from Amazon
Friday, July 11, 2008
Hockey is tribal
Futterman says:
Hockey is tribal. NHL research shows 50% of NHL fans won’t watch the finals if their favorite team isn’t playing. Television ratings for hockey grow just 41% in the playoffs, while baseball’s grow 400%, and the NBA’s grow 135%.
That’s pretty shocking, really. I didn’t realize that. To that end, it makes sense then that you have 16 teams make the playoffs, and you can argue even more should make it.
That said, NHL revenues are just a bit under half of those of MLB, and all that without a national TV contract. And with half the games. Per game, the NHL generates as much revenue as MLB. With the lack of interest in hockey in most of USA, that’s pretty impressive. That the NHL can “only” generate 2.5 billion dollars should be treated as the NHL “somehow managed to” generate that much.