In 2021, when the NHL announced its new television deal with ESPN and Disney, I, for one, was pretty excited. I already had a subscription to Hulu, ESPN+, and Disney+, so now that a bag of pucks full of NHL games was going to be at my fingertips most nights, I dusted off my jersey and was ready to make another dent in my living room couch.
But two years later, and after countless battles with digital ads and regional blackouts, NHL TV ratings downand fans all over North America are not happy. What happened?
Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like digital ads are going away, even if they are. causing crises among some fans (yes, that’s absolutely true). Plus, for the casual fan, it’s hard enough to follow the game and the puck, but now that you’re dealing with digital ads, it can be even harder. Not really a good idea if you’re trying to introduce new fans to the greatest game in the world.
While this all goes against digital ads, the NHL is happy for the extra revenue stream and at the end of the day, they are a business so the almighty dollar is all that matters. Unfortunately, we are going to have to make do with digital ads for the foreseeable future. I hope they wake up a little bit as the playoffs get closer and at the very least not air them then, but I am not holding my breath. This brings us to our next topic, and it is an important one, regional blackouts.
As someone who lives in Northeastern Pennsylvania and is a Boston Bruins fan (I grew up outside of Boston and have been a fan since 1990, so don’t you dare call me a fanatic), it was always difficult to watch games before this new TV deal. I tried to pay the $50 for NHLTV, but it was an absolute joke, and I ended up canceling that subscription within 72 hours. Like many in a similar situation, I resorted to illegal streaming or just watching highlights on YouTube the next morning. It reminds me that even now, if you try to watch highlights on YouTube, it’s usually just goals, and sometimes they don’t even show replays of the winning goals, what a waste. Overall, this is just not an ideal situation for the league or the fans. Plus, this problem at least seems like a pretty easy fix.
I’m not going to sit here and bore you with the nuances of TV deals, streaming rights, and all that other capitalist mumbo jumbo, partly because I don’t get it and I don’t care. But I can tell you that I know that if you’re trying to develop a game and attract new fans without angering your existing ones, your product has to be fairly accessible to everyone.
This all reminded me of when NBC got the rights to the English Premier League (I know, I know, an American watching soccer is gross). I was excited at the time because I thought I would finally be able to watch some good Premier League games. Instead, they tried to force me to use their streaming service, Peacock, if I wanted to watch good soccer games. Major League Baseball Takes Steps to Address Regional Power Outage Issue and I think the NHL should take a long, hard look at what they’re doing or maybe even get together with MLB to address this issue.
The above tweet is just one of many from frustrated fans across North America who can’t seem to get their favorite team on or off the market. I wish I could make sense of it, but I can’t, and that’s too bad; hockey, and the NHL in particular, is one of the best products in the world. Sometimes it’s hard to see, and a big saying making the rounds on social media and in the comments sections right now is “Best sport, worst league,” it breaks my heart to see it.
That said, when it comes to the Stanley Cup Playoffs, the NHL’s product is even better, and it doesn’t take a genius to figure out why. The games, the intensity, and the emotion are simply incredible, and the Stanley Cup is objectively the greatest trophy in all of sports, while also being one of the hardest to win. It’s also no coincidence that around this time of year, the NHL almost always sees a ratings spike while making every playoff game available on one of its networks (a truly shocking thing).
Overall, the NHL needs to find better ways to communicate with fans and capitalize on this incredible sport instead of hiding everything behind a paywall. Oh, and sorry to sound like an old guy yelling at kids to get off his lawn, but get rid of those damn digital ads!
