Sports in Canadian culture

[mistercorporate]

Originally Posted by FrankieFlowerpot

I also highly dispute the fact that a good chunk of TFC fans watch the games on MLS Live.

Aren't most TFC games (the ones on TSN and TSN2) blacked out anyway?

You can still watch them on MLS live, just a different commentary track (the opposing team's).

[Prometheus]

Originally Posted by Acajack

The idea that out of 600-900 k for an Argos vs. X game that less than 22,000 of those are in the GTA, is totally preposterous.

And don't forget: the 4th-highest rated regular season game last season was between the Toronto Argonauts and the Hamilton Tiger-Cats (two GTA teams) with 956,000 viewers.

It starts getting really laughable when people insist on claiming that the vast majority of viewers for this purely GTA match-up must come from every other place in Canada except the GTA itself simply because those huge ratings don't square with their subjective beliefs about the popularity of the Argos within the GTA?

[esquire]

Originally Posted by mistercorporate

Argos territory must begin North of Newmarket or East of Oshawa because i see nothing to indicate a presence here otherwise, regardless of "national" TV ratings.

It is entirely possible that the Argo fanbase is based in the suburbs and therefore outside of your orbit. But so what? Perhaps the guy living in the far reaches of Brampton likes watching the Argos on TV but doesn't care for soccer. Does his viewership count for less than someone who lives on Roncevalles and wears a TFC scarf every day?

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by esquire

It is entirely possible that the Argo fanbase is based in the suburbs and therefore outside of your orbit. But so what? Perhaps the guy living in the far reaches of Brampton likes watching the Argos on TV but doesn't care for soccer. Does his viewership count for less than someone who lives on Roncevalles and wears a TFC scarf every day?

It could also be that he is one of those people who go out of their way to ignore the CFL...

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by Prometheus

And don't forget: the 4th-highest rated regular season game last season was between the Toronto Argonauts and the Hamilton Tiger-Cats (two GTA teams) with 956,000 viewers.

It starts getting really laughable when people insist on claiming that the vast majority of viewers for this purely GTA match-up must come from every other place in Canada except the GTA itself simply because those huge ratings don't square with their subjective beliefs about the popularity of the Argos within the GTA?

In order for their logic to work, viewership for a midsummer regular season game in the home market of the Argos' market would have to be something similar to that of the Super Bowl in Green Bay when the Packers are playing in it!

[esquire]

Originally Posted by Acajack

It could also be that he is one of those people who go out of their way to ignore the CFL...

I know people get on me for ragging on Toronto, but this is what I'm talking about. Toronto is the only place where you get such a grim determination to ignore the CFL, but not only that, you get strident denials that there are any pockets of fan support for the Argos whatsoever, even when it flies in the face of objective fact. As though this were somehow to the city's credit. ("We're so world class that we suck at supporting football!")

[mistercorporate]

Originally Posted by esquire

It is entirely possible that the Argo fanbase is based in the suburbs and therefore outside of your orbit. But so what? Perhaps the guy living in the far reaches of Brampton likes watching the Argos on TV but doesn't care for soccer. Does his viewership count for less than someone who lives on Roncevalles and wears a TFC scarf every day?

North of Newmarket you're no longer in Toronto's suburbs, you're pushing up against Barrie. Brampton is part of Toronto's suburbs and has strong TFC fan support. Incidentally, 2 of TFC's players including a starter and a future starter (now on loan with a Portuguese club) are from B-town. That's why i still maintain Argos have minimal popularity within the GTA, any popularity must be in North-Central Ontario, South-Western Ontario or out of province.

Nobody goes out of their way to avoid the CFL, people go out of their way to support something if it is interesting and cool. The CFL brand looks interesting but it isn't cool yet, for it to become cool in this market you need a good local brand and I don't see anyone from markets where it is popular making strategic moves to popularize it here, only put-downs of this city due to their own inadequacies and frustrations. When I see the BC Lions, or the Montreal Alouettes, I see cool brands that could engage people here, there are too many options here to settle for half-assed country bumpkin bread crumb products. Give us something like the BC Lions, the Alouettes with a local flavour and perhaps expand the list of cities, then Torontonians will take notice and the Leafs will get some competition (TFC is not competition as it's targetting a whole different sports market). The only chance the Argos have is to sell it to MLSE at a reasonable price so they can build something appealing here and make it a success, there's no incentive to go for a CFL team otherwise since MLSE already has great teams that have enthusiastic fan bases.

North of Newmarket and East of Oshawa:
http://www.videobabylon.ca/images/st...market-map.gif

[esquire]

Originally Posted by mistercorporate

That's why i still maintain Argos have minimal popularity within the GTA, any popularity must be in North-Central Ontario, South-Western Ontario or out of province.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by esquire

I know people get on me for ragging on Toronto, but this is what I'm talking about. Toronto is the only place where you get such a grim determination to ignore the CFL, but not only that, you get strident denials that there are any pockets of fan support for the Argos whatsoever, even when it flies in the face of objective fact. As though this were somehow to the city's credit. ("We're so world class that we suck at supporting football!")

One could also make the argument, based on an interpretation of facts, that no one cares about the NFL in Toronto.

For example, just look at the anemic ticket sales for the Bills games. You'd think if the NFL had legions of fans in the GTA that enough of them would have bought tickets for the only NFL game of the year in their city.

As for TV ratings, well for the NFL they are OK in Ontario overall but it could be that all or most of those people watching are in the Windsor and eastern Niagara regions where the Lions and Bills have lots of fans, and not in the GTA.

[mistercorporate]

Originally Posted by esquire

[Prometheus]

Originally Posted by mistercorporate

Totally preposterous unless you live here. It's like someone telling you that a Montreal based lacrosse team are the most popular sports team in Montreal, eventhough you never see or hear about them anywhere. Absolutely no visibility, and the only thing the people making the claim have are the national TV numbers. National TV ratings isn't equivalent to local popularity especially when the lack of local popularity is so apparent to anyone who lives here. Argos territory must begin North of Newmarket or East of Oshawa because i see nothing to indicate a presence here otherwise, regardless of "national" TV ratings. Give me local TV ratings that show they're more popular and you guys will get a convert, until then it's just hot air.

It's amusing to see you clinging on to your purely-subjective, non-scientific anecdotal observations about jersey sightings, water cooler talk, deep-pocketed MLSE marketing campaigns and Rogers-owned media discussions as an objective gauge of TFC's actual popularity, even though the actual objective data demonstrates that virtually nobody is watching TFC, in Toronto or anywhere else in Canada.

All your observations about TFC jerseys and whatnot can be still true for a number of reason completely unrelated to the actual (as opposed to perceived) popularity of TFC. But the claim that TFC is actually popular and the empirical data regarding TFC's atrocious television ratings cannot both be true at the same time. (You cannot sanely call a team that attracts only 22,000 viewers in a city of over 5 million a popular team, jerseys or no jerseys.) The empirical data regarding TFC's atrocious television ratings are true. Thus, the claim that TFC is actually popular in Toronto is false (and rather laughable too).

[esquire]

Originally Posted by Prometheus

All your observations about TFC jerseys and whatnot can be still true for a number of reason completely unrelated to the actual (as opposed to perceived) popularity of TFC. But the claim that TFC is truly popular and the atrocious ratings cannot both be true at the same time. The atrocious ratings are true. Thus, the claim that TFC is truly popular is false.

The comments about seeing TFC jerseys is a bit like someone saying that he sees people wearing polo shirts EVERYWHERE so polo must be SUPER POPULAR.

[mistercorporate]

Keep at it with the Argos circle-jerk, perhaps I should just step aside and allow all you non-Torontonians to school us on how popular the Argos are versus any of the other local teams...

Meanwhile, the other teams will continue to increase in popularity and market share while the Argos will continue with their slide to irrelevance. It would be a shame to lose a brand with so much history but alas with the mentality of denying reality, city-baiting and cloudy glasses could there be any other result?

When TFC was slumping, even the official supporters groups admitted the truth and organized a boycott to force MLSE's hand to listen to fans and change the way it operates. MLSE, bleeding money and on the verge of losing the franchise, gave in and the rest is history. We're now playoff contenders for the first time and by next year will have the largest soccer-specific stadium in the league. The Raptors are also getting a rebrand, instead of blaming the market they're taking responsibility for their own weaknesses as a franchise and the fans are supporting them.

[esquire]

Originally Posted by mistercorporate

When TFC was slumping, even the official supporters groups admitted the truth and organized a boycott to force MLSE's hand to listen to fans and change the way it operates. MLSE, bleeding money and on the verge of losing the franchise, gave in and the rest is history. We're now playoff contenders for the first time and by next year will have the largest soccer-specific stadium in the league. The Raptors are also getting a rebrand, instead of blaming the market they're taking responsibility for their own weaknesses as a franchise and the fans are supporting them.

No question that the Argos have their work cut out for them and that they should follow the TFC/Raptor lead, but they seem to be in a weird state of limbo right now given that their current owner never really fully embraced the team and has been acting as a bit of a caretaker more than anything else. I would not expect any such initiatives to move forward under his watch, despite the fact they're sorely needed. That will be up to the new owner, whoever that ends up being.

[Stryker]

Originally Posted by Prometheus

(You cannot sanely call a team that attracts only 22,000 viewers in a city of over 5 million a popular team, jerseys or no jerseys.) The empirical data regarding TFC's atrocious television ratings are true. Thus, the claim that TFC is actually popular in Toronto is false (and rather laughable too).

Did it occur to you, that one of the prime reasons TFC has such poor viewership, is because typical TFC fans dont watch tv.

You can say what you want about us but bucking tradition is kind of the point of the whole thing.

CFL has a massive television demographic, so does MLB, and there is obvious demographic reasons for that.


Anyway these numbers are completely out of context.

European soccer takes up a huge audience, TFC draws almost no audience outside of the urban core of toronto, while the argos are the second team, for almost everyone coast to coast.

Add to that the short season length for football, and its a no brainer that they have a much better audience.

[Prometheus]

Originally Posted by Stryker

Did it occur to you, that one of the prime reasons TFC has such poor viewership, is because typical TFC fans dont watch tv.

Can you provide us with some empirical data regarding how many people watch TFC games on television versus another medium? Until then, we can only assume that TFC has such poor viewership precisely because virtually no one watches them.

Whitecaps FC fans are soccer fans too but the Whitecaps generate eight times the television viewers while playing in a market less than half the size.

And you do know that every single CFL game is streamed online and that football fans know how to use computers and smartphones too?

[Stryker]

Originally Posted by Prometheus

Can you provide us with some empirical data regarding how many people watch TFC games on television versus another medium?

And you do know that every single CFL game is streamed online and that football fans know how to use computers and smartphones too?

Sure heres some imperical evidence.

I dont own a TV, and I like TFC alot that is a indisputable fact.

Your acting like I have some great stake in this.

I would love to see the cfl expand into the east, but at the moment have no interest in watching.

However it seems like alot of people have never lived anywhere close to downtown Toronto since TFC, has arrived.

When I lived there football was almost never mentioned, except for Rob ford and his argos, people from hamilton talking about some rivalry thing, and the SuperBowl. Which was crazy underwhelming relative to StJohns newfoundland.

The leafs raptors and BJs dominate everything, with soccer, rugby, and cricket following suite.

[Prometheus]

Originally Posted by stryker

sure heres some imperical evidence.

I dont own a tv, and i like tfc alot that is a indisputable fact.

When i lived there football was almost never mentioned, except for rob ford and his argos, people from hamilton talking about some rivalry thing, and the superbowl. Which was crazy underwhelming relative to stjohns newfoundland.

The leafs raptors and bjs dominate everything, with soccer, rugby, and cricket following suite.

lol!

[esquire]

TFC ratings are tiny because their fans are too technologically advanced for TV. Now I've heard everything.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by esquire

TFC ratings are tiny because their fans are too technologically advanced for TV. Now I've heard everything.

While it appears the entire Greater Vancouver region is still stuck with UHF-VHF black and white TVs!