Ian’s just posted a great article covering the CBC’s surprising failure to capture broadcasting rights to the 2010 Olympic Winter Games in Vancouver. Like him, I’m delighted to finally see the 900 lb. Gorilla of Canadian Sportscasting finally get squashed for a change—“Who’s da bitch now??” indeed.
Why the glee in learning of the CBC’s failure? Because Canada’s public broadcaster has an unfair advantage: our Tax Dollars. It is a public entity that routinely outbids private firms such as TSN and Rogers for television rights to sporting events and then goes on to do a horribly mediocre job of broadcasting such events.
To be fair, I actually have a fondness for the CBC as a whole. CBC Radio and Newsworld feature some top notch programs and I’ve grown to further appreciate CBC News as I’ve recognized the shear ineptitude of American alternatives1. I can even now tolerate the endless stream Anne of Green Gables and Avonlee series because I’ve come to terms with the fact that there must be some deeply ingrained demand in the Canadian Psyche for crap shows about the maritimes. But I have absolutely no love for CBC sports.
Even if we pretend for a second that CBC Sports does not have an unfair competitive advantage in acquirng major sportscasts such as the Olympics or the NHL’s Saturday Nights or Playoffs, its program production quality and meaningful coverage cannot hold a candle to its privately run competitors. Consider hockey: what on earth does Hockey Night in Canada actually offer that either TSN or Sportsnet do not? Besides a crotch watcher and senile bigot, I’m really out of unique features. On top of this, TSN and Sportsnet have far better on-air staff—there is no comparison between Sportsnet’s Jim Hughson and the CBC’s Chris “I LIKE to randomly INTONATE!” Cuthbert—and are far more in touch with the average Canadian sportsfan than the stodgy and geriatric CBC Sports. In a nutshell: TSN and Sportsnet provide energetic and insightful broadcasts that are able to keep up with frenetic pace of the modern sports world. Conversely, CBC Sports can atleast be said to have mastered the glacial sportscasting intensity required for Equestrian events and Golf.
As Ian alluded to in his post, without tax money for muscle, CBC is now Canadian Sportcasting’s punk. It also seems unlikely that the 2010 Winter Olympics will be the only time that CBC Sports drops the soap…
1 Canada’s only identity has been and will likely continue to only be derivable by direct comparison to a similar, but flawed, American person, place or thing. This is a rule that may as well be in our Charter of Rights.
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