Stupid David Stern. He’s killing hockey.
Those two sentences normally wouldn’t make any sense at all, since Stern is the NBA’s commissioner. But the deal he struck last month between the NBA and ESPN is another shot in the gut for NHL fans.
Next season, NBC won’t be hosting any NBA games. Instead, ABC will carry about 15 games, with ESPN carrying some games, an new unnamed all-NBA cable channel will air some too, with TNT carrying the rest. Oh yeah, and then there is DirecTV. Next season they will continue to feature games on its NBA League Pass station.
So collectively, the NBA will be on TV Saturday through Sunday, and DirecTV will probably carry games on Friday nights. That means every night you’ll be able to watch the NBA in some way or another.
But what has this got to do with hockey? Sports Illustrated reported last week that ESPN won’t be airing NHL Hockey Night on Wednesday nights next season. An NBA double-header will be taking its place, and pro hockey may move to Thursday nights.
Of course, TNT has its NBA double-header Thursday nights, which draws higher ratings than the NHL, whereas on Wednesday nights, hockey always ran unopposed. To television executives, ratings are the only things that matter, and hockey ratings next season will take a huge hit if it moves to Thursdays.
David Stern and his TV buddies don’t care about the NHL. They have no reason to. But hockey fans do. Unlike baseball, basketball and football, hockey doesn’t draw “casual” viewers. You either love professional hockey or you don’t watch it. It’s that simple. Maybe it’s because the NHL is primarily aired on cable, so you have to make more of an effort to view the games. But that will be the case for the NBA next season. The football season primarily involves 16 Sundays, a day many people are lounging around anyway, so it draws high ratings. During the summer, baseball is the only active Big Four sport, so more people tune in. Now the NBA will be on about 28 channels next season.
Where does that leave the NHL? In a distant 4th place, behind the rest of the pack where it’s always been. Yeah, they have ABC coverage once in a while. Yeah, they have those occasional FOX weekend broadcasts. Technically, hockey can be seen five nights a week (save Mondays and Fridays) on ESPN, ESPN2, FOX and ABC. But ESPN is where pro hockey lives and breathes, and now one of its biggest nights just got turned over to the bigger fish.
The only channel the NHL will basically control among the Big Four will be ESPN2. While ESPN tends to carry games between two high-profile teams, the Deuce carries just as intriguing and exciting games. But again, it’s cable network, one that many cable providers don’t even include in their range of channels.
Maybe it won’t matter. Maybe if NHL Hockey night moves to Thursday opposite the NBA on TNT, hockey fans will still watch. They probably will. But I just hope NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman doesn’t let Stern just walk in and take Wednesday nights from him without a fight. He has spoken out that ESPN is committed to the NHL long-term. But now they’re also committed to the NBA, which will bring in more money than the NHL does.
But Bettman hasn’t made himself as big as he needs to be. If it’s because the NHL isn’t as popular in America as the other three, that’s just the reason he should be working harder. Bettman has created a lot more coverage for NHL games on ESPN and other channels during his tenure. But he runs a league that let teams leave Winnipeg, Quebec and Minnesota, and who approved teams opening in Atlanta, Tampa Bay, Columbus, Phoenix and Nashville. There are people who care about hockey in the South, but maybe, just maybe, the NHL ratings are dropping because teams keep leaving the most popular areas for hockey and playing in places where players drive to their arenas in convertibles. Gary should take Bud Selig’s new philosophy: contract teams that play where nobody cares.
The NHL will always be popular among its loyal fans. But when ESPN’s contract with the NHL expires in 2003-04, who knows if it will be dropped from the network. Maybe NBC would like to try their hand at hockey down the road. The best thing they’ve got going for them now is NASCAR (for the love of God, NASCAR), and they couldn’t do any worse with hockey than they did with the XFL. And that’s the bottom line, so give me a hell yeah!
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