Media as much to blame for Coyotes Problems as the fans

[Espo]

http://phoenix.fanster.com/coyotes/2009/06/17/media-who-criticize-fans-are-to-blame-for-lack-of-coyotes-support/

The in vogue thing for local media to do over the last month has been to criticize the fans who banded together to show their support for the Phoenix Coyotes. Instead of embracing and helping their efforts to keep a major sports team in the city, these local print and radio personalities decided to lambast them.

Writers like the Republic’s Dan Bickley and the Tribune’s Scott Bordow and radio personalities like John Gambadoro are just as big, if not a bigger, reason for the teams’ struggles as the fans that they are so quick to dismiss.

These traditional media members wrote and talked less about the Coyotes over the last four years than they did about national sports like horse racing and golf and high school events. It wasn’t until the team’s financial struggles became apparent that they smelled blood in the water and decided it was time to use some of their precious ink and air time to talk about the team that calls Glendale home.

If local media doesn’t dedicate the time or the effort to covering a team, how will they grow a fan base? The Republic sent out a beat writer to home games but used AP reports for road games. The East Valley Tribune didn’t even send a reporter to home games. KTAR’s Gambo and Ash show, the radio home of John Gambadoro, managed to have exactly six interviews with representatives of the Coyotes the entire season, four of which were Shane Doan. It was probably the six times they talked hockey all year. The Republic didn’t even manage to send a reporter to the Save the Coyotes rally and neither did KTAR, at least Bordow had the decency to show his face and state his point of view in person. Obviously, it’s not entirely their responsibility to generate interest in a team, but without even a minimal attempt to cover the team how do they expect the Valley to get behind them?

Is shifting their thoughts from their downtown offices to Glendale’s Jobing.com Arena just too far of a mental jaunt for these media members to take? Is it just too expensive for them to go to a game with their press pass and eat discounted media food? Is covering a team only warranted when the team is winning (if so, KTAR and both papers should probably stop dedicating time and space to the Diamondbacks)? Some fans have legitimate reasons for not attending games. What’s your excuse?

The Save The Coyotes effort received more positive press and more time on air and in print from the Canadian media who was chomping at the bit to “Make It Seven” than it did from most local media outlets. How does that make any sense?

It may have to do with the fact that the negative local coverage came from people more concerned about how to continue making money in two sinking industries. That and the fact that two of the three, Bickley and Gambadoro, are more pro-Chicago and New York respectively than they are pro-Phoenix.

The bottom line is this group of fans made a valiant effort to hold a rally with no money, five days to plan it, no real marketing effort and 105 degree heat to contest with. People like AM 1060’s Calling All Sports Saturday, Native New Yorker, Wildflower Bread Company and Heritage Graphics were willing to lend their support and help offset some of the cost. Even Arnie Spanier, a skeptic of the validity of hockey in the Valley, promoted the event on his show and came out to support the fans. What exactly did YOU do other than hide behind your microphones and computers?

In the end, the efforts of these fans should be commended rather than ridiculed they stood up for what the team they believe in and a sport they love. The claim was made that the numbers did more to prove Canada’s point that Phoenix hockey fans are apathetic. Without this group, no one would have done anything and fans wouldn’t have been heard at all. All that would have been left was radio hosts and newspaper columnists saying fans didn’t care and hockey wouldn’t work in the desert. That makes the Canadian’s point louder and clearer than anything else.

 

[Gaddabout]

It's not the media's job to support anything. It's the media's job to report, and if fans support an NHL team like it's an IHL team, the media has little to zero incentive to throw resources at it.

 

[ASUCHRIS]

Blaming the media is misguided, the local media is always willing to jump on the bandwagon of a winner. Bottom line is the team has been nothing short of awful since they got here, and their failure to perform at all is the reason why we're in this current predicament.

 

[bankybruce]

I listen to Gambo and Ash on average about 8 hours a week during drive times and I can remember many times Gambo talking about the team. He loves hockey and always tried to talk about them when possible. The reason they had so little interviews is because they moved to XTRA910 this last season and had a bulk on them there. Gambo is a big supporter and to say otherwise is a lie.

 

[CardsFan88]

It isn't wrong that the Coyotes have been the red headed step child of Phoenix sports. They do receive the least amount of coverage. Like the write states, it isn't the media's job to promote the team, BUT when the media does do as he states, it benefits all parties.

More coverage = more hockey fans

Maybe it takes a few years, or an entire generation, but it will have an impact. One could say since the Coyotes have been here around 15 years, had they started in earnest on such a strategy THEN, they wouldn't be here NOW.

Also it benefits the newspapers, and last I checked, pretty much ALL of them are facing intense pressure to even stay alive. So it would seem to me if you need to sell more papers, and reach a wider audience, promoting the Coyotes, and providing coverage would help to do just that. The gains would only come about in baby steps, but saying you can't because there is no immediate payoff can also be correlated to one reason why the economy isn't doing well. Nothing is a quick fix.

I am one of those people that is/isn't a Coyotes fan. I'm a fan, sure, because they are Phoenix's team. But I'm not a big hockey fan. I'm 31, born and raised right here. In school I can assure you I never played ice hockey, and they really only let us play field hockey probably about ten times throughout all of the physical education classes through all the years.

In other words, unlike somewhere else, we need to have people like the media hammer home hockey because otherwise it's foreign to us.

But it has to also go both ways. It's as much the media's fault as it is the Coyotes fault. Well more so for the Coyote's since it's their business, but overall the two components to building a fan base are co-op's between the media and the Coyotes.

The Coyotes need to buck up and do a few things to get the base started. It's not that I don't like hockey, because I don't like hockey. It's because to the average person here that isn't from elsewhere, hockey rules to me are like football rules to your wife. Hard to enjoy that. Plus if you've never really played it, the passion isn't going to be there.

So if you live in an area where you can't play ice hockey, and none of the schools play field hockey, it's harder for a fanbase to be built here than in say Pittsburgh.

So instead of focusing on what they should havve done over the past 15 years, lets assume we keep the Coyotes, and want to build up a fan base over the next 15 years. What do we do?

Well imo I've already started in on what you do. You get kids playing your sport. Maybe it costs more initially, maybe its far more than you have to do than in other cities, but the bottom line is you get kids here in phoenix playing your sport.

You can do this a few ways.

1. You could go the ice hockey approach. Build 5 or more ice dens like the one in N. Scottsdale. Create leagues, and have them be cheap, maybe even almost free the first couple of years. Fill the league out. Co-op with the media to hold events, do press conferences when you open new ice dens. You really could get creative, such as have one of the newspapers maybe even post team standings in it. Yeah it's little league, but who wouldn't buy a paper of their kid's team in the paper? A few lines on C14 wouldn't cost much, but would really make the children and parents feel an intrinsic value to playing hockey.

If it's still a bit expensive, the Coyotes should provide equipment; puck, sticks, masks, pads, etc.

2. You could go the field hockey approach. Co-op with schools to add field hockey as an important part of their physical education. Provide equipment to the schools so pretty much every child has significant time in school playing field hockey. It lets them get better in tune with the rules, so that when they watch the Coyotes, they know what is going on.

It may cost a couple of million for equipment, and probably a few tens of millions to create a few more ice dens. But then again they might not have to pay for it all. Either way, while it's millions to start this up, millions is a drop in the bucket when it concerns a major sports franchise doing something like this over the decade. Maybe signing that 35 year old center to their third line makes a difference, but for the same price every year they could implement a plan like this.

That's the part a lot of people seem to forget. Business doesn't just spring out from the ground, you have to create it. Sometimes it takes decades to create a desire for it. But 30 years ago what alot of NBA teams would currently move their franchise to another city because of lack of support, were considered back then to be great fans. It took decades to get basketball to blossom. Of course hockey and Phoenix will take some time.

But we need start trying sometime. Better to start now around year 15-16 then never.

That's where we are, two industries, not doing what they need to generate sales, and looking for the scapegoat. If you want hockey to be successful, you need to bend over backwards to attract the fans.

It's simple marketing. We've been going through these different ages of marketing. Before you made it, then thought how to sell it. Well that type of marketing approach is what they Coyotes have been doing more or less. Assuming there is a great need for hockey here, and not doing much to generate new interest. It's not like football, where you can almost become a fan by tripping over something. You need to take concrete action to create a fanbase. Ignoring that fact won't make it go away, you'll just lose 200+ million this decade or so on it. To me, a few million spent early might have avoided most of that loss. To me, that would have been money well spent. But instead since it's difficult to quantify, and it isn't a bankers plan, then it can't be a good one right? Wrong.

It is pretty sad that we've had a hockey team for the past 15 years, and still almost no one has either been to a game, or knows it's rules. I think I just stated why, and how to rectify it. But it won't come overnight, and it may take years without getting much back before it builds steam. But we should all conclude at this point, we don't have much of a fanbase, and that isn't going to change on it's own.

I do hope the Coyotes stay, I would feel bad for glendale stuck with a 200 million dollar albatross stadium, and all the fans.

Oh yeah, and I'd have Coyotes on free tv. The fact the Cardinals and Coyotes seemed to play the same amount of games on tv doesn't help either. It seems like for the past decade, fewer and fewer games are on each season/each tv package. Which seems a bit suicidal to me again given it's ice hockey in Phoenix. Every away game should be televised. There's no 'attendance' excuse for those games.

It's not Phoenix are bad hockey fans. It's that Phoenix still doesn't know what hockey is. That's the problem. Those that do know, seem to like it quite a bit. There's just few of them though. Which does look bad. But that's more of an indictment of the Coyotes and the media, than it's fans and residents.

Or else we should consider everyone in America is a crappy sports fan because they don't watch soccer. Everyone else in the world does. It's not that soccer sucks, it's just that in phoenix, hockey is like America views soccer. It's very important to other people, just not to us. Someone has to make us feel it's important. If not us, then our children. That should have been clear from the start. But for the past 15 years, I haven't seen it. I remember a few promotions, but the key word is FEW, and most of the ones I remember, were in the 1990's.