National Hockey League Embraces TV Placeshifting

Egadfly writes "The 'placeshifting' technology that allows digitally recorded shows to be watched in several locations is growing increasingly popular. One particular reason for this popularity is because it enables sports fans to view locally blacked-out games over the Internet. The National Hockey League (NHL) has announced that it will actively support placeshifting by signing an agreement with SlingBox-maker Sling Media. The agreement will allow the company's "Clip+Sling" technologyto share both live and recorded NHL programming over the Internet. Significantly, this has happened only days after Major League Baseball (MLB) launched a public denunciation of placeshifting, accusing SlingBox owners of violating the law by sending television content over the Internet and accusing Sling Media itself of violating contracts with cable and satellite TV companies."

NHL on versus

[jonpublic]

They could just put the games on a real network instead of Versus. Half of the Detroit market couldn't see half the playoff games the Wings were in.This works too, I'll be able to actually watch games instead of having to drive to my folks house. This won't help the NHL from continuing to alienate their less technical audience.

http://sportsbiznews.blogspot.com/2007/05/nhl-spor ts-league-that-sports-fans-cant.html [blogspot.com]

You're absolutely correct.

[attemptedgoalie]

Not to bash the southern teams too badly, but they don't fill the buildings, they don't watch the local broadcasts, etc.

New Jersey can't sell out playoff games, so it's not a uniquely southern issue. If the on-ice product is so boring you have to advertise the competition coming to town, you have a problem.

The biggest problem with those teams is that they were the markets that were easy to expand to. Which meant more teams with the same number of quality players. So the league is diluted and bums are allowed to skate with future legends. Some of those bums attack other players because they aren't all that great at an NHL level without it. Scott Stevens, I'm looking at you.

I love what Don Cherry said during Game 4. People who believe that Americans won't watch hockey because it's too violent are crazy. Americans watch football, and ultimate fighting and Nascar. They don't watch them for incredible skills, they watch for the hits. Unlike football, ultimate fighting and Nascar, hockey has hits AND skill. Anybody who believes differently has probably never put on a pair of ice skates.

One last thing, I have no doubt that one reason that fewer Americans watched was because a Canadian team was in the finals. Everybody I talked to about the games were in two camps. The ones cheering on Anaheim weren't watching the games and just hated Canada. The ones watching each game intently were cheering for Ottawa.

Re:You're absolutely correct.

[kaufmanmoore]

What do you mean the Southern teams don't fill the buildings, the bottom 6 in attendance this year were
25 Boston
26 New Jersey
27 Washington
28 NY Islanders
29 Chicago
30 St. Louis

Tampa Bay was #3 with an average of 19,876. Hockey just doesn't televise well in standard def, its not because of not being able to see the puck, its because you can't see the play develop and the action off the puck

Canada vs. US TV ratings

[Anonymous Coward]

From the CBC [www.cbc.ca]:

Ratings on CBC's Hockey Night in Canada were about the same as last year's Edmonton-Carolina tilt through the first four games of the final, but down 16 per cent from Calgary-Tampa Bay in 2004.

A poll by Decima Research before the Anaheim-Ottawa series suggested 24 per cent of Canadians felt Toronto is Canada's representative hockey team, compared to 22 per cent for Montreal and just 15 per cent for the Senators.

Yet with the Senators facing elimination, not a single federal MP bothered to offer a statement of support Wednesday in the House of Commons.

Still, Canada's hockey fervour simply eclipses support in the far larger American market.

NBC recorded the network's lowest-ever rating for a prime time program when it broadcast Game 3 from Ottawa on Saturday night. In a market 10 times larger, NBC got less than half the 2.6 million viewers who watched the game in Canada.

Even in Anaheim's Orange County home, things aren't exactly ducky.

Only a small percentage of southern Californians follow hockey, not surprising given the many competing pro sports and a climate fit for bikinis rather than balaclavas.

Those who support the Ducks are keen - the team sold out its last 34 home games, including Wednesday night - but the interest is not widespread.

When a restaurant on the Pacific Ocean 20 kilometres to the west of the Honda Center set out a sidewalk sign announcing Monday's game from Ottawa would be shown on a widescreen TV, the few folks on hand paid little attention to the action. Staff wouldn't turn off the music so the play-by-play audio could be heard.

That would be incomprehensible on Ottawa's Sens Mile, some 30 kilometres east of Scotiabank Place.

Most bars along the Elgin Street strip were full by 5:30 p.m. ET Wednesday, almost three hours before game time, and after the puck dropped in Anaheim the only sounds on the street were the muffled play-by-play of CBC's Bob Cole and roaring fan reaction - both inside and out.

Lineups at the bigger establishments remained three deep on the sidewalk as fans watched the game through open windows.

Great Move By the Struggling NHL

[JelloJoe]

This is a great move by the NHL. This won't cause the Center Ice package to lose money, since you can't actually watch the sling + clip clips live.
I have a HD-DVR cable box, so i can control my dvr and cable box all from my slingbox. Being on the road 4 out of 5 days a week, slingbox has been a lifesaver. And being a fan of the NHL, i can actually enjoy my center ice package using the slingbox.

NHL players have also embraced this technology. The NJ Devils were given Slingboxes as a Christmas present. I know that a bunch of them use it on the road to follow other teams/friends.

The NHL struggles with viewership. My solution, put it back on ESPN!!! The coverage on ESPN is so much better than NBC/Versus. Get that boring-ass Bill Clement off the air and that moronic Brett Hull off the air as well. Mike "Doc" Emerick is the only good thing they got going for them. Also, shrink the league so that they get rid of any team that doesn't have atleast 5 days of snow a year!

I really should work for the NHL, I'd turn it around real quick.

Re:Um yeah....about that

[hawkeesk8]

Well, there are about 30 million Canadians that would have to strongly disagree. Oh, but I forgot, the world does not exist outside of the United States. All sarcasm aside, Hockey Night in Canada, the regular Saturday night hockey program carried by CBC is so popular that the ad revenues from that program alone basically carry the entire network. Don Cherry and Ron Mclean, the shows hosts, their salaries rival that of the top news anchor on the network - and may have even surpassed it.

They did themselves in

[tknn]

Chicago used to be a big hockey town before they started blacking out games if they weren't sold out. Guess what? A whole generation basically never watched the games on TV and now they have no fans. Not that I really care about hockey.