News

The National Hockey League is widely perceived to be a sport going nowhere in the United States.

Hockey? Hardly worthy of a place at the table with football, baseball and basketball.

But audience results from last Sunday afternoon suggest otherwise.

The NHL telecast on NBC (Boston Bruins-Pittsburgh Penguins and New York Rangers-New York Islanders regionally) drew a larger national audience than ABC's National Basketball Association telecast (Phoenix Suns-Sacramento Kings).

Each network earned a 1.0 rating (percentage of households tuned in), but NBC pulled in a larger audience share (percentage of time that people spent watching the telecast), 3 compared with 2. In total viewership, NBC outdrew ABC 1.31 million to 1.26 million.

These numbers do not reflect large gains made by the NHL. NBC's 1.0 rating matched its season average.

But ABC's 1.0 is the lowest ever for an NBA broadcast. The previous low was 1.1 for the Dallas Mavericks-New Jersey Nets on March 31, 2004.

From the perspective of the NHL, the numbers show that, on a good day, hockey is in the same ballpark as the NBA and even capable of posting a win.

ABC, for its Sunday NBA telecasts, has a season average rating of 1.9. NBC's NHL average is 1.0.

Remembering 1977

April 7 will mark the 30th anniversary of the Toronto Blue Jays' first-ever game, at Exhibition Stadium against the Chicago White Sox.

Don Chevrier called the game. Tony Kubek was the Jays' colour commentator in the early years, but he didn't work the first telecast. He had another commitment, and Whitey Ford, Kubek's New York Yankees teammate, filled in.

Here's a suggestion: On Saturday afternoon, April 7, the Jays will be in Tampa to play the Devil Rays. Chevrier lives in the area and so does Tom McKee, who worked as a host-reporter on the first telecast.

Why not bring them in, and Kubek or Ford as well, to commemorate the 30th anniversary? Show a few clips of the snowy opener in 1977. They could talk about the inaugural season and perhaps call the first inning or two of the Jays-Rays game.

No sport invokes tradition and history as much as baseball. That's what Rogers Sportsnet would be doing by bringing back the 1977 broadcast team.

Jays' extras

Sportsnet, the Jays' principal network (116 games), has added some production enhancements:

- On home telecasts, which will be shot in high-definition television, the audio has been upgraded to 5.1 surround sound.

- For selected games, including the home opener, Sportsnet will use a replay that tracks a pitch by applying a vapour trail to the ball and following it to the plate, where a box graphic shows the strike zone.

- Jamie Campbell will call the games along with a rotating group of colour commentators: Pat Tabler (55 games), Rance Mulliniks (44) and Darrin Fletcher (15). TSN, which will carry 20 games, will continue with Rod Black and Tabler in the booth. All home games will be shot in HDTV. The CBC will air eight Jays games, if any at all. An issue related to advertising needs to be settled.

- Most Jays games not carried on Canadian TV this season will be available to Rogers Cable digital customers, free of charge, the club said.

- The U.S. dispute concerning distribution of baseball's Extra Innings out-of-market pay channel has no impact in Canada. It's available on Rogers, which can sublicense the service to other cable companies.

FC's opener

Sportsnet president Doug Beeforth says the network will use its own play-by-play team to call Toronto FC's inaugural game next weekend against Chivas USA.

In Major League Soccer, the home team provides a host broadcast. Sportsnet will pick up the host feed, but will send announcer Gerry Dobson and analyst Craig Forrest to California to call the game, as well as two additional camera technicians and a producer.

Beeforth said the option of using the host play-by-play team was available, but rejected.

"At the end of the day, it wasn't the right thing to do," he said.

Sportsnet will air eight FC games, two at home and six on the road, all of which will be called by Dobson and Forrest.

The CBC and most likely Telelatino also will televise FC games, bringing the total to about 23 for the season.

Soccer on TV

Distributing a new channel, Setanta Sports Canada, on a digital tier rather than as a premium pay service is an option and perhaps even most likely, Shane O'Rourke, the president of North American operations for Setanta, says. SSC, which will be launched in the summer, will air about 200 English Premier League games in 2007-08.

- The Score produced its first Toronto Raptors HDTV telecast of the season on Wednesday. It will shoot the remaining regular-season Raptors games and playoff games in HDTV.

- As reported earlier, Hockey Night In Canada will begin shooting both the early and late games of the doubleheader in HDTV Saturday.