Oh, For Christ’s Sake: Cablevision Files Another Appeal in MSG HD Fight with Verizon

From Deadline:

One of cable’s most irksome long running battles isn’t over yet: Cablevision is appealing an FCC order that requires MSG — which the cable operator controls — to offer HD feeds of its two New York regional sports channels to Verizon FiOS and AT&T U-verse. That announcement followed a statement from Verizon today saying that it had “a home-team win in overtime” and promising to offer HD versions of MSG and MSG+ in December to FiOS TV customers in all service packages except FiOS TV Local. The HD feeds are a big deal to fans of the New York Knicks, New York Rangers, New York Islanders, the Buffalo Sabres and the New Jersey Devils.

The NHL Brings Home Sports Marketing Awards

NEW YORK, NY (November 16, 2011) — The National Hockey League (NHL)

won a hat trick of awards at last night’s annual PromaxBDA Sports Media

Marketing Awards for its History Will Be Made™ Campaign and Bridgestone NHL

Winter Classic® Social Media Campaign.

History Will Be Made™, the 2011 Stanley Cup® Playoffs campaign took

home gold in both the Best TV/Video Campaign and Best Overall Integrated

Marketing Campaign categories. The 2011 Bridgestone NHL Winter Classic

Social Media Campaign also received gold for Best Social Media Campaign.

The Sports Media Marketing Awards presented awards in more than 25

categories honoring the most outstanding sports marketing and promotion

work from cable and broadcast to video games, leagues and teams. The jury

panel included Turner Broadcasting Systems President of Sales David Levy,

Sports Illustrated Creative Director Christopher Herick, Madison Square

Garden Sports President Scott O’Neil, LA Kings President Luc Robitaille,

CMO of Fox Sports Media Group Eric Markgraf, NFL CMO Mark Waller, TD Garden

& Boston Bruins SVP of Sales & Marketing Amy Latimer, Chairman & CEO

Wasserman Media Casey Wasserman, and other industry influencers.

The National Hockey League beat out other finalists including NFL and

Nascar in the respective categories. In accepting the awards, Brian

Jennings, NHL Executive Vice President of Marketing said, “We are so proud

to be honored and recognized by such a distinguished panel of judges. We

continue to reach new heights with creativity for our fans that brings this

exciting game to life and engages our fans through a number of different

touchpoints. We’d also like to recognize our Clubs and partners who

continue to inspire the work we do as it reminds us what an awesome

responsibility it is to serve our game.”

During the 2011 Stanley Cup® Playoffs, the History Will Be Made

campaign celebrated some of the greatest moments in Playoffs history –

while motivating fans to tune-in as new history-making moments are made

this year. The integrated campaign was executed across all touchpoints of

both the NHL and its US broadcasters, NBC and Versus, including local

team-specific creative, a new spot each day featuring the best moment from

the previous night, POS materials in retailers across the US and Canada,

and a dynamic digital platform (History vs History) where fans could vote

on 64 of the greatest moments in Stanley Cup Playoffs history in a

head-to-head bracket until only one moment was declared the greatest (Bobby

Orr’s 1970 Stanley Cup-winning goal). A few creative examples include Mess

, 49 Years, and Easter Epic.

The 2011 Bridgestone NHL Winter Classic® Social Media Campaign was a

unique, never-done-before activation between a League and a broadcast

partner, which was created to bolster awareness of the 2011 Bridgestone NHL

Winter Classic, increase viewership and sustain tune-in throughout the

game. In the weeks leading up to the game, fans were encouraged to “Watch

and Win” by registering at NHL’s Facebook page. The application requested

users to submit a profile photo that would be selected during the live NBC

broadcast. By watching for their photo and showing they paid attention to

the game, entrants had the chance of winning one of three major prizes

including a 2011 Honda CR-Z, a VIP trip for four to Universal Studios, and

a VIP trip for four to the 2011 NHL® All-Star Game. Ratings of the NBC

broadcast increased by 22% vs 2010; over 11K submissions were recorded,

driving a total of 42k new Facebook fans. Facebook drove 4.6 million earned

media impressions, making the NHL Winter Classic a top trending topic on

Twitter on Jan. 1st.

Additional League partner recognitions included Titanium award

winners VERSUS (Best Use Of An Athlete – History Will Be Made ‘Wish’) and

HBO (Best Directing – 24/7 Trailer Penguins-Capitals Road To The Winter

Classic). In addition, the Chicago Blackhawks took home gold for Best

Long-Form Promo – Joey the Junior Reporter and Best Stunt, Environmental or

Experiential Installation – Stanley Cup Statues. The Philadelphia Flyers

won for Best in-game experience and EA Sports for Best Use of Original

Music Or Sound Design – NHL 11: The Moment.

The awards were presented during a ceremony at the Millennium

Broadway Hotel in New York City. The ceremony was hosted by actor, writer

and comedian Norm Macdonald.

Bruins Ratings Up 46% After Big Numbers Tuesday

Tuesday night’s Bruins-Devils game earned a season best 5.3 HH Rating on NESN, the 3rd highest regular season rating in network history. The previous best HH rating this season was on Monday, November 7 when NESN garnered a 5.2 HH rating for a game against the Islanders. NESN’s season average is now at 3.9 HH rating, which is up 46% over last year after the same number of games.

The next Bruins game on NESN is this Thursday, November 17 when they host the Columbus Blue Jackets at TD Garden. Live coverage begins at 6 PM with Big Bad Bruins LIVE presented by DCU.

And Now, A Brief Complaint About Canucks/Blackhawks Not Being on National Television Tonight

This is the second time the Canucks and Blackhawks have played this season, and neither game has been nationally televised. In the United States or Canada! How is that possible? This is one of the hottest rivalries on earth, and both VERSUS and TSN are already televising early games! At least their last two games will be on TSN in March, whereas VERSUS/NBCSN won’t air one game from the rivalry. Just seems kind of a bad call to me. Also, Kings/Ducks would’ve been a pretty good television game tonight. Oh well.

This has been a brief complaint about Canucks/Blackhawks not being on national television tonight.