The Montréal Canadiens are no longer English language orphans looking for a TV deal.
Rogers has stepped up and will carry Les Habs en Anglais as part of a new 3-year deal. 39 games will appear on Rogers Sportsnet East. 3 more games will air on City TV in Montréal due to conflicts with the Rogers regional channels.
CJNT (Channel 62) in Montréal will carry 3 games due to conflicts with Rogers Sportsnet East (all times 7:30 pm Eastern): October 13 @ Tampa Bay; November 20 St. Louis; December 18 Anaheim. If you can pick up City TV from Montréal, you can watch 3 additional games.
Presumably, Rogers Sportsnet East would run those games tape-delayed after its conflict.
Rogers will also carry 8 additional games nationally, including the Saturday Super Bowl weekend matinee with Washington. City TV is already carrying the Sunday matinee with Arizona nationally. This keeps alive the tradition from CBC of nationally airing both games.
We've seen that Rogers will air extra national contests involving the Flames and Oilers and now the Canadiens. The Vancouver Canucks have not announced their local schedule, but we should see that trend continue. Both Alberta teams will get 32 national games and the Habs will get 40 national games. Makes me wish I lived in Canada.
Read the press release here.
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If you don't live in Canada, you might wonder why this matters. For NHL Network telecasts outside the Rogers windows of Wednesday, Saturday, and Sunday, the U.S. version can pick up a local Montréal feed in English.
For live telecasts, the NHL Network will have 2 games outside the national windows: October 16 vs. Boston and the Saturday Super Bowl matinee against Washington. Unfortunately, the NHL Network might pick up the Comcast Washington feed, the worst TV announcers in the league. But the channel would have a choice.
NHL Center Ice and NHL GameCenter Live viewers can access a Canadiens feed when offered. Hopefully, Comcast will be more generous in showing the Montréal feed on NHL Center Ice.
And for the Boston games, the NHL Network can choose something else beside NESN.
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Rogers did not announce who will call the games on Rogers Sportsnet East. My unofficial prediction is that Dave Randorf (who called the games on TSN-Habs the past few seasons) and Mike Johnson (a TSN-Habs veteran) will call the games. Mark Lee is available but I don't get the sense that Rogers will reach outside the family to call the extra games.
If Bob Cole were younger, he and Garry Galley would have been a good pair on the local Habs telecasts. Dave Reid and Bobby Dollas provided colour for TSN-Habs last season, and would be available.
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We don't know how or why Rogers came to the decision to carry the Canadiens games in English, but we're very glad this happened.
TSN seemed the logical pick since the channel owns a percentage of the team, so having Rogers call the games for a team partially owned by TSN will be a splash of karma.
With the previous RDS deal, the Canadiens grew a fan base outside Eastern Ontario, Quebec, and the Maritimes. Those west of the viewing area will have to rely on NHL Center Ice or NHL GameCenter Live for the 42 non-national games, but they now have that option … even if it is only in English.
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The rumours of Quebec being one of the 4 new NHL franchises brings up a similar discussion. The Quebec Nordiques would certainly be on TVA and TVA Sports en Francaise.
The English language rights for the Nordiques wouldn't be nearly as valuable as the rights for the Canadiens, and we all saw the lack of fight for those rights.
The Nordiques would receive some national telecasts on Rogers. That would crowd the Saturday night slot a bit.
TSN5 and Rogers Sportsnet East could split a small package. The channels might even agree to have English language announcers call the game in a studio with French language graphics (like RDS has done in reverse for Stanley Cup playoffs).
Those in the Canadiens viewing area can also enjoy the Ottawa Senators. Assuming the Quebec Nordiques share a similar viewing area, you will have an area of Canada where you can watch 3 local teams. I could learn to love that perk.
As for TV for a second Toronto team, TSN4 and Rogers Sportsnet Ontario split the package since MLSE owns the Leafs. Both outlets would fight for rights for a second Toronto area team (Markham or Hamilton). A new franchise could create its own cable channel, similar to Leafs TV, to carry the games.
If Quebec and Toronto2 play Saturday night along with the other Canadian teams, Rogers will need all its channels just for the Canadian teams.
Canucks local broadcast deets have since been announced: http://www.sportsnet.ca/canucks-fans-get-best-seat-in-the-house-as-sportsnet-delivers-all-82-games-this-season/
34 national games and 48 regional. I haven't taken a very close look, but I suspect the number of national games going up is similar to how TSN was able to carry 17 Maple Leafs games nationally in the past. 10 of them were actually regional, but the league and other Canadian clubs agreed to allow TSN to take those 10 games nationally. The schedule must have been designed in such a way that the additional national telecasts were not competing against other regional ones. (Confusing, I know.)
At the end of the day, it's terrific that the Canadian teams not in Toronto will get more national availability.
Posted by: Tyler | September 05, 2014 at 06:34 PM
As for commentators on the Habs regional games, I would like to think Randorf is a candidate but he's going to have a lot of national work and I think SN has already announced he will be sharing the Leafs regional work with Paul Romanuk. It wouldn't surprise me if another play-by-play guy is hired.
Posted by: Tyler | September 05, 2014 at 06:36 PM
16 Leafs games and 42 Habs games, slightly less than the TSN workload for Leafs and Sens. And either Romanuk or Randorf will handle West Coast games on Saturdays. Whoever gets hired will be a last-minute choice that isn't already signed up (Mark Lee?).
Posted by: Chad | September 06, 2014 at 05:31 PM
Rogers is adding extra national games for its teams: Canucks, Flames, Oilers, and Canadiens. This is a nice bonus. The cost isn't an issue since they will use the local crews for a national game. A very good move to bring extra games to Canadians.
Posted by: Chad | September 06, 2014 at 05:33 PM
I'm kinda thinking Mark Lee might be the guy for the Habs gig, unless Rogers goes off the board. The guys they already have are busy enough as is.
Posted by: Tyler | September 07, 2014 at 12:53 PM
Mark Lee fits the bill: national experience, former CBC guy, available right now. We'll see. Hope you're right.
Posted by: Chad | September 07, 2014 at 06:31 PM