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Originally Posted by Erick Estrada
You can't argue that Gary's been good for business as far as the owners are concerned. The owners are all patting him on the back for this deal as has been said it's win-win for them as while Canadian viewers will be inconvenienced we will still tune in. I certainly don't expect a reduction in viewership but problem for Rogers is that they are paying so much money for the rights you would think the status quo of current viewership and advertising will not be enough. They will need more. More viewers to attract more advertising.
It's hard to be overly critical of a product we haven't seen yet on the national level so maybe they will surprise us. That said as the article says the only way they can make money to supplement the deal is through advertising and subscribers and IMO those are both probably pretty tapped out and if they find after a couple of years they can't turn a profit then what happens staring at another 10 years of making little to no money or worse lose money? This could blow up in their faces as they may have bit off more than they could chew with this unprecedented Canadian television deal.
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Bettman also has his list of screw ups. The league is very short sighted and a handful of owners would rather rack in dollars in the next decade rather than care about a healthy league long term.
CBC is in every Canadian home with a TV even if you don't have cable. It was dumb to allow Rogers to cut them out. TSN put out the most entertaining broadcast, and they instead attacked them. I know Bettman doesn't like Ron McLean, but its just business.