Your Announcers and Open Thread For Night 22 of the 2011 Stanley Cup Playoffs
May 4, 2011 27 Comments
Washington vs. Tampa Bay, Game 4, 7:00 p.m. ET
National TV (US): NHL Network
National TV (Canada): TSN
Play by Play: Gord Miller
Inside the Glass: Pierre McGuire
Philadelphia vs. Boston, Game 3, 7:00 p.m. ET
National TV (US): VERSUS
Play by Play: Mike Emrick
Color: Eddie Olczyk
Inside the Glass: Darren Pang
National TV (Canada): CBC
Play by Play: Bob Cole
Color: Gary Galley
Reporter: Elliotte Friedman
San Jose vs. Detroit, Game 3, 8:00 p.m. ET
National TV (US): VERSUS (Joined in Progress)
National TV (Canada): TSN 2
Play by Play: Chris Cuthbert
Inside the Glass: Ray Ferraro
Puck The Media 
have the caps or lightning been on vs too much or is this the influence of NBC affecting vs for game choices? you’d think a potential series clincher would be the national game for vs. guess, they are trying to entice hockey fans/sports viewers to nhl network.
I disagree. A series with a team leading 3-0 is boring and a lot less interesting than the game of PHIL_BOS. with Philadelphia having a chance to close the 2-0 gap. Versus made the right call.
Hopefully, when Versus picks up the SJ-DET game in progress, it will be the CSN California feed as I enjoy hearing Randy Han’s excellent play by play.
Does NBC have any contingency plans in place for this weekend, in case there are sweeps in the East? I’m guessing there’s no way they could move up the Nashville-Vancouver game on Saturday, so unless the Caps come back tonight that day’s a lost cause.
But might they be able to move up the Sharks-Wings game on Sunday from 8 to 3 for NBC?
An NBC rep told Puck the Media: “Ask me when it’s 3-0” with a smile.
Ha ha, well, I guess you can go ahead and ask him in about 20 minutes.
It would be crazy if they lose both games this weekend. Saturday is lost. I can’t see them moving Van/Nsh to 12:30 being that Vancouver is in PT. Not a chance that time changes. As for Sunday, both potential series could end Friday. My guess would be that SJ/Det is moved to 3:00 ET on NBC Sunday if Boston and Detroit win Friday. I don’t see any reason why they wouldn’t do it.
Maybe they can start the Eastern Conference Final on Sunday.
Just kidding. Sort of. But seriously, if things continue to go in this direction, unless Nashville puts up a good fight with Vancouver, we might have the conference finals starting much earlier than planned (I would hope–better than a long, unnecessary wait).
TSN2 feed for SJ-DET on Vs.
Can’t you just see the executives at NBC Sports pulling their hair out. Think about if San Jose wins game 4 and Boston wins game 4, then we will see three non “NBC 7” teams in the final four. What would NBC rather have in the SC Final: Vancouver, Nashville or San Jose? Like I have said before I would love to see Nashville versus San Jose in the West Final and have Tampa Bay win the Prince of Wales Trophy. Then you would see NBC lose their proverbial minds.
The worst case scenario for NBC would probably be a Vancouver Tampa final…..
Are you interested in what is best for the league or just “seeing the executives at NBC pulling their hair out?”
And enough with all this “NBC7” stuff. You will see the same teams on NBC for the next 10 years so deal with it.
Go ahead Kevin. Here is your chance to show your business acumen and marketing brilliance…..sell us all on a Nashville/Tampa Cup Final. Let’s see what you can come up with.
Otherwise stick that NBC7 stuff where the sun don’t shine.
I think one issue we should address is the promotion of the NHL on NBC of Crosby and Ovechkin as the two biggest stars of the league. Now that they are both gone from the playoffs, the announcers and ads should promote some of the other compelling players who are exciting to watch for the rest of the playoffs (e.g. Tim Thomas for his spectacular saves: Tampa Bay’s three big scorers who are as exciting (to me anyway) as Ovechkin/Crosby Or the power scorers from Detroit and SJ.
The NBC promotional ads never did as good a job in selling their other marquee players as they had with Ovechkin/Crosby and it is time for NBC to acknowledge to casual hockey fans that there are other marquee players that are as good, if not better, than Ovechkin/Crosby.
Also, NBC should hire Crosby or Ovechkin as studio analysts now that they are out of the playoffs as their insights would be a lot more interesting than anything that either Mike Milbury or Pierre McGuire could offer in the studio. If nothing else, having Crosby/Ovechkin (especially Crosby because he speaks English with no accent ) in the studio would add to the ratings to the NBC telecasts.
Kevin, what is the point of rooting for poor hockey ratings if you are a hockey fan?
Studying broadcasting and having a bachelor’s in broadcasting from Central Michigan University. I love hockey and all I am saying is I want to see what the numbers for a Stanley Cup Final between two teams not in the “NBC 7” would be. Besides watching the same teams over and over again on NBC gets real old real quick as seen by the regular season ratings this year. What I would like to see is new a fresh match-ups on NBC and Versus. Take one of the “NBC7” versus Tampa or Minnesota or St. Louis or New Jersey or LA or Anaheim or San Jose. Some of you act like we should eliminate 23 teams and leave just the NBC 7 in the playoffs to battle for the Cup while every other team battles for some lesser prize.
Just for the record I am Devils fan, but I hear the moans from fans of other teams that think they deserve to be on NBC.
I’m glad that Versus and the NHL Network both took TSN feeds last night. I do have to say that I wish the NHL Network didn’t feel it had to show their obtrusive crawl/ticker thing across the bottom of the screen during live games. It’s very distracting. if they want to run it every 20 minutes or so that’s fine, but all the time isn’t necessary….
As for scheduling, my understanding is that the final dates are pretty much carved in stone by NBC so if the next to rounds end early then we will just have to wait. I think this is a mistake….but the NHL doesn’t ask me about things like this….. 🙂
C’mon Kevin. We are all still waiting for you to market us a Nashville-Minnesota Winter Classic. Let’s hear your ideas on how to promote this matchup. Show us something.
Well, Minnesota is the home of hockey in this country, very easy to promote that. Nashville is a rising team in the NHL with lots of talented players and stars (Weber, Legwand, Ward, Rinne, Geoffrion, Hornqvist). They can hold the game at TCF Bank Stadium. If you promote it enough people will watch. It is a unique event that has instant drawing power to the casual fan.
The more you promote teams and players to the casual fan the more they will tune in. The general public and the casual sports fans are idiots! If you tell them something enough times they will believe it. Like with Crosby and Ovi all the NHL did was promote them over and over again and they became stars. Now the NHL has other stars and doesn’t want to promote them on NBC. Look at what NBC did in the 90s with the NBA: promoting many stars and many teams (Drexler, Barkley, Malone, Stockton, Bird, Shaq, Penny, Hardaway, Ewing, Starks, Reggie, Pippen, Jordan). Also, NBC put small market teams against big market teams so that small market teams could be on NBC.
Just as an FYI to you Arthur: my belief is that NHL has already made their decision on the 2012 Winter Classic. I think they are going to award it to Washington D.C. and have Pittsburgh take on Washington at RFK or Nationals Park. This is just my belief. I am not breaking any news or trying to start a rumor.
That is some of the funniest stuff I have ever read. Thanks for the laugh.
Okay Arthur, let me see your experience in promoting television and/or radio. Let me see your work experience in media. My four plus years working in broadcasting and my bachelor or arts degree in broadcasting from Central Michigan University and the study I did in those four years and the papers I wrote on programming television and promotion in media says that I have pretty good idea. Your mocking of my idea shows little constructive criticism for what I wrote. So, unless you have an idea better than the one I have presented put it up, otherwise shut up and sit down sir. You are part of what is wrong in the new media society to which we live in. You are willing to openly mock without substance. You ask a question and then think that it is fair to judge without understanding. Why don’t you crawl to some hole you live in, do some study on broadcasting programming and promotion, then think real hard on the subject, come up with an idea, and then present it to rest of us here. We can judge your idea with constructive thoughts and criticism. Otherwise, don’t openly mock those that come up with thought out ideas to questions you pose, and stop asking questions if all you are going to do is mock those that answer your questions.
When you first step into a tv truck, you’ll only be twenty-five years behind me.
Keep studying. And if you really believe Legwand, Geoffrion and Hornqvist are stars, study a lot harder.
I am not saying that they are stars. I am saying the the NHL and NBC can do a lot more work promoting the other stars in the league. I guess you like being hit over the head with the same mallet again and again and again. Let me ask you sir, what should the NHL do to promote the other 17 American based teams and their stars? Should we let them die in their own local oblivion? Should the NHL just contract them because they don’t have any national appeal?
Let me put it another way, Crosby and Ovi weren’t stars until the NHL and NBC did a whole lot of promotion on them and made them stars. I say the NHL and NBC need to do that to the other stars in the league (Kopitar, Mike Richards, Ryan, Perry, Thorton, Kovy, Parise, Bufflyn, Voukun, Stamkos, Eric Staal, Weber). If you want to just watch the same thing over and over and over again I think there is a NASCAR race on just about every weekend. You could tune into that.
P.S. I know that I have misspelled a lot of the names, but I would think you are smart enough to know to whom I am referring to.
“Nashville is a rising team in the NHL with lots of talented players and stars (Weber, Legwand, Ward, Rinne, Geoffrion, Hornqvist).” That is your quote, not mine.
And this argument ends right here because you have no clue when you say Crosby and Ovechkin weren’t stars before the NHL and NBC made them so. Yeah they tend to do that with #1 overall picks who are touted on being the next superstars in their sport.
i’ve said it on this site a hundred times, it is all about ratings and market share for NBC. You, with your four years of broadcasting experience, should be able to figure out that if the people in South Florida don’t give a shit about the Panthers why should the rest of America? The same applies to the rest of the league. Come on man, follow the dollars. Stop dreaming.
Stamkos, Hedman, Duschene, Doughty, Eric Johnson, Bobby Ryan, Hall and Tavares were number one or two picks in the draft and yet they get little to no push. So, your first picks argument holds no water. It is a NHL and NBC promotion machine at work. Why haven’t those number one or two pics been on NBC or Versus? Why haven’t they been promoted? They were number one and two picks so….?
About your comment about South Florida, so lets contract them and teams like Atlanta, Tampa Bay, Carolina, Dallas, LA, Anaheim, Phoenix, San Jose, Colorado, Minnesota, St. Louis, Columbus, Nashville, Buffalo, New Jersey, and the New York Islanders. They aren’t on NBC (regular season) and are rarely on Versus so no one must care about them. I would like you to go to the owners of those teams and tell them to ask to be let out of ownership and contracted. Why don’t you stand outside their home arenas and tell the fans to not come in because they should be contracted because they make no money. In your perfect world there should only be what 12 teams total? The heck with the rest of the fans in the league. I have been to many NHL arenas in many markets and the fans that come to those games are dedicated and enthusiastic about their teams. How dare you say that people in South Florida don’t care?!? Go there with a megaphone and turn them all away so that we can live in your little 12 team world. What about Canada? Who should be contracted (Ottawa, Vancouver, Edmonton)??? Why don’t you think about the fans and your stupid argument? There are dedicated fans of all teams that is why there are teams in the markets. I know that the teams aren’t making money hand over fist, but look at the NBA and MLB a lot of those teams aren’t making money, so we should go to those leagues and tell the league to contract the teams that have no national pull and make no money??? I would love to see you go to Portland and Memphis and tell those fans. You wouldn’t get far there. None of your arguments hold any water. Why not think deeply about this and then come back to me with some constructive comments. If you want to walk away and act like a little loser that is fine by me, but I will be here with the rest of the adults making smart comments on the boards.
Young man, you still don’t get it. You wanna talk about draft picks then Patrik Stefan, Chris Phillips and Alexandre Daigle were also #1overall picks. So stop right there. You said that NBC made superstars out of Sid and Ovi. I said they were superstars before NBC got to them. So enough of that silliness.
Why do you keep associating the word “contract” in this argument. I have never suggested anything like that so I don’t know why you keep bringing that up. All I have ever said is that you better get used to the same teams in the Winter Classic because outside of the ridiculously titled NBC7, they are the ones who are in the biggest tv markets and the teams which provide the best ratings. Ratings equals advertising dollars. Why is that so hard for you to understand?
I’ll buy all the beers when and if any of those teams you mentioned above (NYI, NJ, PHX et al) are named to participate in a WC. Until then, keep up your fantasyland dreamings of parity for all in this league when it comes to exposure. Keep posting whatever teachings your marketing professor is giving you now. And then check out the latest attendance figures for this past season. I have enclosed them for you here.
http://espn.go.com/nhl/attendance
I’m so happy for you that you have been to a lot of arenas. What a great experience for a kid. Enjoy it.
I say let’s agree to disagree. All we are going to be is two experts on broadcasting going back and forth on our theories and ideas. It does us no good because we are both going to think we are right until we get to the point of pure exhaustion. Thank you for the stimulating argument. I have one of those in a long long time.
GO NASHVILLE GO!!!!
Only one expert in this argument. The one who is not rooting for Nashville. Me