The West Wins TO Goes NFL

Well that was a spectacular set of CFL finals on the weekend. As I said to my partner it would be sweet to see the Blue Bombers beat the Argonuts. An all West Grey Cup in the city we all love to hate; Toronto.

After all Torontonians could care less about the CFL they want the NFL. Torontonians have no use for Canadian sports, they view themselves as home to American sports, like baseball and basketball. The CFL well that's just a prairie league. And the prairie league is coming to their home town to show them how the game is really played.

The program OTR (Official Toronto Report) on the Toronto Sports Network (TSN) , a program given to prestidigitation on when the perennial losers the Maple Leafs will win the Stanley Cup ,had Paul Godfrey and Pinball Williams on earlier this year once again talking trash about bringing in the NFL. The premise is if they do the CFL will collapse.

Paul Godfrey, the president and chief executive officer of the Toronto Blue Jays who has been pressing Toronto's NFL viability for 20 years, said that Larry Tanenbaum, chairman of Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment, and media mogul Ted Rogers have joined forces and will bid on bringing an NFL regular-season game to Toronto in 2008 and 2009.

What a pretentious proposition. The CFL is a Western League always has been. Its greatest support and fans are in the West and Hamilton. Toronto has always viewed the league as second best next to the NFL. Ottawa is gone, Montreal collapsed and came back. But in the West the teams are strong. And because of that they were able to bail out Hamilton and Montreal when they had tough financial times. Because unlike privately owned teams that go bankrupt, the majority of teams in the West are community owned.

If Toronto gets the NFL it's impact on the CFL will be minimal. The game will continue. It is a blue collar sport, where the players at the end of the season go back to their jobs, their farms, and work until next season. Unlike U.S. pro sports.

If Toronto got a NFL franchise then the CFL would still have Hamilton, could revive Ottawa, and look east to a team in the Maritimes. Lack of a team in Toronto would only hurt Toronto. And for the CFL no great loss except for Skydome, and that can be rented. And if Toronto gets the CFL the Skydome rent will be cheap because the plan is for Godfrey and pals to build a new stadium for its NFL team.

Toronto must prove mettle as host of the Grey Cup
Tue, November 20, 2007
By TERRY JONES, SUN MEDIA

Bubbling in the background of the 95th Grey Cup is the fight for the right to play host to the 100th anniversary edition.

Should the 2012 Grey Cup be in Toronto? Or out West?

With Toronto to be flooded by football fans from the West for a surprise Saskatchewan Roughriders-Winnipeg Blue Bombers Grey Cup, there will be no lack of fans here to support the concept of the 100th anniversary belonging where the Grey Cup has flourished since Toronto last fumbled the football here in 1992.

Calgary, Edmonton, Saskatchewan and Winnipeg each have held two successful celebrations of Canadiana in the interim with almost no Toronto fans showing up to participate.

But there's more to it than that. Looming in the background is the NFL and the Buffalo Bills. Toronto will have one pre-season game and one regular season game of the Buffalo Bills for each of the next five years.

It's possible the 100th anniversary Grey Cup game could be held here the same year Toronto becomes a full-schedule NFL city.

A Grey Cup on Sunday and the Toronto Bills hosting Monday Night Football the next night? Would that be a good thing or a bad thing?

Canadian Colts? NFL team considering move to Toronto

By Dave Forister, THG Sports

Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay was recently quoted as saying the Colts would consider a move to Toronto in 2007 if the team can’t come to an agreement with the city of Indianapolis on the building of a new stadium by that time.

The Colts, whose revenues are among the worst in the league, feel they need a larger, more modern stadium with luxury skyboxes to be able to compete financially with other teams in the NFL. If the city won’t build them a new stadium, then it is very likely they will move. “The RCA Dome is a very nice facility—by 1984 standards. It is depressing when we go on the road and see all these great new facilities and then have to come back here and play,” said Irsay in a Sunday afternoon interview.

Irsay told The Hoosier Gazette he would like to keep the team in Indianapolis because of the tremendous fan support the team receives, sometimes even selling out a game when a very good opponent comes to town, but in the end the decision will come down to finances. “It is all about the Benjamins,” said Irsay.

Toronto has a metropolitan area of over 5.5 million, five times that of Indianapolis, and is willing to build a new stadium if the NFL wanted to move a franchise into Canada’s largest city.

“We would welcome the NFL to Toronto with open arms,” said the city’s new mayor David Miller, “Except if the Cardinals wanted to move here of course. They suck.”

If the Colts can’t come to terms with Indianapolis and do decide to move, they would play in the Toronto Sky Dome until a new football-only stadium was built. The Sky Dome seats 53,506 for football and is currently the home of Major League Baseball’s Blue Jays and the Canadian Football League’s Argonauts.

SEE:

unintended consequences

Edmonton Eskimo Moon's NFL Hall of Fame

SKYDOME THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF SPORTS

Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
TSN, OTR, Grey Cup, Rona Cup, Paul Godfrey, Pinball Clemens, sports, NFL in Toronto, Canada, Canadian Football, CFL, Skydome,Football, NFL, CFL

unintended consequences

One of the funny unintended consequences of the article below is the RONA ads which play on the CFL games, which show an American football field instead of a Canadian one. You can tell from the hash marks.

Sheesh such a tiny detail could be disastrous for the renaming of the Grey Cup to the Rona Cup.

"As soon as 2008 you could see players competing in the Rona Grey Cup or the Ford Grey Cup," said one high-ranking league source. "It's for sale and the league will be pushing ahead with this."

And some sponsorship experts say the CFL may be risking more than it realizes by selling Grey Cup naming rights.

After their 1953 inception, the league's most valuable player awards were called the Schenleys until 1989, when sponsor Schenley Canada Inc. cut its ties to the league. The awards have had multiple sponsors since but are no longer as well known.
"The league has to ask itself, at what price do you sell your soul?" said Stellick. "The Grey Cup really is the soul of that league."

The more serious consequences are that a regulation that benefits the bank accounts of broadcasters does nothing for Canadian production. And of course the usual suspects will cry for the elimination of the CRTC because of this.

The right to insert Canadian commercials into U.S. broadcasts when shows air at the same time on both sides of the border is worth more than $200-million to the industry.

Such provisions were initially contemplated to give Canadian networks revenue that could be used to fund Canadian productions, including news, drama and comedies. But the report argues simulcasting has instead created overwhelming financial incentives to run U.S. programs in prime-time, since the networks can earn more ad revenue from American shows, which draw much higher ratings.

As a result, Canadian content is being marginalized to Friday and Saturday nights, or to the summer, when audiences are smaller. The report doesn't suggest killing simulcast rights, but the authors wonder if networks should be required to show a certain amount of domestic programs on weeknights.

"It's a great example of an unintended consequence of a regulation," Mr. Dunbar said in an interview. "We have all kinds of incentives for producing Canadian content, all kinds of subsidies for producing Canadian content, and then it's not really getting shown at a time when Canadians are watching television in large numbers. ...We are not saying abolish the rule.

SEE:

Death of Channel Ten

CRTC vs The Public Interest

Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
CRTC, cable, Grey Cup, Rona Cup, ads, RONA, sports, TV, Canada, public-broadcasting, CFL, media,

Don Getty's Legacy

Today is Family Day in Alberta. A province wide holiday brought in by Premier Don Getty. It is his legacy. What is Chretien's? Or Ralph Klien's? They were after all Don's contemporaries and nemesis. And yet what did they do for the citizens, all the citizens. Nothing, nada, zip.

On the radio I heard the announcer prove his ignorance by thanking Ralph for todays day off. But such was not the case, Ralph had his chance to declare a holiday on Sept. 1 as the anniversary of Alberta's province hood, but failed to.

Family day was opposed by business interests which complained that would cost them money. When in reality it didn't. Another shopping day. What they lost in paying work place wages they made up in consumer spending. their wage slaves became their consumers with a commodity fetish.

But that same complaint did stop Ralph from declaring Sept. 1 a holiday. But then the fat boy who was King never played football. Peter Lougheed, and Don Getty, two Premiers did. As did our current Lieutant Governor; Normie Kwong. All three played for the Edmonton Eskimos.

Ralph listened to the business naysayers who run this province and capitulated.

His legacy is what? Defeating the deficit dragon.

Hmmm not so.

That was actually begun by Getty, Ralph inherited his program. Which was why in true Stalinist fashion he had to remake Don into the enemy, the bad guy, the Trotsky, who betrayed Alberta by running it into debt and deficit by trying to diversify the economy. A program begun by Lougheed. But a dream that failed and Getty inherited. But such was Lougheeds stature and reputation, Ralph and his neo-con advisor's could not touch him so they made Getty their scape goat.

Other accomplishments of the Getty Government ; a strong record of fiscal management, self-government for Metis Settlements, private telelphone lines for rural Albertans, the election of Canada's only elected Senator, and the creation of Family Day.

And Ralph inherited Senate Elections from Getty! A key plank of the Reform Party and the old Social Credit rump within the Alberta P C's.

Getty fumbled politically at the end of his Premiership but to be honest Ralph made him his political football, his scapegoat, his Trotsky, as he moved to rule the one party state with a new agenda, to create a Republican movement in Canada. Which was just another example of Ralph's ability at political plagiarism.

A political movement that was in direct opposition to Lougheeds Paternalistic State Capitalism. And one that failed.

See:

Don Getty

Ralph Klein

Alberta

Social Credit

Manning

Lougheed



Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Peter Lougheed, Don Getty, Realph Klein, Alberta, Premier, PC, Conservatives, Tories, politics, family day, holidays, Canada,