Sportsnet - Zero Bingo Coverage

[stigs17]

Sent an email to Sportsnet (http://www.sportsnet.ca/contact/) given their pathetic and unbalanced pro-Toronto AHL coverage. Unless you love their non-stop Marlies coverage, hit them up like I did!


To Whom It May Concern:

A fan of your station, I would like to congratulate the recent decision to replay condensed versions of the Toronto Blue Jays 1992 World Series games. Still, given how long Sportsnet has waited to air these momentous games, I find it odd your station consciously chose to air edited versions. If, after over 20 years, you are to finally air these classics, why not do it right and show the entire pregame and postgame shows? For example, game 2 - to be aired today - which lasted 3:30 from opening pitch to last pitch (or well over 4:30 with the pregame and postgame) has been condensed to 3 hours - including commercials and in-studio segments with Jamie Campbell and the noticeably absent Gregg Zaun - who are excellent.

Even the historic game 6, which took 4:07 from opening to closing pitch, plus an extensive pregame and lengthy postgame celebration - well over the 6-hour mark from the original telecast (which I have) - has been condensed to 4 hours, yet actually significantly less with Rogers' lengthy commercials. Why not break it into two three-hour segments, and even bring back a couple of the heroes in studio with Jamie, who is always right on target?

***

On another front, it is rather evident to any half-awake hockey fan that Rogers fully endorses and supports the Toronto Marlies (a Mickey-Mouse sub-.500 team for many years with modest .500 success this year), meanwhile blatantly ignoring the elite teams in the league. While slow news days do happen, it is perplexing to see a trivial Marlies story 'Burke pleased with Leaf prospects' leading your entire website for two days now (http://www.sportsnet.ca/).

As an example of the pro-Toronto, anti-Canadian coverage, consider the elite Binghamton Senators, who won the AHL title 18 months ago and are still the team with the highest winning percentage in the AHL. A regular Sportsnet viewer, I have not seen even one single game or even meagre highlight of the AHL Champions! Instead, Canada has involuntarily suffered with the mediocre Marlies games and meaningless KHL highlights rammed down their throats ad nauseum. The NHL lockout was well known to any insider in the summer, thus given the ample time to prepare, I find the profound lack of balanced AHL coverage hard to comprehend.

***

Your smarmy primetime Connected host, Ken Reid, is an embarrassment to the profession. Relentlessly superficial, overenthusiastic and obnoxious, on a nightly basis he is confirming why he failed miserably in a minor role at the failed RO news in Ottawa. For a lesson on expert Canadian broadcasting, please refer to Darren Dutchyshen and Jennifer Hedger at TSN. They exhibit a perfect balance of relaxed confidence and subtle humour which is never forced. A stark contrast to the likes of Reid and many other superficial and unlikeable Connected hosts.

Hopefully your station has the insight to see the immediate need for improvement in the noted areas.

Best Regards,

Click to read more...

 

[Benjamin]

They are pro-views not pro-marlies.

 

[OmniSens]

I find it really pathetic...

 

[Buck Aki Berg]

Shocker: an AHL team in the biggest city in Canada is a bigger ratings hit in Canada than an AHL team in a fourth-tier American outpost that you and I wouldn't know existed if there wasn't an AHL team there.

 

[Qward]

Another reason to move them to Kingston. We at least have Cogeco.

 

[BonkTastic]

They are pro-views not pro-marlies.

Haha, this.

If the Regina Pats brought in good national ratings, then S-Net would have a weekly "Friday Night Hockey In Regina" game.

They don't. And therefore they don't.

Marlies>>>>>B-sens as far as viewership goes. If our farm team were in Canada, that might change, but as long as our AHL team is in small-town upstate NY, there will be near-zero interest from Canadian broadcasters to carry the games.

 

[CanadianHockey]

Not sure why ratings precludes them from acquiring the rights to show Bingo games regionally.

 

[Qward]

I think there is a happy medium here.

Sportsnet has multiple channels.

Could they not put Marlies/bluejays on all but Sportsnet-O which is the Ottawa channel? Or even Sportsnet-Sens?

 

[GK]

I think there is a happy medium here.

Sportsnet has multiple channels.

Could they not put Marlies/bluejays on all but Sportsnet-O which is the Ottawa channel? Or even Sportsnet-Sens?

Waaait, I'm confused. Are you saying you don't want Toronto Blue Jays baseball in Ottawa?

 

[BonkTastic]

Not sure why ratings precludes them from acquiring the rights to show Bingo games regionally.

I doubt that there is any return-on-investment at all.

Why acquire the rights to something if you know the ratings are going to be bad?

Ratings = revenue.

 

[Qward]

Waaait, I'm confused. Are you saying you don't want Toronto Blue Jays baseball in Ottawa?

You get all the sportsnet channels if you buy the sports package, at least that is how it is with Bell.

If you want to watch baseball, tune into the sportsnet blah, want to watch marlies, tune into sportsnet bluh

 

[General Granny*]

I wish we just move our farm team already. Southern Ontario like in Markham or something

 

[God Says No]

i get it's all about the ratings, but it wouldn't kill them to show at least one game. one *** game. but hey i guess we can watch marlies vs. bulldogs for the 10th time.

 

[BonkTastic]

i get it's all about the ratings, but it wouldn't kill them to show at least one game. one *** game. but hey i guess we can watch marlies vs. bulldogs for the 10th time.

I have to say, it's fairly easy for a station centered in the GTA to show home games of two teams also centered in the GTA.

It's like: Sportsnet has the two farm teams of the country's CLEARLY two most popular teams within a half-hour drive of them. Makes sense.

 

[jbeck5]

Not sure why ratings precludes them from acquiring the rights to show Bingo games regionally.

This is my concern aswell. I'm sure marlies games get more viewers across canada then bingo games....but i doubt marlies games get more viewers in the ottawa area then bingo games. So why not acquire the feed(without sending a crew) and just broadcast the american feed fairly cheaply? I don't see why they don't do that. If regionally we got bingo games, you could double, if not triple the ottawa area viewers while not affecting other areas viewers.

 

[BonkTastic]

This is my concern aswell. I'm sure marlies games get more viewers across canada then bingo games....but i doubt marlies games get more viewers in the ottawa area then bingo games. So why not acquire the feed(without sending a crew) and just broadcast the american feed fairly cheaply? I don't see why they don't do that. If regionally we got bingo games, you could double, if not triple the ottawa area viewers while not affecting other areas viewers.

Because even if more Ottawa viewers watched Bingo games than Marlies game (which I agree would probably happen), the issue isn't whether Bingo would out-draw the Marlies, it's whether enough people in Ottawa would tune in to B-Sens games to offset the cost of purchasing the rights to the games themselves. There's no guarantee that it's financially feasible for them.

It costs NOTHING for Sportsnet to show Marlies games in Ottawa, because they've already recovered their initial costs by showing them in the larger Toronto market.

Also: unfortunately, it seems as though Ottawa valley is still like 1/4 Leafs fans, at minimum. So Marlies games already, for argument's sake, get 1/4 of the AHL-watching demographic in Ottawa. Would the cost of purchasing the AHL Bingo broadcast rights be worth it to increase their Ottawa-Valley viewership by 50%?

Also: what is the quality of the Binghamton broadcasts? I've only ever seen the streamed online, which isn't a good way for me to analyze their regular quality, so I can't say for sure. If the standard Bingo broadcasts are not up to Sportsnet's minimum quality requirements, then that's also an issue.

 

[CanadianHockey]

Because even if more Ottawa viewers watched Bingo games than Marlies game (which I agree would probably happen), the issue isn't whether Bingo would out-draw the Marlies, it's whether enough people in Ottawa would tune in to B-Sens games to offset the cost of purchasing the rights to the games themselves. There's no guarantee that it's financially feasible for them.

It costs NOTHING for Sportsnet to show Marlies games in Ottawa, because they've already recovered their initial costs by showing them in the larger Toronto market.

Also: unfortunately, it seems as though Ottawa valley is still like 1/4 Leafs fans, at minimum. So Marlies games already, for argument's sake, get 1/4 of the AHL-watching demographic in Ottawa. Would the cost of purchasing the AHL Bingo broadcast rights be worth it to increase their Ottawa-Valley viewership by 50%?

Also: what is the quality of the Binghamton broadcasts? I've only ever seen the streamed online, which isn't a good way for me to analyze their regular quality, so I can't say for sure. If the standard Bingo broadcasts are not up to Sportsnet's minimum quality requirements, then that's also an issue.

Sportsnet aired a Panthers game using a jumbotron for video... I doubt quality is the principle reason they haven't acquired Bingo rights.

 

[God Says No]

I have to say, it's fairly easy for a station centered in the GTA to show home games of two teams also centered in the GTA.

It's like: Sportsnet has the two farm teams of the country's CLEARLY two most popular teams within a half-hour drive of them. Makes sense.

i know it makes sense, but they also have shown abbotsford, oklahoma city, chicago and st.john's games as well. these are all affiliates of canadian nhl teams which are not in the gta area last time i checked. so lets review which teams have been represented so far:

- toronto - check
- montreal - check
- calgary - check
- edmonton - check
- vancouver - check
- winnipeg - check
- ottawa - nope

 

[John Holmes*]

It is a business.

It is arguable that the least popular Canadian team's AHL affiliate in Buttfark nowhere, upstate New York doesn't seem all that attractive to the Sportsnet suits.

Do they not play the Marlies or another Canadian affiliate any time soon?

 

[BonkTastic]

Sportsnet aired a Panthers game using a jumbotron for video... I doubt quality is the principle reason they haven't acquired Bingo rights.

Haha, yeah, I forgot about that. I think the quality issue was more me playing devil's advocate.

Still think that it's the $$$ why we don't have Bingo games in Ottawa.

 

[BUCKLE UP]

People are paying for Sportsnet Sens right? Why not show a few games on that channel?

 

[BK201]

Wow surprised the Rogers owned sports net show more Rogers owned leafs programs...

 

[Ski]

Bottom line BSens are contractual to Time Warner Cable in NYS (which also covers Fox Sports in other US markets..hence the coverage for the Calder Cup playoffs in 2011)

 

[PatrickEaves]

i know it makes sense, but they also have shown abbotsford, oklahoma city, chicago and st.john's games as well. these are all affiliates of canadian nhl teams which are not in the gta area last time i checked. so lets review which teams have been represented so far:

- toronto - check
- montreal - check
- calgary - check
- edmonton - check
- vancouver - check
- winnipeg - check
- ottawa - nope

I think this is the main issue.

If they ONLY showed Marlies games, you could say it's because they are based in Toronto and it's easy for them.

If they ONLY showed Marlies and Bulldogs games, you could at least say Ontario teams are easy for them.

If they ONLY showed Marlies, Bulldogs, and IceCaps games, you could at least say it's a Canadian rights issues in that they can only show teams that are based in Canada.

But they have showed games from every single Canadian team affiliate EXCEPT the Sens.

 

[God Says No]

I think this is the main issue.

If they ONLY showed Marlies games, you could say it's because they are based in Toronto and it's easy for them.

If they ONLY showed Marlies and Bulldogs games, you could at least say Ontario teams are easy for them.

If they ONLY showed Marlies, Bulldogs, and IceCaps games, you could at least say it's a Canadian rights issues in that they can only show teams that are based in Canada.

But they have showed games from every single Canadian team affiliate EXCEPT the Sens.

bingo! (yes, that is a pun. keep walking)

p.s. i can't believe "f ' n" is censored on this site.