In April 2011, the NHL announced that it had agreed with NBC on a 10-year deal to broadcast hockey in the United States. The deal saw the league land roughly $200 million annually and was heralded as an end to the days of hockey being a second-class sport on American television. It was a big deal for U.S. teams.
But a new Canadian television deal, announced by the league on Tuesday morning, is even bigger news for clubs south of the border.
Why is it such a big deal?
For starters, because the new 12-year deal with Rogers Communications that the NHL revealed this morning is for huge money: $5.232 billion, more than double the total dollar commitment from NBC.
And thanks to the NHL’s policy of distributing centrally generated revenue (such as national television deals), every team in the United States gets a cut of that money.
Of course, American hockey teams have always been given a share of Canadian national television revenues, but never has that share been so rich. In August, The Globe and Mail’s excellent media reporter Steve Ladurantaye reported that th ...
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Article written by Jonathan Willis
American NHL Teams the Big Winners in New Canadian TV Deal
November 26th, 2013 by Jonathan Willis Leave a reply »
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