For as long as I can remember, ESPN's John Buccigross has been saying that the NHL should be buying Super Bowl advertising to promote its product. Well, now it's Super Sunday, and there's one minor North American sport that will be getting just that kind of super exposure:
Soccer in America received a major infusion of accessibility this week when Fox Sports World announced it would morph into the Fox Soccer Channel come February. (The formal ceremony will come during a 30-second spot on Fox's Super Bowl pregame show on Feb. 6; the revamped network begins broadcasting at 12:01 a.m. Feb. 7.) With 85 percent of Fox Sports World's programming already soccer-based, the network decided to ditch Aussie Rules Football, darts, rugby and concentrate on the world's most popular sport.
A couple of other thoughts: How is a sport that is far more alien to American culture than ice hockey able to leverage not one, but two seperate cable networks in the U.S.? Shouldn't the NHL be embarassed and afraid at what this might mean?
After all, America's Latin population is rapidly integrating into the mainstream, and they're going to take their cultural proclivities with them -- and that includes a love of the beautiful game.
It's really impossible to overstate this, but it should be obvious at this point: The NHL runs the real risk of permanent irrelevance if it can't find a way to get back on the ice, and soon.
As for me, ever since the lockout began, all the time I used to spend concentrating on the action on the ice, has now been refocussed on pitches around the world -- and Fox Sports World has been the main beneficiary. Something tells me I'm not alone. Certainly Fox, which lost millions of dollars on the NHL in the 1990s, is placing its bets elsewhere.
Bottom line to the NHL: Hurry back, lest there be little or nothing to hurry back to.
