reasons of which I won’t get into because my blood pressure would go sky high. The college game is much better and I wish I had taken it seriously years ago, but better late than never.

 

[molon labe]

NFL is still popular among 20-49 year olds due to Fantasy Football and gambling.

No doubt. But a lot of those folks don't follow it beyond the stat lines. My brother is slightly older than me and is a religious fantasy football guy - at cookouts with his buddies, I ask them all the time and typically hear how they mostly follow through ESPN or morning iPhone scrolls. Without a doubt though - not one of them is considering putting their kid(s) in football. Living in Florida - this is a HUGE deal as this has been a football mecca for a very long time.

I've taken quite a bit of interest in this subject so I like to poll my own feedback. All I ever hear about is how well NFL ratings are - yet I hardly ever run into anyone who watches all that often. Perhaps it's your Buffalo Wild Wings with 87 screens showing the games that account for a lot of it.

 

[McDonald19]

The NHL struggles to outdraw, and often doesn't outdraw, the Premier League on NBC and NBCSN. How anyone thinks it's even in the top 4 is beyond me.

but how are MLS tv ratings...

 

[McDonald19]

Increasingly 5th in the Big 5.

MLS has strong attendance, but very low tv ratings and almost no mention by sports talk or news outlets.

 

[rodney dangerfield]

im indifferent on that. but the NHL has a severe marketing problem. they just don’t know how to market their game effectively. the tv shows and websites look dated by about 10-15 years. they dont market their top stars (mcdavid) and they often have terrible match ups on their primetime slots. just isnt working imo

 

[NorCalhockey]

Hockey is a very diverse sport in terms of different nationalities such as Canadians, Americans, Swedes, Fins, Russians, Slovaks, Czechs, Germans, and the Swiss. It is just not racially diverse. But that's alright. Hockey being an overwhelming White sport (95%) is very unique for a major North American team sport. It would be a shame if that was to change in a significant way.

Wow - this almost reads like a variant of "Irish need not apply". If you're fine with hockey being a predominantly white sport, be prepared for hockey irrelevance as the white population in NA continues to shrink.

(As a POC and an American, the reason I like hockey and soccer is because the pinnacle of international competition for each sport (Olympics/World Cup) can be won by more than just 1 or 2 countries.)

 

[The Roy Of Ottawa]

The NHL was once called The Ringo Starr of the 4 major league sports by the Sun-Sentinel in Fort Lauderdale in the 1990s.

Number 4 in the U.S., but number 1 in Canada.

 

[DaveG]

Wanted to see what everyones thoughts are on this, it's no secret among the big 4 NA leagues that the NHL is dead last in popularity. I'm torn on the matter and I'll explain why.

Pros:
-The fans are generally knowledgable, that isn't to say there are not bandwagoners but the ones who are, are nowhere near as annoying as NBA bandwagon fans are. I don't love when opposing fans take up half of PNC Arena but at least most of those guys know the game, and their own teams history,

Cons:
-I live in a state where Hockey is very much a 'niche' sport. People assume I'm from Michigan or Boston or Canada when they find out I'm a Hockey fan. Some of thats because the Canes were irrelevant up until last season but even during the playoff run, I personally heard some snide comments about how Hockey is not a "Southern" game and how the Canes are "Raleighs team and no one else cares". It wasn't as bad as when they won the Cup but I still figured with none of the college Basketball teams in the Final Four, and the Hornets/Panthers not making the playoffs that the 'Bunch of Jerks' would have captured some interest around here, not as much as I would have hoped. It's similar to how the national sports media tends to treat the sport.

So I guess to conclude, I like how players and fans tend to love the game for the game, but I wish it got more respect.

What say you?

Just going to touch on these two points:
I won't disagree with the pro you list here at all. It's one of the fun things about the sport that you can have solid banter with someone at most games unless they're a drunken prick or a bandwagoner, and it's easy to pick out either of those two the second they open their mouths.

The later point - I can't disagree. It drove me absolutely NUTS how much NBA the local sports radio station was talking during the NHL playoffs. It's legitimately got to the point that I'd cut off 99.9 and listen to something else. Your own home market has a team in the conference finals in the NHL, why are you talking about the NBA when the team in Charlotte was basically eliminated back in f***ing December?

Additionally, at least with the Charlotte media, there's a tendency to just shit on what might go on sports wise in the Triangle outside of college hoops and that transfers over to public opinion. It wasn't just this run either, jackholes in the media in Charlotte were giving a "yeah whatever" reaction to the Canes winning the cup in 06. You'd think the Canes affiliates now both being in the Charlotte area would have some positive change on that but it really hasn't.

 

[The Roy Of Ottawa]

I don't care. I only like hockey, and nothing else!

 

[Jeremy2020]

Is it even part of the 'big 4' anymore?

 

[HisIceness]

Just going to touch on these two points:
I won't disagree with the pro you list here at all. It's one of the fun things about the sport that you can have solid banter with someone at most games unless they're a drunken prick or a bandwagoner, and it's easy to pick out either of those two the second they open their mouths.

The later point - I can't disagree. It drove me absolutely NUTS how much NBA the local sports radio station was talking during the NHL playoffs. It's legitimately got to the point that I'd cut off 99.9 and listen to something else. Your own home market has a team in the conference finals in the NHL, why are you talking about the NBA when the team in Charlotte was basically eliminated back in ****ing December?

Additionally, at least with the Charlotte media, there's a tendency to just **** on what might go on sports wise in the Triangle outside of college hoops and that transfers over to public opinion. It wasn't just this run either, jackholes in the media in Charlotte were giving a "yeah whatever" reaction to the Canes winning the cup in 06. You'd think the Canes affiliates now both being in the Charlotte area would have some positive change on that but it really hasn't.

That reminds me, I don't remember the show but I drove to Raleigh the day before game 5 of the Washington series and tuned into 99.9 FM. I don't remember what show it was but I'm pretty sure it was local, they were talking about LeBron, the whole time I listened. Really disappointing, I'm a NBA fan too (though nowhere near as much as I used to be) but I do not care at all about LeBron and frankly at this point I won't miss him when he retires.

I barely tuned into any local sports talk in Charlotte last spring, but my co-workers love Colin Cowherd and the Skip and Shannon show on FS1, so I got to listen to LeBron apologists 5 days a week. Really riveting stuff I tell ya.

 

[ItWasJustified]

You do realize there are black hispanics here, yes ?

I don't care.

 

[Beukeboom Fan]

im indifferent on that. but the NHL has a severe marketing problem. they just don’t know how to market their game effectively. the tv shows and websites look dated by about 10-15 years. they dont market their top stars (mcdavid) and they often have terrible match ups on their primetime slots. just isnt working imo

It is extremely difficult to market a sport to people who never played the game and don't have a tradition of fandom.

How do you market McD? He is as vanilla as it gets.

Bottom line, Don Draper would struggle to market the NHL. It has die hard fans, but it is really difficult to grow the sport when you really have to be in a rink to be converted.

 

[majormajor]

I don't care.

I remember strongly rooting for hockey to get every bit of coverage it could, because it reduced the feeling of alienation of being a hockey fan surrounded by more popular sports fandoms. I would watch on espn and be thrilled for a highlight on sportscenter. Somewhere I stopped caring. Maybe it's that you can watch hockey nonstop now if you want to, on dedicated networks for it, and I can open up sportsnet/tsn streams whenever too. It's just everywhere whenever I want it to be, so it doesn't matter.

 

[Tyrolean]

I also don't care what others think of hockey (NHL style). It is a cold weather sport so in Canada, Russia, Sweden, Finland etc. I understand why is is so popular. Being in Canada the CFL is my second favourite sport. It's 100 times more exciting than the NFL. Baseball is incredibly boring and so is soccer. Basketball is somewhat exciting, but the baskets count so little compared to the sports.

Rugby surprisingly to me is interesting as there is always a lot of action.

 

[High five Tom]

Hockey is only #4 because American players are not the majority in NHL.

 

[WingsMJN2965]

 

[awfulwaffle]

I don't watch espn or listen to sports radio for NHL coverage. I'll listen to the nhl channel on Sirius and local team podcasts for nhl coverage. It is what it is with the place in pro sports. Considering nhl was on oln 15 years ago, compared to where they are today, progress.

I really don't care how popular it gets, ticket prices won't fall if and when the league gets a new us TV deal. The only thing I wish is the league makes more money through tv rights so it isn't as gate driven as it is now.

 

[awfulwaffle]

Hockey is only #4 because American players are not the majority in NHL.

Wrong. Just wrong.

 

[SJSharksfan39]

I like it where it's at. Basketball is so overhyped because of the individual personalities, and I wish someone would be more critical on the NFL product because while I'm a football fan, the product on the field has decreased over the years and the Refs are way too involved now.

 

[Dr Black]

It would be a shame if hockey stopped being overwhelmingly white? WTF is wrong with you?

MLB is 7% African American, 27% Latino, most are presumably non-White. The NFL is 68% African American, 4% Pacific Islander.
The NBA is 74% African American

As you can see, there is no shortage of diversity in North American professional sports. So why the hell it is such a problem for some people that ONE sport, namely hockey, is overwhelmingly 95% White?

So the question isn't, WTF is wrong with me. The question is, WTF wrong with you?

 

[Perfect_Drug]

All 4 of these sports are dwarfed by FIFA.
And FIFA is soon to be dwarfed by E-sports.


I still like hockey, despite it being a speck of dust in terms of viewership of DOTA 2.

And I make MONEY off of DOTA 2.