Category Archives: Sports

| Montreal, Photos, Sports

Celebrating, win or lose

A police officer directs traffic (most of which is celebrating Spanish fans) with his Italian flag shortly after Spain defeated Italy in the Euro 2012 final on July 1.

It’s not often in this town that you see a police officer smiling and laughing on the job. Not because they’re evil or humourless, but just because they’ve been called on to do some rather serious stuff with some rather confrontational people. Many of them are overworked, tired, frustrated and otherwise not in the best of moods.

And yet, here he is, enjoying himself on a day you’d expect him not to be.

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| Canadiens, Media, Montreal

(Some awesome pun involving the words “Red” or “Fisher”)

Updated June 20 with link to Ken Dryden’s story in the Globe and Mail.

The news hit pretty suddenly on Friday morning. In fact, I heard about it on CFCF’s noon newscast, having just woken up. Red Fisher, who has covered the Montreal Canadiens for more than half a century for the Montreal Star and The Gazette, has retired at the age of a billion and three (or, more accurately, 85).

There’s no farewell column, no big party. He’s not even giving interviews. Other media who wanted to report on the end of this long career had to settle for talking to some of Fisher’s friends and colleagues. Dave Stubbs, in particular, was busy talking to various media while preparing his own story on Fisher’s departure. It’s the only one I’m aware of that quotes Fisher directly speaking after his retirement was announced.

Fisher is a legend in more than just his hockey writing. He has a reputation as a friendly curmudgeon, who wouldn’t go after players unnecessarily but wouldn’t acknowledge anyone’s existence until they proved themselves worthy of it. The list of respected figures in Canadiens history who lauded Fisher speaks to the man’s reputation.

Even though I work at the same paper, I’ve never spoken to him in person. Sports writers in general spend little time in the office, and Fisher even less. We’ve conversed over the phone, but by “conversed” I mean he called to confirm that his postgame column had arrived by email and after a quick reply of “yeah, I got it” we hung up.

There are many stories of younger (and by that I mean under 60) colleagues at The Gazette that involve the elder sportsman uttering the words “who the f*** is …” – I don’t think I even reached that level. Though I remember the first time I saw him file a story that had my name in the address list. I imagined him typing my email in and wondering who the heck I was.

Everyone knew who Red Fisher was, though. For years, his reputation was such that there was a column devoted to him, the only column devoted to writing about another columnist. Of course, that column was Mike Boone’s Eeeee-mail, and it wasn’t so much writing about Fisher as it had some fun at the man’s expense (consistently referring to him as the Living Legend of Sports Journalism or LLSJ). But still, I can only wish for status like that someday.

Fisher’s refusal to give interviews is unusual in today’s hypermediatized world, but not so much for him. Fisher wasn’t the type to appear on radio or television regularly, chatting with the TSN hockey panel or giving his take once a week on CKGM’s morning show. Even though his reputation and wealth of knowledge about Canadiens history would make him a fantastic guest, he’s said no to such requests from those broadcasters and others who haven’t long ago given up trying to get him.

There are some who say Fisher retired 10 years too late, that his relevance had waned significantly in the past few years. There are points in favour of this argument. He wasn’t the scoop machine he used to be, and many of the big announcements come via RDS, TSN, La Presse or some of the younger front-line journalists who cover the Canadiens, if they beat the official announcement at all. Fisher stopped travelling with the Canadiens years ago – Pat Hickey does day-to-day team coverage. And the weekly Red Line page sometimes felt more like a roundup of hockey news reported elsewhere than anything original from Fisher.

But Fisher was still influential, and he could still write things that made a difference. In 2008, Fisher won a National Newspaper Award – the most prestigious Canadian award for this industry – for a column saying the Canadiens should not retire the jersey of Patrick Roy (they did anyway, of course, but Fisher’s column provoked a lot of discussion). It’s hard to argue someone has one foot in the grave when he’s winning an award many of his colleagues only dream of one day getting once in their careers.

It’s unclear if Fisher will continue to contribute occasional freelance pieces for The Gazette. He was the go-to guy for Canadiens-related obituaries, for example. But it is clear that the Saturday Red Line is history, and nobody should be expecting a regular column in its place.

He’s done.

Coverage

See also

UPDATE: Mike Cohen says he moved this resolution at Côte St. Luc city council Monday evening:

Whereas Red Fisher is a longtime resident of Côte Saint-Luc.

Whereas Red Fisher has covered the Montreal sports scene for The Montreal Star and The Montreal Gazette, specifically the Canadiens for the past 56 years.

Whereas Red Fisher Fisher won the National Newspaper Award for sports writing in 1971 and 1991 and has been nominated for that award on two other occasions.

Whereas Red Fisher was also the recipient of a Lifetime Achievement Award from Sports Media Canada in 1999.

Whereas Red Fisher is a member of the Hockey Hall of Fame.

Whereas Red Fisher last week announced his retirement.

It was

MOVED BY COUNCILLOR Mike Cohen

AND SECONDED BY COUNCILLOR Allan  J. Levine

AND RESOLVED

THAT Council wish Red Fisher the very best in his retirement and that a formal letter of good wishes be sent to him signed by the mayor and council.

“I will now come back to council with some recommendations as to how we can further honour Red Fisher,” he says.

| Media, Montreal, Sports

Montreal Stars are unfortunately anything but

A database search tells me it was Saturday, March 21, 2009. I was on the sports desk and putting together a package of hockey notes. Among them was an item about Montreal’s team in the Canadian Women’s Hockey League winning the inaugural Clarkson Cup, a trophy designed as the women’s hockey version of the Stanley Cup.

A hockey championship for a Montreal team, and it was essentially a brief.

I helped it a bit by taking a photo of the team with the cup that the league had put out through Canada Newswire. If there wasn’t going to be much text, there could at least be a nice photo. But there’s just so much an editor can do without copy.

Three years later, Montreal has won its third championship and women’s “professional” hockey is being taken a bit more seriously. The Gazette had a story advancing the tournament, and had a freelance story about the championship final afterward, though there wasn’t a photographer so we had to use a file photo to illustrate the story.

The championship game was televised. On TSN2. On tape delay.

Small steps.

Gazette hockey writer Pat Hickey wrote a column about the Stars, about how women’s hockey is still far from professional, and the players have to spend their own money to participate. But, as he points out, it’s getting better. They have to pay less, partly because more people are going out to see the games. As in more than 200, paying $5 a pop.

I wanted to go see a Stars match this season, but my work schedule didn’t give me an opportunity. By the time I could find the time, they weren’t playing any more home games.

Okay, the Canadian Women’s Hockey League has a lot of work to do. It only has six teams, for one, and one of them doesn’t play a full season because it would require too much travel.

But if there’s any hockey team that deserves support, it’s them. A championship team with locally-bred stars (many Olympic champions) who play not because they get millions of dollars for it but because of their love for the game. A team who, despite having dirt-cheap ticket prices can’t draw a significant crowd at home games.

They are, in just about every sense, the anti-Canadiens.

But public support is tied with media support. The Stars and other CWHL teams are covered as much as amateur and university sports. Local media send dozens of people to every Canadiens game even after they’ve been mathematically eliminated from the playoffs, but nobody is seriously covering the Stars.

I’ve used this team as an example when talking to young people who want to get their start in journalism. When they say they want to cover the Canadiens, I wonder: Why? What could you possibly report about this hockey team that dozens of veteran professionals haven’t already dug up and rehashed ad nauseam?

Yeah, it’s cool to go to Canadiens games and sit in the press box (or so I assume – I’ve never been). But journalism is about finding out things everyone else doesn’t already know. And there’s little opportunity for that at the Bell Centre.

And yet, across town, there’s a team of dedicated hockey players who would be happy to grant you interviews, to talk at length about their games and their lives without resorting to sports clichés. There’s an opportunity for a young journalist to own a beat that nobody else seems to care about, to instantly become the expert in something rather than a forgettable also-ran in an overcrowded dressing room. An opportunity to uncover fascinating stories about real-life people who are at the height of athleticism while others celebrate the chance to be the seventh person to ask Mathieu Darche what his favourite food is.

It’s a golden opportunity, but nobody is taking advantage of it.

When I brought this up with one up-and-comer in the journalism industry, his response was that he doesn’t really care about women’s hockey, but he is very interested in the Canadiens.

I can’t tell him he’s wrong. I understand why a fan would feel that way. But I don’t understand how a journalist would.

UPDATE: The New York Times, of all things, has a story about the CWHL and the Stars along the same lines.

| Montreal, Radio, Sports

CJAD to broadcast Impact home games

There were rumours for a while that Astral’s CJAD would take over broadcast rights for Montreal Impact games – as kind of a consolation prize for losing rights to the Canadiens. A few journalists came out with the news before it was announced, although nobody got it exactly right.

The announcement came Monday morning on Andrew Carter’s show: CJAD will be carrying all Impact home games this season, as well as the season opener this coming Saturday in Vancouver. They even got some players to pretend they care about a radio broadcasting agreement say hi to their fans listening on CJAD.

The broadcast team will consist of CJAD Sports Director Rick Moffat doing play by play, and former Impact player Grant Needham doing analysis. The station will also cover the team outside of games, notably with interviews during Abe Hefter’s Locker Room show.

The press release is here, but it’s a bit short on details. So here’s what I got out of CJAD brand director Chris Bury:

  • CJAD will broadcast all home games during the season, plus the season opener. (You can see which games on the Impact’s website)
  • CJAD will broadcast all home playoff games (if the Impact reaches the playoffs), but road playoff games are still to be determined. “We’ll take a look at the possibility of broadcasting road playoff games when the opportunity presents itself,” Bury says.
  • There are no direct conflicts between home Impact games and Alouettes games, which CJAD still holds the radio rights to. (There are two Impact away games that conflict with Als games, on July 21 and Oct. 20.) But in the event that there might be conflicts during playoffs (which is during November for both leagues), “we will deal with that if it happens,” Bury says. Among the options Astral would have would be moving one of the games to CHOM (a workaround they have used in the past when Alouettes and Canadiens games conflicted).
  • Abe Hefter will act as a backup for Rick Moffat if he’s unavailable. (Since Moffat also does Alouettes play-by-play, this might happen a few times.)
  • The broadcasting agreement is for two years (the 2012 and 2013 seasons).

Other Impact broadcasters

All of the Impact’s 36 regular-season games will be televised this season, which is a big plus for fans. A third of them, including the season opener, the home opener, the first game at Saputo Stadium and all games involving Canadian opponents (Vancouver and Toronto) will be carried in French on RDS. The other two thirds will be on the new TVA Sports network.

In English, all games that RDS has rights to will be carried on TSN or TSN2.

You can see which games are on which networks on the schedule on the Impact’s website.

The big remaining question mark is French radio. The transformation of CKAC into Radio Circulation complicates matters immensely, because it leaves Cogeco with one talk station, and that station carries Alouettes and Canadiens games, making scheduling difficult. The station’s sports programming director told Métro that they’re working on something, but because of the conflicts it would cause (less than if the Canadiens would make the playoffs this season), it’s unlikely CHMP will air a full season of Impact games.

With the Impact’s season opener just days away, a deal on French radio rights should come soon.

| Montreal, Sports, TV

Michel Godbout leaving CBC for TVA Sports

Michel Godbout has found a new career opportunity over the horizon

Quebecor’s soon-to-be-launched TVA Sports specialty channel isn’t just looking to RDS hockey analysts like Dave Morissette and Yvon Pedneault (or La Presse’s Réjean Tremblay) for on-air talent. Their hiring spree has also poached CBC Montreal’s sports anchor.

Michel Godbout confirmed Monday that he will be leaving the CBC to join the TVA Sports channel set to debut this fall. His last day is July 30. (He was cut off early: see below)

Godbout (who is, as you can imagine, fully bilingual) worked for 15 years at Radio-Canada and then CBC Montreal – most famously as the evening news anchor between 2005 (when Dennis Trudeau retired) and 2009 (when Andrew Chang and Jennifer Hall took over a revamped newscast). He starts an anchoring job at TVA Sports on Aug. 22.

TVA Sports, which was approved by the CRTC in February 2010, has already signed deals to carry some Ottawa Senators games and most Montreal Impact soccer games, though it failed to get the government to break the deal the Canadiens have with RDS. Quebecor is also trying to get an NHL team to Quebec City, giving another big reason for fans to subscribe to this channel.

No word yet on who will replace Godbout permanently. CBC Montreal News Director Mary-Jo Barr is on vacation until August.

You can follow Godbout on Twitter at @GodboutSports (fortunately he won’t have to change that name – but expect it to be a bit more francophone in the future).

UPDATE (July 21): Thursday was Godbout’s last day. He says during an interview this morning on CBC Daybreak that he gave his two weeks’ notice on Friday (July 15), but was told that Thursday would be his last day, being let go because he was leaving for a competitor.

Godbout had a brief goodbye on air with Debra Arbec (Andrew Chang was off):

| Canadiens, Montreal, Radio

CJAD loses Habs broadcasts to Team 990

It was the worst-kept secret in the radio industry: Bell-owned Team 990 has secured the English-language radio broadcast rights to Canadiens games for the next seven seasons.

No financial details have been announced for the deal, but it’s clear that the station is putting some serious dough into this contract, because losing out again to Astral-owned CJAD was simply not an option. You can’t have an all-sports radio station that doesn’t carry broadcasts of the most popular sports team.

No announcement has been made about the play-by-play team yet, most likely because one hasn’t been decided. Still, rumours are spreading wildly, everything from Shaun Starr and Elliott Price to having the CJAD team move over to using the TSN play-by-play to bringing back Dick Irvin and the reanimated corpse of Danny Gallivan.

Okay, I made that last one up.

Convergence!

Though it’s great news that this little station that could has scored this contract, it’s a bit worrisome for critics of Canada’s media oligopolies. When Mike Boone wrote about the deal a couple of weeks ago, he said it was helped significantly by a deal Bell signed for regional English-language TV rights on TSN. Bell’s business agreements with the Canadiens are many (though Bell itself does not own the team), from the naming rights to its arena and practice facility to its French-language TV rights to mobile rights to broadcasts.

This deal takes Bell one step further toward doing with the Canadiens what Quebecor wants to do with a Quebec City hockey team and what Rogers wants to do with most of the professional sports coming out of Toronto.

There’s also, as one Team 990 personality told me during their recent 10-year anniversary party, the problem that the station might be restricted a bit in what it can say about the team. Doing impressions of Jacques Martin might not fly so well when you’re the official broadcaster.

What about CJAD?

Though it certainly can deal with not having the Canadiens easier than Team 990 did, CJAD is still going to have to find a way to fill hundreds of broadcast hours every season. And they’re going to have to deal with the loss of advertising that comes with losing such a big audience-getter. There’s no word yet on what they’re planning to do.

There’s a story in The Gazette and some discussion in the Radio in Montreal group.

UPDATE: Some comments from the peanut gallery on Hockey Inside/Out.

| Radio, Sports

Alouettes broadcasts return to CKAC

For the second consecutive year, the Alouettes have prematurely ended their deal with their official French-language radio broadcaster and switched to its major competitor.

It was announced on Tuesday that the Alouettes will be returning to Cogeco’s CKAC Sports for the 2011 season. CKAC will broadcast 20 games (the regular season has 19 18, so this covers all of those and the two preseason games), plus all playoff games.

Pierre Martineau, a spokesperson for Cogeco Diffusion, says the deal is for this coming season only, and some games will also air on Cogeco’s regional FM stations.

Having CKAC Sports broadcast the games seems like such a no-brainer, and indeed they broadcast the games for many years, signing a five-year deal in 2007. But that deal was mutually dissolved so that the Alouettes could strike a deal with Astral Media’s NRJ for broadcast rights in 2010. That deal was supposed to last until 2013.

The switch to NRJ wasn’t perfectly smooth. NRJ is a music station (like CHOM, which also broadcasts some Alouettes games), and license limits meant they couldn’t broadcast five games last season, according to La Presse.

Fans also weren’t crazy that NRJ used the RDS play-by-play audio instead of their own staff, though CKAC did the same thing.

A representative of the Alouettes did not immediately respond to voice mail messages requesting comment.

The Alouettes’ English radio rights are held by Astral, with games airing on CJAD and CHOM until 2013. It’s unclear if the move away from Astral on the French side will have any impact on the English rights. No doubt the Team 990 would be more than happy to pick up rights to Alouettes games, much like they would love to take rights to Canadiens games away from CJAD someday.

Last month, CKAC announced an agreement to air Canadiens games for two more seasons, ending in 2013-14.

| Canadiens, Media, Montreal

Koivu fan #1

I’ve never been too crazy about people who carry giant signs into sporting events, particularly those whoring themselves out to the television rights-holders by trying to get the initials “TSN” or “RDS” or “NBC” into a “go team” message.

But let’s give a nod to the anonymous front-row fan holding the “Koivu #1” sign, who combined good placement with perfect timing and is seeing that sign everywhere.

(The photo was captured by at least three photographers: Shaun Best of Reuters, Graham Hughes of Canadian Press, and Pierre Obendrauf of The Gazette).

There was a Facebook campaign (and others, I’m sure) for fans to vote Saku Koivu the first star of the night. It would have succeeded, except Koivu took a late penalty that led to the tying Canadiens goal (he was also in the box for their first goal – perhaps we should add two to his Canadiens assists total?). Under the three stars rules, the person who scores the winner in overtime or a shootout is automatically the first star.

Of course, none of that really mattered. The fans got to show their appreciation, and see Captain K on Montreal ice, perhaps for the last time as an NHL player.

| Montreal, Sports

Assshh!

Remember kids, when the Alouettes offence is on the field, fans should be quiet so the players can hear each other.

So Assshh!

And when the other team’s offence is on the field, be as loud as possible so they can’t hear each other.

That’s when you can be an Assshh-olé.

| Montreal, Sports, Video

The Expos: Even the best memories are heartbreaking

Annakin Slayd, known best for his songs about the Canadiens (so popular they’ve been parodied) but also a die-hard Expos fan, has produced a music video honouring Montreal’s former baseball team.

The look back comes just as Andre Dawson is set to be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame tomorrow as an Expo (even if he preferred a Cubs cap on his head).

And if that isn’t enough, here’s another video (well, it’s more about the song than the video) to remind you of the Team of Heartbreak:

And a preview of what might be the last Expos Hall of Famer someday, Vladimir Guerrero:

Meanwhile, The Gazette’s Andy Riga explores what to do with that giant monstrosity that the Expos used to call home, including what to do with the space around it, what to do about its roof, and what to do about getting events there. There’s also some numbers worth looking at, and his blog has a whole truckload of suggestions from readers about the stadium’s future (some serious, some not so much).

And the Bleacher Report has compiled a list of the top 25 Expos.

| Fun, Montreal, Opinion, Photos, Sports

Happy World Cup, everyone

A huge crowd of France supporters flood St. Denis St. after World Cup semifinal win on July 5, 2006.

I love the World Cup.

After a month of the most important sporting tournament on Earth, I still think watching soccer on television is incredibly boring compared to other sports. And it shows no evidence of supplanting hockey as the No. 1 sport in this city. The game is badly officiated, mostly because its governing body doesn’t want to enter the 20th century, much less the 21st. And many of the players are overpaid whiners whose sole purpose, it sometimes seems, is to turn the most incidental contact with an opposing player into a theatrical death scene.

And I still think soccer’s offside rule is stupid.

But there’s something about the way the World Cup takes over Montreal’s fans. Because Canada isn’t nearly good enough to make it to the final tournament, there is no home team, and everyone is free to choose sides. Many go with countries of origin, or maybe the team of their favourite player, or the country they once lived in.

No matter what country wins a game, whether it’s a big player like Brazil or Germany, or a tiny speck on the globe like Uruguay or Ghana, there’s always a parade of elated fans, honking their horns and waving their flags like they just had sex with a supermodel and realized they won the lottery.

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| Canadiens, Media

Trades are killer on magazine news cycles

L’actualité this week recently had a profile of Canadiens goaltender Jaroslav Halak teased big from its cover.

On the cover: “Que réserve l’avenir du gardien du Canadien?”

And in the piece itself:

Son mari envisage une seule « folie » : faire fi de sa peur de l’avion et s’envoler pour Montréal si Jaro se rend en finale de la Coupe Stanley l’année prochaine. Et, qui sait, en profiter pour voir un défilé rue Sainte-Catherine…

Thankfully, there’s little chance of that now.

There’s also a photo gallery of Halak’s hometown of Bratislava, Slovakia, and a blog post about Halak’s trade to St. Louis to downplay somewhat how much the magazine is two weeks behind the news.