Ansem Posted February 3, 2018 Share Posted February 3, 2018 14 minutes ago, dyslexic nam said: Maybe they are. It just never seems to get mentioned in broadcasting discussions. People advocate for the big 2 or some new streaming platform while omitting our massive public broadcaster. Of course, it could just be the rum talking... TV rights are negotiations. It's smart of the league to not negotiations in public. Personally, I have no doubt that CBC would be interested in picking it up and could use the content but ultimately, they should want TSN or SN money. I'm sure they know what they are doing Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yellowsweatygorilla Posted February 3, 2018 Share Posted February 3, 2018 9 hours ago, HfxCeltic said: No love for CBC? Really thought their free streaming platform would be ideal for CPL. CBC has very little soccer content and may allow for CPL to reach both cable folks and cord cutters. Personally don't have cable and have only watched hockey in the past 10 years either live (Hfx Mooseheads and the Sens), through CBC HNIC online streaming, or through other not so ethical online streaming means. CBC online streaming would be great for cheapo's like me. I would definitely love for CBC to have the rights. Was very happy with their TFC early years coverage, and their world cup coverage had been amazing. The accessibility piece will be key I think. The guy CPL hired was CBC's streaming guy right? Or was it TSN's? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BuzzAndSting Posted February 3, 2018 Share Posted February 3, 2018 1 hour ago, Ansem said: TV rights are negotiations. It's smart of the league to not negotiations in public. Personally, I have no doubt that CBC would be interested in picking it up and could use the content but ultimately, they should want TSN or SN money. I'm sure they know what they are doing Bontis and Clanachan were specifically talking about “the big 2” and the “duopoly” when discussing traditional broadcasting the other day. They weren’t shy about their desire to have deal with one of them. No mention of any other broadcaster. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dbailey62 Posted February 3, 2018 Share Posted February 3, 2018 16 minutes ago, BuzzAndSting said: Bontis and Clanachan were specifically talking about “the big 2” and the “duopoly” when discussing traditional broadcasting the other day. They weren’t shy about their desire to have deal with one of them. No mention of any other broadcaster. Well there's no doubt that getting on to RSN or TSN would be a fine thing. CBC has all sorts of financing issues and did say they were going to concentrate more on amateur sports (outside of HNIC) so perhaps it was a non-starter from the get go. RSN would probably preferable to TSN so as to avoid conflict of interest. In an ideal world, one could use MLS broadcasts to promote CPL broadcasts but it would be a cold day in hell before MLS or the Canadian clubs would allow that to happen. BuzzAndSting 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BringBackTheBlizzard Posted February 3, 2018 Share Posted February 3, 2018 (edited) 8 hours ago, dbailey62 said: ...In an ideal world, one could use MLS broadcasts to promote CPL broadcasts but it would be a cold day in hell before MLS or the Canadian clubs would allow that to happen. Unless of course the MLS teams had affiliates involved (I'm talking Ottawa Fury's arrangement with the Impact rather than TFC II here), but reaching a compromise on that so everybody is pushing in the same direction is a notion that seems to drive some people apoplectic on here, probably because it takes away the dream/delusion of eventually displacing MLS. If something as fringe as the Toronto Wolfpack can get involved with CBC through online streaming when playing very small semi-pro clubs during their first season there probably are ways to convince one of the main traditional pre-cable era broadcasters to get involved through non-traditional delivery and push it on their other platforms. Edited February 3, 2018 by BringBackTheBlizzard Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BringBackTheBlizzard Posted February 3, 2018 Share Posted February 3, 2018 On 2018/02/02 at 9:58 AM, harrycoyster said: ...The executive, whose name I'm forgetting, seemed pretty confident that Fath doesn't think Edmonton can support professional soccer. Meanwhile in Ottawa the guy who broke the move from the NASL to the USL has this to say: Dub Narcotic 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
C2SKI Posted February 3, 2018 Share Posted February 3, 2018 As an Edmonton resident during much of the NASL era, it was pretty hard to get excited about games, and I love soccer. But why would I care if we beat North Carolina, or Jacksonville, or Oklahoma. I have no connection to those places. Pit us against a team in Calgary, Saskatchewan or Vancouver for the Canadian championship, and I'll care. It's not the sport that failed in Edmonton, it was the league. Macksam, BenFisk'sBiggestFan, Zem and 3 others 6 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Macksam Posted February 3, 2018 Share Posted February 3, 2018 “Unless of course the MLS teams had affiliates involved (I'm talking Ottawa Fury's arrangement with the Impact rather than TFC II here), but reaching a compromise on that so everybody is pushing in the same direction is a notion that seems to drive some people apoplectic on here, probably because it takes away the dream/delusion of eventually displacing MLS.” Don’t be a bitch like that by revising your previous arguments. You were always arguing for MLS teams having significant stakes in their CPL clubs, not some minimalist arrangement that the Fury have with the Impact. Also, if people here did have an issue with the arrangement the Fury have with the Imapct, they would be voicing their concerns over that if they do in fact move to the CPL. I ask, has anyone here questioned that part of the equation if they move? I haven’t seen it. Delusion of displacing MLS? That’s quite the reach here. I don’t recall anybody saying that. What people do want is for cities without MLS clubs to reach their max potentials, something that can’t quite happen when you turn the league into a USL division like you envision. gator 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Macksam Posted February 3, 2018 Share Posted February 3, 2018 (edited) 14 minutes ago, C2SKI said: As an Edmonton resident during much of the NASL era, it was pretty hard to get excited about games, and I love soccer. But why would I care if we beat North Carolina, or Jacksonville, or Oklahoma. I have no connection to those places. Pit us against a team in Calgary, Saskatchewan or Vancouver for the Canadian championship, and I'll care. It's not the sport that failed in Edmonton, it was the league. I think most people don’t take the whole read between the lines hearsay that Fatz thinks “pro soccer can’t work in Edmonton” as a commentary on the city’s soccer potential itself. Again, this is a city that outdrew the Toronto Blizzard during the early 1980s in the old NASL. FC Edmonton problems had mostly to do with the surrounding circumstances regarding the club and league itself like you suggest. Edited February 3, 2018 by Macksam Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BringBackTheBlizzard Posted February 3, 2018 Share Posted February 3, 2018 33 minutes ago, C2SKI said: As an Edmonton resident during much of the NASL era, it was pretty hard to get excited about games, and I love soccer. But why would I care if we beat North Carolina, or Jacksonville, or Oklahoma. I have no connection to those places. Pit us against a team in Calgary, Saskatchewan or Vancouver for the Canadian championship, and I'll care. It's not the sport that failed in Edmonton, it was the league. Agree it's not the sport that failed. If you put an MLS team in Edmonton I suspect they would do OK, because of the higher playing standard and the chance to see big name DP players. An Edmonton MLS team would probably do better than the Crew, but might struggle a bit compared to the big three Canadian markets, which is why MLS rightly or wrongly is looking elsewhere at the moment as they think they can get more bang for their buck in larger American cities like Miami. The problem with assuming that a Canadian league would work better than FCE in a similar sort of way is that the playing standard probably wouldn't be as high as the NASL was. FCE had to load their roster with imports to be able to compete, which suggests that there isn't a huge untapped pool of genuinely pro level quality Canadian players waiting to be discovered. Those of us who watched many a TSN turning point being described by Graham Leggatt back in the day, can also remember that the games against Vancouver, Calgary and Winnipeg teams didn't seem to get the job done for the Brickmen the last time around when compared to the interest level in the Drillers of the original NASL a few years earlier, probably for just that reason. Even if Tom Fath is right there still should be ways to make something work on lower budgets in a way that provides a longer season that PDL does and doesn't rely on a roster of NCAA scholarship players. Think that's what he is getting at on the sustainability side of things. If he thought it was a complete lost cause he wouldn't have been at the last CanPL meeting. m-g-williams 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Complete Homer Posted February 3, 2018 Share Posted February 3, 2018 Are we really getting worked up about what a sports executive, who left FC Edmonton in 2012, postulates are FC Edmonton's motives? Especially when their actual GM is tweeting about #YegToCanPL? The guy's main comments were that the split season, travel, and lack of help from the city and sponsors hurt FC Edmonton in a way that lots of people didn't understand. A couple of those issues may be solved in CPL, especially with a proper marketing setup for the league. None of us has a crystal ball into Fath's mind, but I have a feeling Ball wouldn't be tweeting the way he is if there wasn't a chance that FC Edmonton were taking a good look at an eventual return BuzzAndSting, Rheo, johnyb and 3 others 6 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rheo Posted February 3, 2018 Share Posted February 3, 2018 6 minutes ago, Complete Homer said: Are we really getting worked up about what a sports executive, who left FC Edmonton in 2012, postulates are FC Edmonton's motives? Especially when their actual GM is tweeting about #YegToCanPL? Welcome back to the CPL general thread lol dbailey62, BuzzAndSting and grande 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
C2SKI Posted February 3, 2018 Share Posted February 3, 2018 1 hour ago, BringBackTheBlizzard said: Agree it's not the sport that failed. If you put an MLS team in Edmonton I suspect they would do OK, because of the higher playing standard and the chance to see big name DP players. An Edmonton MLS team would probably do better than the Crew, but might struggle a bit compared to the big three Canadian markets, which is why MLS rightly or wrongly is looking elsewhere at the moment as they think they can get more bang for their buck in larger American cities like Miami. The problem with assuming that a Canadian league would work better than FCE in a similar sort of way is that the playing standard probably wouldn't be as high as the NASL was. FCE had to load their roster with imports to be able to compete, which suggests that there isn't a huge untapped pool of genuinely pro level quality Canadian players waiting to be discovered. Those of us who watched many a TSN turning point being described by Graham Leggatt back in the day, can also remember that the games against Vancouver, Calgary and Winnipeg teams didn't seem to get the job done for the Brickmen the last time around when compared to the interest level in the Drillers of the original NASL a few years earlier, probably for just that reason. Even if Tom Fath is right there still should be ways to make something work on lower budgets in a way that provides a longer season that PDL does and doesn't rely on a roster of NCAA scholarship players. Think that's what he is getting at on the sustainability side of things. If he thought it was a complete lost cause he wouldn't have been at the last CanPL meeting. You completely missed my point. It's the significance of the competition, not just the quality. Making this league meaningful to Canadians is going to be an important factor in it's viability. Bbeto 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BringBackTheBlizzard Posted February 3, 2018 Share Posted February 3, 2018 (edited) Really? Think I addressed that with the parallel made with the Brickmen. We have already had two national domestic pro leagues with Edmonton teams involved playing against other Canadian cities in the manner you described. The Eagles in 1983 in the original CPSL and the Brickmen from 1987-1990 in the original CSL. If all it takes is a Canadian angle for a league to suddenly be meaningful to people in some way, we already would have had a league up and running for several decades by now and there would be no need for this thread. In reality, the only pro soccer leagues operating on a national scale that have ever drawn into five figures with any consistency in a Canadian context have been the original NASL and MLS and both have involved teams from Canadian cities mainly playing against American teams, so there's no reason to believe that angle was a significant impediment in FCE's case. American opposition has never seemed to do the Oilers any harm. Edited February 3, 2018 by BringBackTheBlizzard 1996 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
matty Posted February 3, 2018 Share Posted February 3, 2018 10 minutes ago, BringBackTheBlizzard said: Really? Think I addressed that with the parallel made with the Brickmen. We have already had two national domestic pro leagues with Edmonton teams involved playing against other Canadian cities in the manner you described. The Eagles in 1983 in the original CPSL and the Brickmen from 1987-1990 in the original CSL. If all it takes is a Canadian angle for a league to suddenly be meaningful to people in some way, we already would have had a league up and running for several decades by now and there would be no need for this thread. In reality, the only pro soccer leagues operating on a national scale that have ever drawn into five figures with any consistency in a Canadian context have been the original NASL and MLS and both have involved teams from Canadian cities mainly playing against American teams, so there's no reason to believe that angle was a significant impediment in FCE's case. American opposition has never seemed to do the Oilers any harm either. Can I ask, what differences you see in the current soccer landscape in Canada between the 1980s and now? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BringBackTheBlizzard Posted February 3, 2018 Share Posted February 3, 2018 (edited) Not as huge as people think, if you compare the interest levels in the original NASL and MLS. The CPSL and CSL both could reasonably have been expected in advance to do a lot better than they did in terms of drawing crowds. Edited February 3, 2018 by BringBackTheBlizzard Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
matty Posted February 3, 2018 Share Posted February 3, 2018 (edited) 14 minutes ago, BringBackTheBlizzard said: Not as huge as people think, if you compare the interest levels in the original NASL and MLS. The CPSL and CSL both could reasonably have been expected in advance to do a lot better than they did in terms of drawing crowds. And what about interest in international soccer, the availability of the sport and the general understanding of the game? Also the Blizzard were never drawing at the levels TFC have drawn even when TFC was drawing their worst numbers. Edited February 3, 2018 by matty Bbeto 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BringBackTheBlizzard Posted February 3, 2018 Share Posted February 3, 2018 Why does any of that suddenly transform the situation in a CanPL context compared to what happened with FCE, if the level of soccer on offer isn't very good and is at a level that would struggle to draw a large crowd even in hardcore soccer nations? In Toronto, the Lynx drew flies compared to what TFC have drawn a lot more recently than the 1980s and the main difference was the quality of the entertainment product, because it was no different when they were at Varsity Stadium operating on a reasonably large budget initially before the Hartrells moved them to Centennial. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
matty Posted February 3, 2018 Share Posted February 3, 2018 1 minute ago, BringBackTheBlizzard said: Why does any of that suddenly transform the situation in a CanPL context compared to what happened with FCE, if the level of soccer on offer isn't very good and is at a level that would struggle to draw a large crowd even in hardcore soccer nations? Firstly, FCE were not marketed well and lacked a lot of support. Here you have a number of well connected rich people trying to build a league in a similar style to the CFL to play up on Canadiana in a new soccer landscape were people actually have some understanding and enjoyment of the game. CPL is aiming to be decent (like the CFL) and decent plus marketing, regional support and Canadiana could do a lot more than OK soccer with none of the later two. 8 minutes ago, BringBackTheBlizzard said: In Toronto, the Lynx drew flies compared to what TFC have drawn a lot more recently than the 1980s and the main difference was the quality of the entertainment product, because it was no different when they were at Varsity Stadium operating on a reasonably large budget initially before the Hartrells moved them to Centennial. The Lynx are a non-factor here cause marketing and TFC have ALWAYS outdrawn what the Blizzard did even in their worst drawing years with a 0-0-9 start. Bbeto 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BringBackTheBlizzard Posted February 3, 2018 Share Posted February 3, 2018 Just now, matty said: ...CPL is aiming to be decent (like the CFL)... Soccer is a global market for players in a way gridiron football isn't where only a tiny fraction of top NCAA players get drafted by the NFL and a league like the CFL is pretty much the only show in town for a lot of former college players that want a shot at being pro athletes. The salary budgets they are talking about are not that big compared to elsewhere and are not likely to draw back too many of the best CMNT players from playing in MLS or outside Canada or draw in too many quality imports. Without those types of players you are looking at Lynx level soccer. Not terrible and still watchable for many people, but no matter how it is marketed you are only going to get some people out because a lot of reasonably hardcore soccer people are simply going to turn their nose up at it and steer clear while others won't show up regularly the way they would for a team like TFC. As for the point you make about the Blizzard, it is all for one nowadays because there is no NSL with teams like Croatia and Italia also drawing healthy crowds as well. it's not so clear cut on crowds in Vancouver and Montreal when a comparison is made between MLS and post-Pele NASL. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rheo Posted February 4, 2018 Share Posted February 4, 2018 Blah blah blah the eighties blah blah blah the CSL blah blah blah it can't work wash, rinse, repeat ted, dbailey62, Cheeta and 3 others 5 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
toontownman Posted February 4, 2018 Share Posted February 4, 2018 11 minutes ago, Rheo said: wash, rinse, repeat ahem... you missed this: Rheo 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kent Posted February 4, 2018 Share Posted February 4, 2018 7 hours ago, C2SKI said: As an Edmonton resident during much of the NASL era, it was pretty hard to get excited about games, and I love soccer. But why would I care if we beat North Carolina, or Jacksonville, or Oklahoma. I have no connection to those places. Pit us against a team in Calgary, Saskatchewan or Vancouver for the Canadian championship, and I'll care. It's not the sport that failed in Edmonton, it was the league. I think a good online presence with a mingling of fans from all teams is a useful thing for generating interest. I’m a TFC fan and last year I gained a heightened hatred for Sounders fans (above the usual annoyance) which ratcheted up the stakes for MLS Cup final last year. If I didn’t frequent mlssoccer.com I would have missed out on the fear of the possibility of losing to those idiots/jerks/whatever’s. I forget where I have heard about the idea of a CPL Hub for fans, but that is intriguing and I think can help make people care more about watching certain teams lose in games their own favourite team isn’t playing in, etc. I think that plays a bigger role than just the nationality of the opposing team. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lazlo_80 Posted February 5, 2018 Share Posted February 5, 2018 Have no idea who this but hey, why not? https://twitter.com/ElCanaco/status/960263243502469121 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dbailey62 Posted February 5, 2018 Share Posted February 5, 2018 3 minutes ago, lazlo_80 said: Have no idea who this but hey, why not? https://twitter.com/ElCanaco/status/960263243502469121 Hopefully a twofer. Stadium and team!https://globalnews.ca/news/3800718/surrey-pro-soccer-team-stadium/ Bbeto 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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