NHL possibly getting bumped for a WNBA game

[joelef]

Who knows.

I think a big part of her 'draw' was the college aspect of it and the popularity of college sports.

if she can keep the same level of interest and elevate the WNBA good for her, i'm all for it.

I just don't see the college level popularity carrying through into the WNBA other than in the beginning maybe

It is what it is. A lot of fans have trouble connecting to a sport they never played. NHL is also tougher for the average fan to follow - it's largely non-stop action and it's tough to follow the puck at times, whereas every other major sport stops/starts frequently and you can clearly see what's going on with the ball at all times. How many goals do you have to watch slo-mo replays to see who/what it deflected off of before it went in? It's always going to be somewhat of a niche sport for those reasons alone.

Not sure what the big deal is about seeing the NHL grow in popularity for fans of the sport. What's the upside - higher ticket prices? The satisfaction of knowing that the players and owners will be making even more money? Maybe a little extra coverage on ESPN and sports radio?

The nhl wouldn’t be going with second rate brands like biostee

It is what it is. A lot of fans have trouble connecting to a sport they never played. NHL is also tougher for the average fan to follow - it's largely non-stop action and it's tough to follow the puck at times, whereas every other major sport stops/starts frequently and you can clearly see what's going on with the ball at all times. How many goals do you have to watch slo-mo replays to see who/what it deflected off of before it went in? It's always going to be somewhat of a niche sport for those reasons alone.

Not sure what the big deal is about seeing the NHL grow in popularity for fans of the sport. What's the upside - higher ticket prices? The satisfaction of knowing that the players and owners will be making even more money? Maybe a little extra coverage on ESPN and sports radio?

we wouldn’t be getting fanatics or never ended up on oln.

 

[Ace]

How many NHL playoff games will do a bigger rating than the WNBA draft did on Monday?

 

[HBK27]

Again if this was a random sharks vs coyotes game I could understand but we’re talking about freaking playoff game.

Yeah, and there's a whole lot of them when you have 15 different best-of-7 series going on over a 2 month period. That's 90 games if each series goes an average of 6 games. I'm a diehard hockey fan, but I'm sure as hell not tuning into close to every playoff game.

Again, as long as the game is available on one of the network, it's not a big deal.

 

[Barnum]

Again if this was a random sharks vs coyotes game I could understand but we’re talking about freaking playoff game.

And television is about ratings.

Dude, her last few tournament games absolutely crush the men’s tournament games in viewership by alot. Truth is, ESPN would have replaced NBA and MLB games for her debut because she is the “next biggest” thing ATM.


This really shouldn’t be this complicated or upsetting to anyone.

 

[joelef]

And television is about ratings.

Dude, her last few tournament games absolutely crush the men’s tournament games in viewership by alot. Truth is, ESPN would have replaced NBA and MLB games for her debut because she is the “next biggest” thing ATM.


This really shouldn’t be this complicated or upsetting to anyone.

Not playoff games though.

 

[GKJ]

How many NHL playoff games will do a bigger rating than the WNBA draft did on Monday?

Possibly the finals since they’re on ABC

 

[HBK27]

The nhl wouldn’t be going with second rate brands like biostee

we wouldn’t be getting fanatics or never ended up on oln.

Who gives a shit what sports drink the league promotes? Would seeing Gatorade bottles on the bench made the viewing experience any better?

MLB is hugely popular and they're going through massive issues with Fanatics. That's just a matter of the league going to the highest bidder.

A lot of people for whatever reason cheered the NHL going to ESPN, but I hate their coverage and enjoyed things a lot more when they were on NBC Sports. ESPN caters their broadcasts to non-hockey fans, which is why you end up with idiotic things like the names of players appearing on the screen during powerplays.

 

[Barnum]

Not playoff games though.

Yeah playoff games too. You can keep throwing down caveats and spinning scenarios all you want, it doesn’t change the fact that Clark equals high ratings for a TV network, bigger than most sport’s leagues, male or female.

There are bigger things to worry about than WTF ESPN is airing. Your game is still going to be televised.

 

[joelef]

Who gives a shit what sports drink the league promotes? Would seeing Gatorade bottles on the bench made the viewing experience any better?

MLB is hugely popular and they're going through massive issues with Fanatics. That's just a matter of the league going to the highest bidder.

A lot of people for whatever reason cheered the NHL going to ESPN, but I hate their coverage and enjoyed things a lot more when they were on NBC Sports. ESPN caters their broadcasts to non-hockey fans, which is why you end up with idiotic things like the names of players appearing on the screen during powerplays.

When did fanatics become the official jersey partner of the nhl?

When did fanatics become the official jersey partner of the nhl?

Excuse me mlb?

 

[The Gr8 Dane]

I don't understand people saying this is an embarrassing look for the NHL.

How many times do we have to tell you guys nobody watches the sport , its a niche sport played on ice. What are you guys going on about in here.
Watch or don't watch , why cry on the internet ?
Most Canadians don't even follow/play the sport

 

[joelef]

I don't understand people saying this is an embarrassing look for the NHL.

How many times do we have to tell you guys nobody watches the sport , its a niche sport played on ice. What are you guys going on about in here.

Well apparently now more then the wnba

 

[tarheelhockey]

According to the survey I posted, NASCAR is more popular than the NHL in the States

The survey you posted tells us how many people responded to a survey that they “like to watch” those leagues on television.

That’s a different matter than the number of people who actually follow and watch those leagues.

- NASCAR has stopped publishing attendance figures due to the bad story they tell, but it’s universally understood that they’re drawing something like half to two-thirds of the 3.5 million spectators they drew in 2013. The NHL just set a historic high with over 22.5 million this year.

- Take the same exercise and apply it to television ratings. There are only 41 NASCAR races a year, including playoffs, and only 21 are shown on broadcast television (the remainder stashed away on FS1 and USA). The NHL broadcasts roughly 1400 games including playoffs, with more games on ABC/ESPN than the entire NASCAR schedule.

- While NASCAR is more popular in some parts of rural middle America, the NHL is by far and away more popular in the large population centers. On a day to day basis, this impacts everything from merch sales to sports radio.

- And then there’s the participatory side. Few people play hockey recreationally. Virtually nobody races cars recreationally.


It’s not even that the NHL is all that popular compared to the other big leagues, but NASCAR has fallen off sharply since their heyday 20+ years ago while the NHL has grown slowly and steadily.

Whether or not college sports are included in the "big 4 sports" is completely subjective. Sports fans in many areas around the US would say they are. College football is a religion in the Southeast.

If you’re counting pro separately from college, then football and basketball take up the entire “big 4”. That doesn’t make any sense.

 

[BB79]

Not sure what the big deal is about seeing the NHL grow in popularity for fans of the sport. What's the upside - higher ticket prices? The satisfaction of knowing that the players and owners will be making even more money? Maybe a little extra coverage on ESPN and sports radio?

Don't forget, more money for the billionaire owners and millionaire players. What do we fans get with game growth? Higher ticket prices and merchandise prices? Pay more for streaming packages so we can watch? They win, we lose. So, don't really care for the "growing the game" crowd. I'd actually rather it stay niche, and I don't watch any other sports anymore anyways.

 

[Grifter3511]

Who gives a shit what sports drink the league promotes? Would seeing Gatorade bottles on the bench made the viewing experience any better?

MLB is hugely popular and they're going through massive issues with Fanatics. That's just a matter of the league going to the highest bidder.

A lot of people for whatever reason cheered the NHL going to ESPN, but I hate their coverage and enjoyed things a lot more when they were on NBC Sports. ESPN caters their broadcasts to non-hockey fans, which is why you end up with idiotic things like the names of players appearing on the screen during powerplays.

I love that you ask 'what the big deal is' with the NHL getting outviewed, and the poster's only response is, 'they'd have better sports drink sponsors.' LOFL. Of all the possibly irrelevant reasons one could be concerned about the size of the NHL's footprint, that's got to be pretty damn near the bottom of the list.

 

[BB79]

A lot of people for whatever reason cheered the NHL going to ESPN, but I hate their coverage and enjoyed things a lot more when they were on NBC Sports. ESPN caters their broadcasts to non-hockey fans, which is why you end up with idiotic things like the names of players appearing on the screen during powerplays.

Those people are called stupid NBC broadcasts were 100 times better than ABC and ESPN. I hate that they went back.

 

[Il Stugotz]

The single elimination format of the NCAA tournament generates a ton of interest (every game is game 7!), as does an exciting player's first pro game. Obviously interest will wane during the WNBA regular season, but viewership and attendance will likely be up in general.

I think hockey suffers a bit from our collective attention deficit. It rewards sustained attention. Football, our most popular sport, requires sporadic attention, like 15 minutes over 3 hours.

I also don't think it's necessary for the NHL to market individual players in the same way as basketball, which is much more driven by stars who play almost entire games and are basically guaranteed to score some points. Instead, I think the smart thing to do would be to market games between good teams and between intense rivals. That outlook matches the team-first ethos of hockey since individual personality expression is so heavily policed anyway.

 

[vancityluongo]

It may be depressing to all of us, but Caitlin Clark is a much bigger sports star than Connor McDavid, Auston Matthews, or any other hockey player.

Many more Americans know who Caitlin Clark is.

it's not even just clark. angel reese laps matthews or mcdavid in searches

it's been trending this way for a long time. american celebrities are highly invested in women's basketball. they don't care about hockey.

the wnba is objectively still well behind the nhl, and you can make an argument that reese/clark won't stay household names forever - the reigning MVP in breanna stewart barely registers relative to crosby/ovechkin (closer to household names given that they've been around forever and play in the US) - but when you see the coverage ionescu got from being in the NBA all-star game, it's pretty clear that there's much more upside for women's basketball players.

take this last one for whatever it's worth:

 

[MuckOG]

The survey you posted tells us how many people responded to a survey that they “like to watch” those leagues on television.

That’s a different matter than the number of people who actually follow and watch those leagues.

- NASCAR has stopped publishing attendance figures due to the bad story they tell, but it’s universally understood that they’re drawing something like half to two-thirds of the 3.5 million spectators they drew in 2013. The NHL just set a historic high with over 22.5 million this year.

- Take the same exercise and apply it to television ratings. There are only 41 NASCAR races a year, including playoffs, and only 21 are shown on broadcast television (the remainder stashed away on FS1 and USA). The NHL broadcasts roughly 1400 games including playoffs, with more games on ABC/ESPN than the entire NASCAR schedule.

- While NASCAR is more popular in some parts of rural middle America, the NHL is by far and away more popular in the large population centers. On a day to day basis, this impacts everything from merch sales to sports radio.

- And then there’s the participatory side. Few people play hockey recreationally. Virtually nobody races cars recreationally.


It’s not even that the NHL is all that popular compared to the other big leagues, but NASCAR has fallen off sharply since their heyday 20+ years ago while the NHL has grown slowly and steadily.



If you’re counting pro separately from college, then football and basketball take up the entire “big 4”. That doesn’t make any sense.

When a network is making a decision about which sport to televise, they are going with the one that gives them the most eyeballs for that game. Not what sport has the largest attendance over an entire season. A NASCAR event will have more viewers than Game 7 of the Cup Finals in many markets around the US. Same goes for college hoops and football.

Plus, as hockey fans, we all know that the sport doesn't translate to television as well as the other big sports.

As far as your comment about "virtually nobody" races cars recreationally. Where I live, many people race cars recreationally. The local dirt tracks are filled to capacity on any weekend in the summer.

 

[Machinehead]

Caitlin Clark is most significant prospect in pro sports since LeBron James.

That game would outdraw anything happening that day unless it was the Superbowl.

 

[tarheelhockey]

When a network is making a decision about which sport to televise, they are going with the one that gives them the most eyeballs for that game. Not what sport has the largest attendance over an entire season.

That’s got nothing to do with which league is more popular.

If the NHL had 32 Winter Classics instead of an 82-game regular season for each team, they’d average more eyeballs on each game. That doesn’t mean it would be a more popular league. The fact that it rolls out 100K+ ticket-buying fans night after night for months on end is evidence of its greater general popularity than a sport that struggles to draw 50K twice a month.

Plus, as hockey fans, we all know that the sport doesn't translate to television as well as the other big sports.

Which, again, is why the question “which do you like to watch on TV?” is not a stand-in for general popularity.

As far as your comment about "virtually nobody" races cars recreationally. Where I live, many people race cars recreationally. The local dirt tracks are filled to capacity on any weekend in the summer.

And I can go down to the local park on Saturday and see a bunch of people flying kites. That doesn’t mean a large number of people fly kites, just that I am going to the one place where all of them congregate.

I’m from North Carolina, the grassroots autosports heartland. I would bet my house that there are more hockey players in NC than amateur auto racers, unless we’re counting 16 year olds showing off their modded Civics in front of the local Walmart on Friday night.

 

[MuckOG]

That’s got nothing to do with which league is more popular.

If the NHL had 32 Winter Classics instead of an 82-game regular season for each team, they’d average more eyeballs on each game. That doesn’t mean it would be a more popular league.




Which, again, is why the question “which do you like to watch on TV?” is not a stand-in for general popularity.



And I can go down to the local park on Saturday and see a bunch of people flying kites. That doesn’t mean a large number of people fly kites, just that I am going to the one place where all of them congregate.

I’m from North Carolina, the grassroots autosports heartland. I would bet my house that there are more hockey players in NC than amateur auto racers, unless we’re counting 16 year olds showing off their modded Civics in front of the local Walmart on Friday night.

I'm not sure what point(s) you are trying to make. Are you saying that NHL games have higher television ratings than the other sports I listed? If you are going by tv ratings, the NHL is not in the big 4 sports in the US.

 

[Poppy Whoa Sonnet]

Who knows.

I think a big part of her 'draw' was the college aspect of it and the popularity of college sports.

if she can keep the same level of interest and elevate the WNBA good for her, i'm all for it.

I just don't see the college level popularity carrying through into the WNBA other than in the beginning maybe

I think she's going to become a major cultural force in america, tons of endorsements, a lifestyle brand basically with an atheltic wear brand making her the female Air Jordan. She's not going away if she can stay relatively healthy and effective.

She's probably more famous than every single active NHL player in America already and it's gonna grow.

 

[Machinehead]

Here's my thing, though. For the people in this thread who want hockey to be more popular...why??

It costs me $200 to sit in the 200's at the Rangers game. For $100, I can go to the Liberty game and sit in 7th row.

Popularity just makes your consumption more expensive.

 

[tarheelhockey]

I'm not sure what point(s) you are trying to make.

I made them clear in my first reply:

- NASCAR is not more popular than hockey in the USA.

- College football and basketball are not counted separately than pro football and basketball when people say “big 4 sports”.

Are you saying that NHL games have higher television ratings than the other sports I listed? If you are going by tv ratings, the NHL is not in the big 4 sports in the US.

And again, if you go by average TV ratings, the second most popular sport in the world after soccer is bicycle racing.

Average TV ratings are not a reliable measure of a sport’s general popularity.

 

[Grifter3511]

Here's my thing, though. For the people in this thread who want hockey to be more popular...why??

It costs me $200 to sit in the 200's at the Rangers game. For $100, I can go to the Liberty game and sit in 7th row.

Popularity just makes your consumption more expensive.

Because we live in a world where people define themselves by the things they like, and finding out that others don't value your favourite player/team/league as much as you do is a personal affront.