Rogers hockey ratings tank, Poor Len gloats

Poor Len, again. Forgive me for indulging in a bit of schadenfreude, but I can't help saying "I told you so" after reading "Rogers’ early-season TV ratings down sharply for NHL, Maple Leafs" in today's Groan & Wail.

A couple of years ago, Rogers outbid the Canadian Broadcasting Corpse for the Canadian broadcast rights for all NHL games, for 12 years. It then "leased" some of the games to CBC, RDS and other networks, but retained control of which games would be shown on Hockey Night in Canada, which it now owns, and SportsNet, its ridiculously expensive pay channel.

Then, because Toronto is Canada's biggest TV market, Robbers decided to foist games featuring the Maple Laffs on the entire nation, relegating Canada's team -- the Montréal Canadiens -- to "regional markets", i.e. the French-language networks (TVA and RDS) and (sometimes) English broadcasts in Québec and Atlantic Canada. I have complained before about the blackouts of Habs games from the Québec-Ontario border westward, and predicted Robbers would rue its, Conn-Symthian, francophobic bias.

And so it has come to pass. (Lifetime pct .990.) The Glob reports that NHL TV ratings are down across the board on average for Rogers for the first seven weeks this season. According to Numeris, Canada's only broadcast ratings service, combined ratings for the Leafs on all the Rogers-connected networks that carry them -- CBC, Sportsnet and City -- are down 30 per cent from October 7th through November 21st.

The Eastern games on Saturday’s Hockey Night in Canada, which usually feature the Leafs (on CBC) and some other team, not the Habs, on City, are down 19% from the same period last year. From October 7th through November 21st, an average of 1,771,500 viewers saw the prime-time Hockey Night Eastern game, a drop of 412,500 from last year’s 2,184,000.

Dontcha love it? I do. I hope Robbers lose their blue-and-white shirts.