Satirical news outlet 'The Onion' spoofs sportscasts

Chris Zelkovich

thestar.com


If you happen to confuse Wednesday’s Canadian debut of the Onion SportsDome with real sports highlights, then the creators of the new comedy show have done their job.

It’s the latest project from the satirical news outlet The Onion and aims to entertain, satirize and confuse.

“What we’re trying to accomplish is what The Onion is always trying to accomplish, which is to misinform people as much as possible, deceive them and trick them into thinking they’re watching real news,” says Jack Kukoda, co-executive producer and head writer of the show that’s scheduled to run 10 episodes on the Comedy Network (Wednesdays, 10 p.m.).

The show is a bang-on takeoff on ESPN’s SportsCenter and will strike a chord with Canadians because TSN’s SportsCentre and its counterparts on The Score and Rogers Sportsnet look so much like the American version.

The overheated, overly serious delivery peppered with catchphrases are only slightly exaggerated versions of what sports fans see every night on honest-to-goodness sports shows. The stories? Not so much.

On the other hand, a report on NHL commissioner Gary Bettman staging a fake kidnapping to bring much-needed publicity to “his strange ice sport” looks quite real, as does another detailing NBA rule changes inspired by LeBron James, Chris Bosh and Dwyane Wade (“dribbling will be optional if you’re planning to do a really sweet dunk.”)

It’s hilarious at times, tasteless at others. And a rapid-fire segment entitled “Who Would You Kill?” couldn’t have come at a worse time considering the events of the past week.

Kukoda says that although it isn’t always in good taste, the beauty of the show is that it has no limits.

“It’s less like The Daily Show, which is reacting to real events, but more The Onion style where we’re not bound by reality,” he says.

We asked five Canadian sportscasters to give their impressions of the show.

• Jim Van Horne, College of Sports Media television co-ordinator and former sports anchor:

“I really loved the banter between the hosts. It’s a real shot at your typical sportscaster.

“ Every guy who’s been on the air has done what you see there, me included. If anybody denies that they haven’t done that at some point, they’re lying.

“We all want to use the jargon, the clichés and come across as the macho man.

“I’m curious to see how long it is before somebody takes one of these stories seriously. Somebody will because it’s so authentic-looking. It looks just like ESPN or TSN.”

• Renee Paquette, The Score:

“I absolutely loved it. The way they executed it was bang on.

“Somebody totally will take this seriously, because so many of the announcers’ opinions are the same ones the common sports fan would have.

“I don’t think I saw myself there because I don’t think I have the typical sportscaster delivery.

“There were a few things that made me think they shouldn’t have done that, but it’s on the Comedy Network so they might as well go for it. . . . I felt guilty about laughing at some of the stuff, but it was funny.”

• James Duthie, TSN host and former anchor:

“I laughed a few times. The National Crystal Meth Hallucination League was pretty funny.

“The challenge this show will have is that many of us realize how silly some of the things we do are, and so we already parody ourselves.

“We do that on The Quiz. Jay Onrait and Dan O’Toole do it on SportsCentre every morning. It’s much easier to make fun of something when it takes it self too seriously, like The Daily Show does with U.S. politics and news.

“We try not to take ourselves too seriously. At least most of the time.”

• Sean McCormick, former Sportsnet anchor:

“I thought it was comedy genius.

“It does a pretty good job of taking every stereotype about sports announcers and making fun of it.

“I loved the interplay between the hosts, but the one guy looked a bit too much like Stephen Colbert. They’re trying to piggyback on that, but the stereotypes were bang on, from the BlackBerry on the desk and the line about the announcer being glad he doesn’t have a family. You know who those guys are.

“I’m setting my PVR now. That’s destination viewing for me.”

• Tas Melas, The Score:

“There are some great writers on that team, but I kind of question how they can sustain those storylines for 10 episodes. Sportswriting/comedy writing is a pretty hard road to travel.

“I’m not sure it’s possible. Some of the storylines, like the Miami Heat story, happened seven months ago. That’s a bit stale.

“I loved the whole story about St. Louis trying to keep Albert Pujols by giving him the keys to every building in the city and letting him sleep in your basement.”

Top ESPN searches of 2008

Top ESPN searches of 2008

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TSN clear winner on NHL trade deadline day
WILLIAM HOUSTON
Globe and Mail

TSN won the battle for NHL trade deadline viewers on Tuesday by a wide margin, drawing more than triple the audience of Rogers Sportsnet and almost 14 times as many viewers as The Score.
TSN's audience of 166,000 jumped 11 per cent from last year's trade deadline day. Sportsnet's 54,000 was flat. And the Score's 12,000 represented an increase of 33 per cent.
Réseau des Sports, the French-language sports service, topped them all, drawing 268,000. But the RDS telecast was only four hours in length, from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. EST.
TSN and Sportsnet were on the air for 10 hours and the Score for 10 1/2 hours. It's more difficult to hold an audience over 10 hours than four.
"We did fantastic, really," TSN president Phil King said. "We're continuing to grow every year."
King noted TSN (and the other English-language networks) went on the air two hours earlier this year than last and presented a longer telecast, but still managed to increase the audience.
"The first two hours are the toughest, because trades are unlikely," he said.
The TSN, Sportsnet and Score numbers are down from 2006, but interest in hockey two years ago was extraordinarily high because of the NHL's return from the cancelled 2004-05 season.
Although Sportsnet improved the quality of its coverage from last year, when it employed a failed studio party format, it was unable to win back viewers. The Score continued to rank a distant third.
Speculation about the Montreal Canadiens trading for Atlanta Thrashers star Marian Hossa kept viewers glued to RDS in the afternoon.
But TSN, Sportsnet and Score took a hit when Toronto Maple Leafs veterans with no-trade clauses, including captain Mats Sundin, refused to be moved.
Online, records were set.
TSN.ca had its busiest day, with 14.26 million page views, up 39 per cent from last year and bettering the previous mark of 13.92 million in 2006.
The Score set a one-day record for its online traffic. Its website received 88,647 visits, an increase of 89 per cent from last year's trade deadline.
TSN.ca provided 1.4 million streams of its TV coverage, more than double last year's 607,000. It had 359,00 unique visitors to its live video and audio services, up 30 per cent. At Sportsnet, 60,000 used its live video stream, double last year's traffic.
Page views for the deadline special on Hockey Night in Canada Radio streamed on CBCsports.ca jumped 135 per cent to 800,000 from about 300,000.

Courtesy of Dr. CFL

Asper’s deal for Bombers nearly done: Franchise will soon become private business
Scott Taylor
National Post

David Asper can now see the light at the end of a 14-month-long tunnel, a light that will result in the Winnipeg Blue Bombers ending 75 years of community ownership.
"Yes, I will soon take over sole ownership of the Winnipeg Blue Bombers," Asper said late last week. "But I say 'yes' as part of the overall proposal for a new stadium. I believe now, that in due course, there will be a new stadium."
It is somewhat of a bold position for Asper, the chairman of the National Post and executive vice-president of Canwest Communications, and a man who first presented his plan to privatize the CFL franchise and build a brand new 40,000-seat stadium, back in early January of 2007.
For months, through an often difficult negotiation with the city and provincial and federal governments, Asper was hesitant to answer in the affirmative when asked if he believed he was ever going to take over the team he has cheered for since childhood.
Last Thursday, however, during a lengthy interview in Winnipeg, he admitted that the deal is almost done. "Soon," he said, "the community-owned Winnipeg Blue Bombers will be privately owned and a new stadium will be under construction.
"Over the past year, me, members of my team, Lyle Bauer and the members of the Blue Bomber board of directors, have made a compelling case that, as a matter of public policy, there is an issue here that must be addressed," Asper said of the 53-year-old Canad Inns Stadium.
"I now believe that after months of negotiation and discussion at various levels, that intelligent people will get this done.
"All three levels of government are willing to make the commitment and are looking at how this project will come together. Where there is a will, there is a way. Over the period of time we've been making our position known, there has grown a better understanding that [a new stadium] is a benefit to the community ? that it's not just a benefit to the football club but to the entire community."
Asper plans to spend $65- million of his own money, with an additional $80-million in public funds, to build a stateof- the-art 40,000-seat football stadium, plus a retail mall in which all profits will go to the football club in order to guarantee the team's long-term future in the community. (The entire project can be viewed at http://www.blueandgold.ca/) The one sticking point is government commitment. The federal and provincial levels have promised no more than $30-million each. Asper wanted them to match the $40-million he plans put into the $120-million stadium plan.
"We will still try to make the case for the original $120-million concept," Asper said. "I guess there is always a chance that the project could end up being smaller, more modest, than the original plan. But I
will try to make the argument that it's worth working toward the original design. Historically, this is a 50-year project. We build it, it has to stand for 50 years.
"I guess, when we have all the cards on the table, we'll see what the money will get us."
One thing seems certain -- the Bombers will soon lose their "community-owned" designation and become a private business. Although there could be more community involvement than there was with the old community ownership.
In Asper's original plan, the public will actually own the stadium; the University of Manitoba football program will be a major beneficiary of the project; amateur sports organizations will be given free use of the building as a training facility during the winter months; and the public will have access to the team's stateof-the-science training and medical facilities.
For Winnipeg, that could be the best news of all.

Another banned Super Bowl ad...

A Turnkey Sports Poll asked more than 800 sports executives:
"Which event is the most prestigious?"
SportsBusiness Journal

Masters..........41.8%
Super Bowl..........34.84%
World Series..........6.15%
Final Four..........4.92%
Kentucky Derby..........4.51%
Stanley Cup Finals..........2.46%
Indianapolis 500..........1.64%
Daytona 500..........0.82%
NBA Finals..........0.82%
U.S. Open tennis..........0.41%

Hockey: Now with extra maple leaf syrup

Gold medal game a ratings winner for TSN
The Canadian Press

TORONTO - The Canada-Sweden world junior hockey final Saturday afternoon was the fourth most-watched program ever aired by TSN.
Live coverage of the championship game, won 3-2 in overtime by Canada, attracted a national average audience of 2.22 million viewers, the network announced Monday. Peak viewership was 3.04 million just before the start of overtime.
The ratings were up 23 per cent from last year's gold-medal game in Sweden when 1.8 million watched. Another 168,000 viewers took in the replay later Saturday, while 526,000 watched on RDS, bringing total viewership to 2.8 million.
The gold-medal game was the No. 2 program of the week in Canada. It was edged by Desperate Housewives on CTV (Jan. 6, 2.27 million).
TSN's coverage of Canada's seven tournament games averaged 950,000 viewers, making it the most successful world junior tournament for TSN taking place in Europe, surpassing the previous high of 933,000 in 2007 in Sweden.
Canada's 4-1 win over the United States last Friday attracted 1.02 million viewers.
TSN's most-watched program of all-time was the 2003 gold-medal game between Canada and Russia with 3.45 million viewers.
The record audience for a sporting event in Canada, with more than 10 million English and French-language viewers on CBC, was the Canadian men's gold medal hockey win over the U.S. at the 2002 Salt Lake Olympics.

Shock jock-sniffer

W. Va. DJ silenced for support of UM: Radio host enthused by Rodriguez's move to Big Ten

Associated Press

CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- A Charleston disc jockey was yanked off the air Wednesday morning after listeners complained of hearing too much "Hail! Hail! to Michigan."
Coach Kidd, a Michigan native who co-hosts a morning show on Electric 102.7 FM, was warned three times to ratchet down his enthusiasm over former West Virginia University football coach Rich Rodriguez's decision to become head coach at the University of Michigan, said program manager Wade Hill.
"Basically, it boils down to insubordination," Hill said. "He was just taking it a little too far."
Coach Kidd was taken off the air after playing the Wolverines' fight song, The Victors, for a fourth time Wednesday morning.
Hill said listeners complained that his over-the-top support of Rodriguez's decision was disrespectful to the state.
Coach Kidd said he was willing to do whatever it takes to return to the air, including apologizing for his actions.
"I'm not afraid for my job because I know I'm not going to lose my job," Coach Kidd told WCHS-TV.
Hill said he plans to meet with Coach Kidd later Wednesday to try to resolve the situation.

If media conglomerates among the Canadian forest, does it make a sound (policy)?

Anybody there?

Diverse voices are lost with big media mergers
Steve Anderson
Thestar.com

Several major media mergers are threatening to make the Canadian media scene an even more concentrated affair.
A few examples: CTVglobemedia has inhaled CHUM (with Rogers taking the spoils), Alliance Atlantis is on the brink of becoming a part of CanWest and Quebecor Media is poised to take over Osprey Media.
In June 2006, the report on the Canadian news media by the standing Senate committee on transport and communications concluded that there are "areas where the concentration of ownership has reached levels that few other countries would consider acceptable." Canadians agree.
Well before the latest round of mergers, 56 per cent of Canadians said they had less trust in the media because of media consolidation, and fewer than one in five Canadians thought news organizations were independent.
Canadians understand very clearly the effects of media consolidation on media choice. For example, CanWest will now own the Independent Film Channel. Since CanWest is known for its conservative editorial stances, this change indicates that the Independent Film Channel is now anything but independent.
The Canadian Energy, Communications and Paperworkers (CEP) union recently published a landmark study focusing on Canadian journalists titled Voices from the Newsroom. The study suggests that journalists and news consumers are already feeling the brunt of big media domination.
Only 9.5 per cent of journalists indicated that they believe the corporate owners of their news outlet valued good journalism over profit. This perspective perhaps reflects the bookkeeper's view of employees as liabilities – a management approach that is only exacerbated when big media get bigger.
CHUM laid off 281 people and cancelled news broadcasts across the country just hours before CTVglobemedia announced its intention to take over CHUM. Quebecor – another big media enterprise looking to get bigger – has locked out the office and editorial staff of the Journal de Québec since April 22. Journalists tried to restart the negotiation process in mid-June, only to have Quebecor negotiators reject their efforts, sticking to their original demands from last December.
With this kind of treatment it is not surprising that 44 per cent of journalists in the CEP study report decreasing desire to stay in journalism.
With the recent and likely continuing corporate centralization of media, we can look forward to more unemployed or dissatisfied journalists and more media consumers left wanting the penetrating journalism that used to be more prevalent in Canada.
Some people point to the Internet as the medium that will save us all from concentrated print and broadcast uniformity.
Unfortunately, a high level of media consolidation also means that we are in danger of losing the open Internet in Canada and the ability to choose which websites we go to. For the most part the media conglomerates that dominate conventional media also dominate web traffic.
As big media increasingly merge with Internet service providers like Rogers, BCE and Telus, we risk unwittingly trading our open Internet for a closed system.
In such a system, Internet (and cellphone) service providers can push traffic to their own content and that of their partners, while traffic to other more diverse media sites is slowed or blocked.
During the Telus strike in 2005, the corporation blocked access to a website run by striking Telus employees called "Voices for Change."
There are many more examples of non-neutral Internet service provider behaviour. A lone blogger or independent news website is hard-pressed to compete with the vast holdings and promotional clout wielded by national media conglomerates.
Canadians have historically supported media diversity. In 2002, an Ipsos-Reid poll reported that 86 per cent of Canadians believed the federal government should do something to alleviate Canadians' concerns about media concentration.
However, there is a new factor now. Canadians from across the country are speaking out loudly and clearly, asking for media choice over big media domination.
In just a three-week span, nearly 2,000 Canadians submitted comments to the CRTC demanding tighter ownership rules for big media.
The question is, will the CRTC take the lead from the Canadian public?
With a clear indication that Canadians want a more diverse media system with more media choice, will the CRTC live up to its mandate to regulate media in the public interest?

"News.. communicating news and ideas, I guess.. is my passion. And giving people alternatives so that they have two papers to read and alternative television channels."
-Rupert Murdoch

If Canadian media conglomerates in the forest, does it make a sound?

Where is our media going?
Antonia Zerbisias

Yesterday's appointment of Konrad von Finckenstein, former head of the federal competition watchdog, to chair the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) was pure synchronicity.
That's because, as the news came out, C. Edwin Baker, a law professor at the University of Pennsylvania and one of the foremost authorities on how media concentration hurts democracy, was delivering the Grafstein Annual Lecture at the University of Toronto.
His talk? Media Ownership and Media Markets: A Democratic and Economic Evaluation.
A dry title for a crucial subject.
My translation? Don't be fooled by all those TV channels and all those Internet sites and all those blogs and all those so-called choices. There are not, as the ideologues who think the airwaves should be unregulated claim, thousands of flowers blooming out there.
"You have to ask, who owns those flowers," said Baker in an interview. "If the audiences are concentrated, it doesn't matter."
In fact, he emphasized, online audiences are more concentrated than offline audiences, with the top few blogs commanding the major share of hits and the Top 10 news sites outpacing all others.
So fans of deregulation who believe that it's safe to let the barriers come down and let the market run free have it wrong. The question is, where does Finckenstein stand?
"The current regulatory model is not sustainable in the evolving communications environment," he told a Commons committee while head of the Competition Bureau. "The bureau expects that, within the next five to 10 years, the system will experience substantial pressure as the result of potential North Americanization of the television rights market, the advent of online broadband technologies delivering non-Canadian programming into Canada on an unregulated basis, the increasing popularity of new media technologies and services, and the ongoing fragmentation and possible reduction of broadcasting viewership."
But Finckenstein's record on media mergers doesn't necessarily bode well for those looking forward to the takeover of CHUM by CTVglobemedia, and the deal between Canwest Global, Alliance Atlantis and New York investment bank Goldman Sachs.
A few years ago, for example, the bureau blocked Astral Media's $225 million bid to buy 17 radio stations from Telemedia – even though the CRTC approved it – because it would have allowed Astral to dominate Quebec's radio advertising market.
That said, much has changed since then. The way things are going, we could soon be looking at an English-Canadian media landscape made up of CTVglobemediaCHUMCanwestGlobalAllianceAtlantisTorstar and the shell of CBC.
Think I'm kidding? On Tuesday, this paper reported that Bay Street was rubbing its money-grubbing hands together over the prospect of a marriage between Rogers and Shaw.
"The key value, which I think people recognize, is that democracy means that power should be distributed among the population broadly rather than concentrated," says Baker. "Concentrated media is just a form of concentrated power in the public sphere – and that should be objectionable."
Baker rattles off all the benefits of widely held media: "If you have more watchdogs, you're more likely to catch wrongdoing. That's a democratic gain.
"If you have more media entities, it would be more difficult to corrupt them or turn them over to your particular interests. There would be too many to get to follow your line.
"If you have more media, it reduces conflicts of interests. One can get over a media entity by exercising power over a portion of it," he says, citing examples of how a newspaper might be held hostage to advertisers because of other corporate interests.
Most important, says Baker, is to avoid what he has dubbed "The Berlusconi Effect," the situation in Italy where one man, Silvio Berlusconi, runs all the media and the government.
"The structure of the industry is crucial and the structure is a matter of government policy," Baker insists. "Trying to prevent concentration is just one of many things. You also need journalists committed to having sensible government policy.
"If you want to prevent the downward spiral of public knowledge, you need to have people committed towards changing the structures of the media and that requires political action.
"What you need is a powerful public movement for reform."
Trouble is, Canadians, ill-served by too many of their hometown papers and their concentrated media, aren't even being told about the situation.
And few of them recognize the need for a broadcast regulator.
But who would when you have one that rubber stamps every media merger deal that crosses its desk?
Over to you Mr. von Finckenstein.

Monday Night Football: Now in Double Head(ach)er.
NFL Football also available on Sunday nights and new and improved Thursday nights.
[Note: Canadian Football and high school is also available on Friday nights, Saturdays are for the NCChurchA].





The blackout bowl: NFL Network's Texas Bowl may shut out Rutgers fans
Associated Press

Rutgers football fans hoping to watch their team in the Texas Bowl later this month may be better off going to Manhattan -- the one in Kansas, that is.
The hometown of bowl opponent Kansas State is likely to have better coverage since the NFL Network, which has exclusive rights to televise the game, is not carried on two cable companies that serve more than 1 million of New Jersey's 2.5 million cable subscribers, not to mention most of New York City.
With No. 16-ranked Rutgers suddenly at the flashpoint of the dispute between the NFL Network and cable operators Time Warner and Cablevision, New Jersey Sen. Frank Lautenberg sent a letter to the NFL on Wednesday urging the league to allow the Dec. 28 game to be telecast on local television.
"Rutgers fans and the people of New Jersey do not deserve to be punished or used as a bargaining chip in that dispute," Lautenberg wrote.
Through spokesman Seth Palansky, the NFL Network said a solution will depend on an agreement between the network and the cable providers.
"As the senator recognizes, we have repeatedly offered to make not only this Rutgers game, but all NFL Network programming available broadly throughout New Jersey," Palansky said. "We regret that Time Warner and Cablevision have not yet agreed to carry NFL Network, but we will continue to work as hard as we can to resolve this commercial dispute as soon as possible."
That isn't likely to happen in the next three weeks. According to Time Warner cable spokesman Mark Harrad, the NFL Network wants cable providers to offer it as part of a basic cable package rather than as a premium service, an idea he said would force Time Warner to raise rates for all subscribers to cover the network's $140 million price tag.
"The NFL Network is asking for a price that would make it one of the top five networks in terms of audience," Harrad said, comparing it to networks such as Disney, ESPN and TNT. "But they're not a network that has shown broad ratings or broad appeal. That doesn't mean we don't want to offer it, because there are definitely customers who will want to pay more to get the NFL Network."
In his letter to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell and NFL Network President Steve Bornstein, Lautenberg asked the league to apply the same policy for the Texas Bowl that it uses for its eight NFL telecasts this season. Those games are also broadcast locally by network affiliates.
Officials from Rutgers and the Big East are searching for a way that a local broadcaster such as MSG Network or Secaucus-based WOR Channel 9 could show the game.
That would require changing the NFL's broadcast agreement with the Texas Bowl, and Palansky said the league has no plans to alter that agreement.
Barring that, Rutgers fans could be forced to find bars or restaurants that have satellite feeds, since the NFL Network is carried on DirecTV and the Dish Network.
Comcast, the largest cable company in the country, carries the NFL Network on its digital service that is used by about 7 million of its 24 million subscribers. Comcast is the largest cable provider in New Jersey with about 1.3 million subscribers.

More TSN and less CBC

1967

Tie Domi had his entire 1000th game (dressed) ceremony televised on CBC recently, much to the delight of all the QEW & 401ers out there, especially the presentations from all-time Leaf "greats" Dougie Gilmour and Tiger Williams. All that was missing was the footage of Domi’s cheapshot against Neidermeyer in the playoffs or McGrattan’s asskicking of a fading Domi in November 2005? Domi's upcoming retirement might be easier to appreciate if I knew that I wouldn’t be seeing his mug on everything from Canadian Celebrity poker, Live from Casino Rama to Rock’em Sock’em XXXII.
But more importantly was the role of the national broadcaster CBC is covering (producing?) this event. A week later, Boom-Boom Geoffrion, Montreal Canadien great, and “inventor” of the slap shot, barely received a sniff of media attention from the CBC. I realize the CBC needs to keep its consumers and sponsors happy but why is the Toronto sports fan such an insecure demographic? Surely they can appreciate the success of others. Don't worry T-dot. You have pro sport covered. The Expos are long gone. Go Jays! The Grizzlies barely existed. Go ©Raps! The NFL ain’t comin. Go Argos! Bob Cole even thinks you are the bestest city in the country. But as anyone who saw Conan O’Brien’s week of episodes in Toronto a few years back can attest to, there is nothing more quaintly pathetic than "Leaf Nation"…Sittler v. Lafleur, Salming v. Robinson, Wregget v. Roy, Gainey v. Ferguson, etc. [I’d keep going but you get the point].

Nascar Dad hates soccer: Strategic Isolationism or ignorant "cavemanism"?

Hatred for hockey is on the rise -- but so too is disdain for sport of varying professional stripe
ROY MacGREGOR

It's official. Americans don't like us.
Or, at the very least, do not like the Canadian game, though only 25.4 per cent of Americans actually hate, even loathe, the sport we think the rest of the world should adore.
The poll was conducted in mid-July and involved 1,020 American adults who were shown a list of 28 sports (NHL hockey included) and asked to give a reaction: "(1) love, (2) like a lot, (3) like a little, (4) no opinion, (5) dislike a little, (6) dislike a lot or (7) hate."
To no surprise, dog fighting turned out to be most despised of all, with 81 per cent of those interviewed loathing it and the other 19 per cent in need of psychiatric care.
Professional wrestling, which many would argue is not even remotely a sport, came in second, bullfighting third and pro boxing fourth.
None of this is particularly surprising, but just wait . . .
Weighing in it at No. 5 on the hate list is PGA golf, disliked by 30.4 per cent of Americans. No. 6 is the absurd PGA senior tour (29.9 per cent), the women's LPGA Tour (29.2 per cent), NASCAR racing (27.6 per cent), Major League Soccer (27.6 per cent) and the ATP men's tennis tour (26.5 per cent).
NHL hockey comes very close, with 25.4 per cent of Americans having only negative feelings toward the sport.
That is a considerable increase, by the way, from the 20 per cent NHL hockey registered on the hate meter in 1993, the last time the Sports Marketing Group carried out such a survey.
It is this 10-year comparison that has caused such interest, as people seem to be growing ever more resentful toward professional sports. The National Basketball Association now has nearly one in five Americans (19.7 per cent) hating the sport, whereas in 1993 only 11.9 per cent had such strong feelings -- worrisome for a league with such an increasing image problem.
As for Major League Baseball, 17.5 per cent of the United States is now strongly against "the great American pastime," well up from the 9.9 per cent of a decade ago.
"Baseball is on the decline," Lavalle told the American media, "and it could be dying if it doesn't change the way it's structured."
But what about hockey?
Lavalle says NHL commissioner Gary Bettman is actually doing a good job with the game, despite so much criticism.
"The No. 1 problem researched for the NHL," says Lavalle, "is that the average Joe can't get to the games." People can find a way to a football game, or to a couple of baseball games, but hockey tickets are now considered beyond the reach of the average sports fan.
Lavalle's studies have found that the NHL fan base is actually much older and richer than the beer ads would suggest.
"It's an affluent base," he says. "Much higher than even PGA golf. And that's both good and bad. If you create an elitist sport that is limited to the people who can afford to pay for it, you put off gaining a mass audience."

Post-Olympic thoughts

Hockey
Who will be in charge for 2010?
Gretzky two biggest mistakes:
i) Bryan McCabe. He did not score and led the team in penalty minutes with 18.
ii)Todd Bertuzzi. His final stats: 2 Assists v. ITA, 1 Assist v. GER, 4 Pim v. SUI, 2 Pim v. RUS

Media
The success of the Olympic Games as rated by the Neilsen ratings on NBC?


















Canadian sport
Canada had its most successful Olympics ever, winning medals in 10 of the 15 Olympics events, which ranks first. Overall tally: 24 medals plus 13 4th place finishes. Does this make the "national pain” of the loss by Gretzky & Co more tolerable? Or is Canada finally growing up as a country and excelling in more than just hockey?

The future of the Canadian sport delivery system might mean track sprinters’ suffer in order to fund speed skaters. Is it a problem to make winning medals as #1 prirority? Memo to fairplay4all advocates: Bronze medals are good but not the best. In 2010, the host of the party deserves has the opportunity to be the best dressed. Holding a party and hangin’ out all night in the garage is no way to entertain. Fund Canada's elite athletes!!!

Other
Challenge for the next American century: To come 2nd in something and not whine about it.
If the rest of the world cares and the US doesn’t, does it make a sound?
NBC held back the big events (i.e. Bode Miller: The great American hype) for prime time in order to capitalize on its fake fireplace.
2038 Headline: Global Warming and/or US disinterest threatens Future of Winter Games