Monthly Archives: September 2026

| TV

Rogers is betting it can squeeze more money out of NHL fans

Updated Sept. 12 with Bell announcement about TSN Premium.

We’re just about ready to start the new era of NHL on Canadian TV, as the second 12-year Rogers deal finally gets under way. And yesterday, the company that negotiated an $11-billion deal announced its national broadcast schedule for the 2026-27 season and included this subtle notice:

“Monday Night Hockey, which is exclusive to Sportsnet+”

Oh, I thought, that sounds suspicious. Sure enough, if you get into the weeds, you see that people who subscribe to Sportsnet through their TV provider will have to get a $13/month add-on to watch those Monday games, which includes about a half-dozen games from each Canadian team through the season.

Those who subscribe to Sportsnet+ directly won’t have to add this add-on. They get it with the $30/month or $250/year subscription (oh wait, it’s $35/month and $270/year starting in less than two weeks).

And if that wasn’t enough to hammer the self-serving nail, subscribers to Rogers TV services (including Shaw/”Rogers West” and Shaw Direct) also won’t have to pay extra. In fact, they’ll get three new digital channels on their TV grids so they won’t have to switch to the streaming app to watch the games, they can just change channels like regular TV.

Whether you call it “shrinkflation” or nickel-and-diming (loonie-and-toonieing?), Rogers is now demanding more for less.

It’s a move that will have consequences for fans and for Rogers.

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| Opinion, Radio, TV

Who killed Corus? Assessing blame for the media company’s decline

Corus Entertainment, which owns Global TV, specialty channels like Showcase, YTV, History, W Network, Home and Flavour, and radio stations in Ontario and western Canada, is dying a slow death.

It’s currently awaiting received CRTC approval for a plan that would dilute its stock enough to hand 99% of its equity to its debt holders, which means the Shaw family giving up control of the company to private equity, whose main focus will be the bottom line.

The transaction has become necessary because of Corus’s very heavy debt load. According to its most recent financial report in June, the company has more than a billion dollars in debt, and its total liabilities exceed its total assets by more than 50%. It’s spending more than $10 million a month just on debt interest payments. The proposed deal would cancel $500 million in debt in exchange for 99% equity, which effectively values the company at $505 million.

As recently as 2017, Corus’s market capitalization was over $2 billion. Now, because of the dire financial situation and pending dilution, Corus stock is trading at 3.5 cents and its market cap is $6 million.

While the deal would go a long way to bringing Corus closer to a break-even point, the company will probably continue to struggle going forward unless something dramatic changes.

How did we get here? Who caused this once great company to get to this point? Turns out there’s plenty of blame to go around if you’re trying to find people to point fingers at. Here are my prime suspects:

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| TV

How Canada’s NHL broadcast rights are divided

Yesterday, the NHL, Rogers and Quebecor finally settled the big missing piece of broadcast rights for the coming season (less than a month away), confirming that TVA Sports will remain the national French-language rights holder for the NHL, minus Wednesday night games that are going to Amazon.

With that in mind, let’s review the breakdown of national and regional rights by team. In bold are changes taking effect this season.

Team English TV French TV English radio French radio
(National) Sportsnet (2038) TVA Sports (2038) N/A N/A
Amazon** (2038) Amazon** (2038)
Vancouver Canucks Sportsnet Pacific (2033) None Kiss FM (2033) None
Edmonton Oilers Sportsnet West (2035) None Corus/CHED (2029) None
Calgary Flames Sportsnet West (2035) None Corus/QR 770 (2031) None
Winnipeg Jets TSN3 (Unknown) None Corus/CJOB (2030) None
Toronto Maple Leafs TSN4* None TSN 1050* None
Sportsnet Ontario* Sportsnet 590*
Ottawa Senators TSN5 (2038) RDS (2038) TSN 1200 (2038) Cogeco/104.7 FM (2028)
Montreal Canadiens TSN2 (Unknown) RDS (Unknown) TSN 690 (Unknown) Cogeco/98.5 FM (2027?)
Laval Rocket (AHL) AHL TV/FloHockey RDS (home games only) None Sick Media (home games only)

*Leafs rights are governed by an agreement between Bell and Rogers as part of Rogers’ takeover of Leafs owner MLSE. The rights remain split between the two in the short term and guarantees Bell rights to continue those rights at fair market value for the next 20 years.

**Amazon national rights are limited to Wednesday evening games (27 per season), two first-round playoff series and one second-round playoff series.

Besides Amazon’s increasing presence in English and new presence in French, the only major differences relate to English radio rights in the two markets where Rogers shut down its Sportsnet radio stations. In Vancouver, it will reportedly move the games to Kiss Radio on FM, while in Calgary, a new deal was signed with Corus’s QR 770.

The rest of the announcements were all renewals of contracts, including CHED with the Oilers, and Bell Media with the Senators and Canadiens. Starting last season, French-language radio rights for the Senators were contracted to Cogeco, while the online outlet Sick Media got French-language radio rights to Laval Rocket games.

Two of these deals are up for renewal after this season. CJOB’s Winnipeg Jets deal will likely get renewed has been renewed because there’s no competition there — it’s the only talk station. Cogeco’s Canadiens radio rights deal might be more contentious. We don’t officially know when it ends, but BPM Sports’s new owner said recently he believes it’s up next year and he may be gunning for it.