ESPN at it again...

[OG6ix]

http://espn.go.com/

Go on their site and look where they placed the "NHL" tab behind friggen IRL racing. Go look down the list of their columns and features and they have NHL behind Womens basketball and fantasy sports.

Nothing on their video highlights in the main page. It's getting worse my friends.

Click to read more...

 

[One Day A Lion]

http://espn.go.com/

Go on their site and look where they placed the "NHL" tab behind friggen IRL racing. Go look down the list of their columns and features and they have NHL behind Womens basketball and fantasy sports.

Nothing on their video highlights in the main page. It's getting worse my friends.

I noticed that too.

The day after Evgeni Malkin scored the 2 goals in 1 game to have 7 goals in his first 6 games, ESPN mentioned it at the beginning of SportsCenter so I was like "wow they'll talk about hockey!"
When they got to the Malkin story, they showed some clips of his previous goals, said he scored 2 goals including an OT game winner and that he's the first player to do what he did in so long and that was pretty much it...no mention of anything else that happened in what was otherwise still a pretty damn good game. It was all over in two minutes. Needless to say, SportsCenter then went on to discuss the NFL games that had ended a few days before and discuss the NFL games that hadn't even happened yet for maybe an hour total.

 

[Snap Wilson]

So what? Who goes to ESPN to read about hockey anyway? Or IRL racing for that matter? The only real news they have revolves around Major League Baseball, the National Football League, the National Basketball League and men's NCAA football and basketball. Add tennis and golf, but only the major events (or if Tiger is prominently involved). Go ahead and check the front page headlines each day and see what percentage of their news is devoted to those five competitions.

I've written their ombudsman, George Solomon, about it. Eager to see if he addresses the issue.

 

[One Day A Lion]

So what? Who goes to ESPN to read about hockey anyway?

To tell the truth ESPN's hockey stuff on their site isn't all too bad they just need more TV coverage.

 

[NYYmt62]

I don't think we should read to much into the front page. If you notice, we are before the college sports, which I think would rank right behind NFL and MLB in the minds of ESPN. Maybe there is no rhyme or reason for the order of the cover page.

 

[Jazz]

John Buccigross (sp?) once mentioned on the radio that the order of tabs is a floating order, meaning that it is determined by the number of hits from the main (ie homepage) site within a given time period (I think the last 24 hrs).

This was a couple of years ago, so I'm not sure if it is still the case.

 

[hexrae]

I go to TSN.ca, NHL.com or yahoo sports for coverage. Why should we care about the exact ordering ESPN chooses?

 

[jBuds]

To tell the truth ESPN's hockey stuff on their site isn't all too bad they just need more TV coverage.

QFT.


I'm all about TSN, but I'd love a real American perspective on Hockey.. and I can't go anywhere to do that.

ESPN isn't bad, Bucci knows his stuff... they just get no time

 

[bictron]

Their fantasy updates are pretty good. Otherwise, I just watch FSN's FInal Score for short highlights, and since I don't want short highlights, I log on to yahoo or TSN or NHL.

The internet helps us hockey fans a lot more than any other sport.

 

[One Day A Lion]

T
The internet helps us hockey fans a lot more than any other sport.

Yeah, that's definitely true. For football or baseball I rarely check the internet unless a game just happened of my favorite teams.

 

[weezman]

.
Bucci knows his stuff...

... if knowing your stuff means gushing about contraction, and singing the praises of New England teams then yeah he knows his stuff.

Personally, between reading about bands, the Hartford Whalers, and his intense desire to be taken seriously in the hockey world, I don't think he knows much of anything.

 

[Stevedude530]

Seriously, I go to Versus' NHL page before I head to ESPN. They have some pretty good exclusive web content on video.

 

[OG6ix]

the versus page sucks!

 

[Cawz]

http://espn.go.com/

Go on their site and look where they placed the "NHL" tab behind friggen IRL racing. Go look down the list of their columns and features and they have NHL behind Womens basketball and fantasy sports.

Nothing on their video highlights in the main page. It's getting worse my friends.

I do like this article though - buy or sell.

http://sports.espn.go.com/nhl/columns/story?columnist=buccigross_john&id=2651405

 

[XX]

CNN, an american news channel, was showing clips from the Oilers-Habs game, including the hits and fights. Not sure why. ESPN would rather cover TO 24/7

 

[Stevedude530]

Who cares, we have a bigger network TV presence than the NBA.

 

[OG6ix]

Who cares, we have a bigger network TV presence than the NBA.

What are you talking about?

 

[Stevedude530]

We have more (at least playoff) games on national tv than the NBA.

 

[NYYmt62]

We have more (at least playoff) games on national tv than the NBA.

I don't think you are right. The first two games of the Stanley Cup Finals were shown on OLN. NBC only showed games three to seven. I am sure the NBA had quite a few games on ABC during the playoffs. And even so, during the season the NBA is on ESPN, TNT, and ABC on a regular basis. The NHL is on Versus and NBC.

 

[Stevedude530]

This season, we will have network TV coverage every Saturday and Sunday, something the NBA likely will not have.

 

[OG6ix]

This season, we will have network TV coverage every Saturday and Sunday, something the NBA likely will not have.

They will have much more money though.

 

[kdb209]

This season, we will have network TV coverage every Saturday and Sunday, something the NBA likely will not have.

Actually no - NHL on NBC games are Sundays only (9 weeks), NBA on ABC are Xmas Day plus Sundays (13 weeks).

It is a joke to try and compare the NHL US TV deals to the NBA.

NBA:
====
ABC:
- 13 weeks (Christmas Day and Sundays Jan 21 - Apr 15)
- Total of 25 games
- 16 National games
- 3 weeks have split regional coverage (3 games)
- 6 weeks have National or National/Regional double headers

TNT:
- Double header every Thurs night
- Total of 23 weeks (Nov 16 - Apr 12) / 46 Games

ESPN:
- 68 games on Weds, Fri, and Sun nights

NBA TV:
- 95 games - almost every day of the season

NHL:
====
NBC:
- Sunday Afternoons for 9 Weeks (Jan 13 - Apr 8)
- Only 1 game/wk
- Total of 26 Games
- All games are regional (2 or 3 games)

Versus:
- 56 games on Mon & Tues

And the most important comparison:

NBA:
- ABC/ESPN - $600M/yr ($2.4B / 4 yrs)
- TNT - $367M/yr ($2.2B / 6 yrs)
- NBA TV - league owned network

NHL:
- NBC: $0/yr - no guaranteed money, only shared revenues after costs
- Versus: $67.5M/yr ($135M / 2 yrs)

 

[Stevedude530]

I ment the playoffs, typo my bad.

 

[Butch 19]

This season, we will have network TV coverage every Saturday and Sunday, something the NBA likely will not have.

?? The NBA is on every freakin' day, on some BASIC cable channel. (ESPN, TBS, NBC, ESPN2, somewhere...)

The NHL is on Vs Mon & Tues. - NOT a basic cable channel.

What are you talking about?