Selling hockey....
I'm all for giving markets a chance, but at what point do you need to give up and admit it's just not going to work? How many dollars in advertising do you need to throw at certain areas before it becomes apparent that it's not working? Sports are very heavily engrained into cultures, hockey in Canada, Baseball/NFL in America, soccer in Brazil and England (and pretty much the rest of the world), cricket in India and Pakistan.... I think that counts for a lot, and I don't think you can just expect advertisments and fancy TV angles to sell a sport. Chances are it'll become popular for a bit, but once that wears off, if it has no cultural roots, it's not gonna stick. The NHL was quite popular in the early 90's, and now we're constantly reminded that the westminster dog show gets better ratings in the US.
Does hockey have the ability to become ingrained in a culture that's not familiar with it? Does any sport? I don't care how exciting rugby or cricket are, i doubt i'll ever care about it, it's just not something i'm familiar with. I might grow to follow football a little more closely, but that's not saying much considering how closely I follow it now. There's no way I'll ever remotely "care" about it.
I'm gonna transcribe something from the conclusion of Roy MacGregor and Ken Dryden's book "Home Game" that I think ties in with this.
"The average American fan (my note : to me, what this refers to is people who have no cultural background relating to the game) sees only the hockey game in front of him - the speed, the collisions - the full power of which never reaches him in his living room. He doesn't hear names with rich, complicated histories. He doesn't see ghosts of players past, games and teams past, a whole lifetime of them, cavorting across his TV screen with every second of the present. He has no childhood stories, no childhood heros to remember. He can see baseball's ghosts - for baseball is America's game. Football might make more sense, might come into fasion, might be better suited for television, but baseball has the history and the mythology. The mistress may be beautiful, but someone else lies under the American fan's skin. That is where the depth of passion lies.
Hockey is Canada's game. Nothing else is, nothing else will be."
Needless to say I disagree with the last couple sentances, but this was written in 1989, so things change.
I think the key word for me there was "mythology". You can't create that, no amount of advertising can.
Does hockey have the ability to become ingrained in a culture that's not familiar with it? Does any sport? I don't care how exciting rugby or cricket are, i doubt i'll ever care about it, it's just not something i'm familiar with. I might grow to follow football a little more closely, but that's not saying much considering how closely I follow it now. There's no way I'll ever remotely "care" about it.
I'm gonna transcribe something from the conclusion of Roy MacGregor and Ken Dryden's book "Home Game" that I think ties in with this.
"The average American fan (my note : to me, what this refers to is people who have no cultural background relating to the game) sees only the hockey game in front of him - the speed, the collisions - the full power of which never reaches him in his living room. He doesn't hear names with rich, complicated histories. He doesn't see ghosts of players past, games and teams past, a whole lifetime of them, cavorting across his TV screen with every second of the present. He has no childhood stories, no childhood heros to remember. He can see baseball's ghosts - for baseball is America's game. Football might make more sense, might come into fasion, might be better suited for television, but baseball has the history and the mythology. The mistress may be beautiful, but someone else lies under the American fan's skin. That is where the depth of passion lies.
Hockey is Canada's game. Nothing else is, nothing else will be."
Needless to say I disagree with the last couple sentances, but this was written in 1989, so things change.
I think the key word for me there was "mythology". You can't create that, no amount of advertising can.
posted by Julian at 11:28 a.m.
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