This is really interesting. How Pro teams get their revenue.
- Thread starter ChiefJusticeMarshall
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pittdan77
Athletic Director
The sooner the NHL figures out that people want to see the stars actually play and not the goons beating them up and holding on for dear life to stop them, the better they'll be.
What is shows, is the NFL is profitable before one ticket is sold, it is profitable. The NBA is pretty much the same, and is the biggest change of all the pro sports in the fact that before the mid 80's, the NBA had worse TV coverage than the NHL.
It also shows how MLB has the most disparity as local media rights have almost double the impact as other sports and the NHL is obviously is most reliant on gate.
It also shows how MLB has the most disparity as local media rights have almost double the impact as other sports and the NHL is obviously is most reliant on gate.
Yeah, the NFL dominates national TV and that's where the money is at.
Their national TV & media rights are more than the other leagues revenue total.
Their national TV & media rights are more than the other leagues revenue total.
pittdan77
Athletic Director
It's also why we've been saying for years that the NFL doesn't lose sleep over a few empty seats. That's more of a local problem.
No. It shows its not popular to an American TV audience. I've said they should change their season. Stanley Cup Finals at end of August. Really stupid they go head to head with the NBA Playoffs.
Hockey is a niche sport. It doesn’t have the same popularity across the country as the 3 main sports. That’s why their national TV contract will never be as good as the others.
Thanks. I had no idea. So, just to clarify: if somethin' ain't as popular and less peoples is watching then the tv networks is gonna pay them less to carry the product n' all that junk?
I had never thought there was any correlation in the past. I could have sworn they just threw numbers at dart board and went with that.
They don't schedule games on the same day. Either way, I don't think there's much of a crossover audience.
I couldn't imagine two sports having any less of a crossover audience. Not saying the number is zero; just saying it's probably about as big as it can get between two major sports.
The only thing the sports have in common is they play the same season(s).
I think there's a ton of men who will watch any major sport that is on TV at 8 PM. I barely ever watch regular season NHL or NBA games but by the time the conference finals come around it's easy to get invested for 3 weeks. I do the same with Soccer, only instead of every year i just wait until the World Cup.
Probably true, though I don't know if I would extend that to hockey as much because I don't think people in this country relate to it like they do other sports. Most people have played baseball, basketball, and football in some form (including in gym class), but most people cannot ice skate.
On the contrary, I know a ton of people whom I would not consider well-rounded sports fans who like hockey. Like, it's weird. It seems to attract a certain breed of, dare I say, nerd who would never consider watching any other sport. I know a lot of hockey fans who couldn't name five Steelers, for example (of course, I'm not totally convinced some could name five Penguins, either). It has really asserted itself as the non-jock sport.
Personally, I'm not a fan of the NHL or the NBA. I'll watch Two and a Half Men reruns before I turn either of them on.
Honestly though, the size of the players in the NBA makes the above-the-rim-style of basketball played in the NBA probably as dissimilar to the average pick-up basketball game as the NHL is dissimilar to playing street hockey with a ball in tennis shoes.
with this mindset, you'd think the wnba would be more popular. a wnba game resembles the average pick up basketball game being played at the YMCA..
Right -- I don't necessarily think "relatability" is the NHL's problem. I think maybe the nature of the sport is less superstar driven (even guys with the most ice time aren't playing half the game), and perhaps too much parity among franchises. And/or too many franchises. That makes the product the NHL is trying to sell less captivating to our present day society.
Absolutely not. Good point. Those are the epitome of awful TV.
You could extend that to any sport. Guys in gym class or Legion ball weren't throwing 100 mph or hitting 450-foot jacks. They weren't running 4.4 40s and throwing a football 65 yards in the air. But how many kids did you know who played either high school or rec baseball, basketball, and football vs hockey?
Canada doesn't have a superstar program when it comes to getting into hockey, because they're familiar with the sport. It's just what you grew up with (or didn't). Europeans don't just ditch soccer because the NFL is all of a sudden more star heavy than usual (and vice versa).
pittdan77
Athletic Director
You make a pretty good point. Honestly, pro sports in the US are generally less captivating than maybe a dozen years ago because they have all become hyper driven by money. Yes, they always were money driven but it really changed sometime over the last 10-15 years. The cost of attendance makes any pro sport very expensive. The push to make the biggest and best games prime time events deprives kids of a chance to view games on their biggest stage. Seasons are too long and in the case of the NHL and NBA, really only pause for a month or two. There is also the constant din of nonsense that is driven by the gambling and fantasy industries but those are both huge money makers.
Maybe it's just me but I find myself less and less interested to the point I don't watch nearly as much. It's all so watered down. Like, training camp is opening in Latrobe and all of the media attention feels forced because the excitement just really isn't there. Could be because the local teams are all down but it just all feels tired and excessive.
It's gotten too difficult to follow sports ever since ESPN decided to get into the societal influencer business as opposed to just showing highlights. I preferred the days when I could quote SportsCenter by the third time around. Just leave it on in the background while you were getting ready for the day, and it was all good.
I still consider myself a big sports fans, but the truth is I'm really not. If you named the top 20 players in every sport, I could probably tell you who 30% of them play for. I've never done fantasy or anything, so I just don't know the players anymore... outside of the local teams, of course.
pittdan77
Athletic Director
I think ESPN got so far down in the weeds with talking heads that the societal influence stuff was just a natural byproduct. I mean, you can only talk about the same thing so many times so that stuff just comes up.
I'm the same. I followed football and baseball so closely that I could pretty much predict the rotations for a given series. Heck, there aren't even daily newspapers where you could pour over box scores quickly and compare stats. No, there are now a dozen different metrics that I don't think anyone truly understands and I get told that it's fine if the guy is batting under .250 because his Wobble to Waggle ratio is really good. I don't know when baseball became about how good a guy might be at war. It's not like these guys even have to go and fight anymore.
I admit I do not follow European soccer that closely so correct me if I am wrong, but European soccer seems very star heavy and has little parity (both issues that I pointed out above that I think hurt the NHL). I know there are Europeans in the NHL so I bet hockey is "relatable" at least in various pockets of Europe, but I'm willing to bet that European soccer is still more popular than the NHL is in those places.
Yeah, I agree with that. I just want to watch sports, not people at a desk.
My point is just that soccer will always be what Europeans gravitate toward, just as football is what we like the most and hockey is what Canadians will always hold dearest, because that's what we all grew up with. I don't think it would matter who the players were at any one given time. It's ingrained into each respective culture.
I won't argue hockey isn't "dearest" in Canada and it remains the national sport there, but I'm willing to bet that over the past 40-50 years, the relative popularity of the NBA in Canada has grown even more than the relative growth of the NBA in the US. And that's because the NBA has a good product to sell. NHL not so much.
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The biggest takeaway is not the slice of the pie from the national media rights but the size of that pie they slicing it from.
Mind you, the different leagues pies are different sizes to divide up.
The NFL's National TV media pie per year is $10 billion/year, that ~$300million a year to a team.
The NBA's National TV media pie per year is like $7 billion/year which is like $220 million per team Which is amazing as there are only 12 player rosters vs the NFL's like 55 player.
MLB is more murky because so much local, but as of 2022, Every MLB franchise gets $60 million a year from national sources, and the estimates that most local (hello Pirates) are north of $40 million so at least they have $100 million in media, and we know some teams like the Dodgers have local media right 6-8 times that.
The NHL is more complicated because of the Canadian networks, but through ESPN/TNT the total is about $625 million dollars which is only $21 million per team per year. Hello ticket sales, why there is so much focus on not just capacity but ticket prices.
Mind you, the different leagues pies are different sizes to divide up.
The NFL's National TV media pie per year is $10 billion/year, that ~$300million a year to a team.
The NBA's National TV media pie per year is like $7 billion/year which is like $220 million per team Which is amazing as there are only 12 player rosters vs the NFL's like 55 player.
MLB is more murky because so much local, but as of 2022, Every MLB franchise gets $60 million a year from national sources, and the estimates that most local (hello Pirates) are north of $40 million so at least they have $100 million in media, and we know some teams like the Dodgers have local media right 6-8 times that.
The NHL is more complicated because of the Canadian networks, but through ESPN/TNT the total is about $625 million dollars which is only $21 million per team per year. Hello ticket sales, why there is so much focus on not just capacity but ticket prices.
What's amazing, according the 2023 numbers, the Pens are quite well situated and obviously one of the successes. It brought in $207 million in revenue, with the cap around $85 million, obviously they can handle payroll just fine and do. It is interesting that the Pens are right in a group of teams, Detroit, Washington, Philly and Dallas all much bigger markets. I suspect the Pens overall success as being the top performing team of all major league sports teams in local ratings have given them favorable contracts.
It's not 1984, 1994 or even 2004! Everyone can access whatever sports highlights they want to watch within seconds, there's zero need to sit and wait until they show up on Sportscenter.
pittdan77
Athletic Director
Not sure what generation you represent but I completely understood what he meant. There was some beauty in that simplicity and a certain level of comfort in being able to passively enjoy the highlights as the show ran over and over. The entirety of the sporting world was distilled into one show and it was really entertaining. You looked forward to it. But like you said, it's out there immediately and that sort of sucks the excitement out of things.
Yeah, it's just that. I could turn on a single channel and be done with it. I didn't have to navigate my way through 100 different videos. Instead, I just don't watch any highlights. Hence, why I have no idea who anyone is anymore.
pittdan77
Athletic Director
I remember that there were just certain guys that they had obsessions over. Nobody cared about the Milwaukee Bucks but there was a Frank Brickowski highlight every night. Was like clock work. The group of guys I went to school with would gather and loudly cheer when the "Brick Highlight" finally happened. Guess you had to be there, LOL.
When I was younger, I used to love emulating batting stances of everyone. SportsCenter was basically a half hour (later changed to an hour, I think) of home run highlights this time of year. Cecil Fielder, Albert Belle, Juan Gonzalez, Mickey Tettleton, Ken Griffey Jr, Jay Buhner, etc., etc., etc.
I think sports still have stars; they're just harder to find. I can't just flip on ESPN and watch the aforementioned, Fred McGriff, Kevin Mitchell, Mo Vaughn, Jose Canseco, Sosa, McGwire, Bonds, Walker, Ramirez, Thome, Piazza, etc. hit steroid-induced moon shots.
pittdan77
Athletic Director
Oh, absolutely. Grown ass men even did that at softball games.
pittdan77
Athletic Director
He's made it pretty clear that payroll is dependent on ticket sales. Don't argue why that doesn't make sense because I won't fight you.
