from Steve Lepore of Awful Announcing,
NBC holds a monopoly on hockey in the United States. They control both the sport’s broadcast and cable television partners. They also own a share in the NHL Network, the supposed 24-hour, all-hockey, all-the-time channel. Yet, why is it that no one owns hockey talk in this country during the day, or even during the afternoon?
Though we can all agree that NBC’s coverage is professionally done, regardless of how you feel about its personalities, there is just little done with them beyond the games and their pre- and post-shows, especially since the network dumped its late night highlights show after 2012-13. Why not have Mike Milbury and Keith Jones on throughout the day, or give second-string guys Jeremy Roenick and Anson Carter some more reps with an afternoon talk show? The network has an appealing host in Liam McHugh, why not see if hockey fans will follow him to a show earlier in the day?
A simple solution: add a third hour of NHL Network’s two-hour daily talk show, NHL Live, from 4-5 p.m. ET on NBCSN. It’ll fill some time previously used by hunting and fishing, can easily be pre-empted for mid-week soccer, and is already fairly cheaply done and has personnel in place. Plus, you get an hour every day to pitch NHL Network to potential subscribers who’ve maybe soured on the channel from some of the fans who have access to it giving negative reviews.
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