Hey NHL and NBC...Where Is The Puck?
What would be a great way for the NHL to make their game even less attractive to the millions of viewers out there that do not appreciate the sport? (I mean, other than having so many playoff games on the rather obscure Versus channel, a channel by and large only available on premium cable/satellite packages where the announcers stop giving a shit about the same time that the last east coast team is eliminated.)
Well, I think having NBC handle the broadcast coverage is an astute part of the NHL's strategy of suicide through obscurity.
During last night's game on NBC the telecast was so poor that at various times during the game these things were not visible; the puck, the blue lines, center ice, the face off circles, player's numbers on the light color sweaters, and even the heads of players wearing white helmets. All white objects burned into the background of a glaring white ice surface the likes of which has not been seen since the last blast on Bikini Island.
I love hockey and it was pure torture to watch. I watch every game I can during the regular season and playoffs. Most of this is done on Fox Sports Detroit where there is never this problem.
Hats off to NBC, Versus and the NHL. It works so much better when three guys are holding their own pistol.
2 comments:
So how do you feel about games 3 and 4 being broadcast in the US only on Versus?
(Get this: after last night's game, Versus broke-away to promote their new show "Sport Soup" - not a Top 100 sport/entertainment program IMHO - by delaying the postgame "Hockey Central" for 30 minutes so the audience could "enjoy" the fun!, hoping they'd stick around to then watch the postgame. The NHL is playing Russian Roulette with 5 bullets instead of 1 in their six shooter. You can thank Gary Bettman. Ass.)
I think that every year that the NHL insists on a television contract with an obscure cable-only channel for any of its Stanley Cup games it guarantees at least one more year of existence as the 4th major team sport.
For the most exciting of all the major sports to be largely ignored is a real injustice. Bettman has had long enough to get it turned around.
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