SOURCES: CTV’s Olympic boss Keith Pelley set to walk
March 12, 2010 · 37 Comments
The blockbuster scuttlebutt in Canadian television has Keith Pelley leaving the CTV-Rogers Olympic consortium in the wake of his success as head of the Vancouver Winter Games TV coverage.
Sources say Pelley, who ran the CTV-Rogers Olympic consortium’s television and marketing operation, will launch his own sports management firm.
Pelley did not respond directly to two email messages sent on Thursday. However, his assistant Rebecca O’Toole, wrote, “Keith is in and out of the office these days, mostly out. I am clearing his emails right now for him. He has over 2,000 congratulatory emails still to respond to. . . He is still decompressing from the Games. You will hear from him. . . but wouldn’t be till middle of May likely.”
The question of whether Pelley was leaving CTV-Rogers was not answered. Why would he go? As one insider said this week, the “Pelley brand” has never been stronger. The quality of the Vancouver Olympic telecasts was very high. CTV-Rogers lost money on the Games because of the economic recession, but the audiences were huge.
“Right now, he can write his own ticket to anything that’s available in Canadian broadcasting or even outside broadcasting,” a source said.
Pelley’s entrepreneurial instincts are well known. A TV executive who left his job as president of TSN in 2003 to run the Toronto Argonauts, Pelley’s skills in marketing are on a par with those in television where he was a producer of football and hockey for Fox Sports before rejoining TSN in 1997 and advancing to the position of president.
His CTV-Rogers contract ties him to the consortium through the 2012 London Games, but sources say he has an escape clause. One source said producing the London Olympics would be comedown after the multitude of resources available for the Vancouver Olympic coverage.
“Producing London will be anti-climactic and on a much smaller scale,” he said. “I could see him doing something else.”
According to insiders that something else will be a sports marketing operation that would be involved in sponsorships, event organizing, television and perhaps representation.
Fan590 hires a new program director
Don Kollins replaces Nelson Millman as program director of Rogers owned Fan590 in Toronto. Kollins was head of programming for News 570 and KIX106 FM in Kitchener, Ont., both owned by Rogers Media. Kollins was not available for an interview Friday, but I hope to talk with him later.
The scuttlebutt is he has no background in all-sports radio, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing.
Millman is now a senior producer of news content at Rogers Sportsnet. His former position of station general manager has been assumed by Chuck McCoy, who also oversees the Rogers cluster of radio stations in the Toronto market.
Changes at the Fan590? We’ll see. I think work is needed on the morning shows, 6 a.m. to noon. In the afternoon, I like Hockey Central, less so host Daren Millard. Doug MacLean’s hockey commentary is excellent. Jack Armstrong’s act, in my view, begins to wear after a while. Bob McCown’s afternoon drive is untouchable. Disclosure: McCown’s website, fadoo.ca, carries my T&R column.
Still with Rogers, here’s how the Toronto Blue Jays TV schedule is shaping up: Sportsnet is likely to carry about 100 games on its four channels, with another 18 to 20 receiving two channel distribution. That’s the way it went last season. TSN will air 20 games, TSN2 five.
There is speculation that Sportsnet will launch its new national channel (no name yet), for which it has granted a license two weeks ago, in time to air a few Jays games this season, but that’s a long way from being a done deal. Buck Martinez, working with either Pat Tabler or Rance Mulliniks, will call the games for Sportsnet. For TSN and TSN2, Rod Black with Tabler, returns.
Olympics gave Fan590 a boost
The Fan590 radio station in Toronto, an Olympic rights holder, saw its audience share almost double during the second week of the Vancouver Games. That’s when Canadian athletes started to win gold medals and the men’s hockey team advanced to the gold medal game. In the men 25-54 demographic, the station had a share (percentage of the listening market) of 5.7 for the first week of the Olympics. That jumped to 9.9 for the second week.
Over the 13 week BBM measurement period (December, January, February), the Fan’s share was 5.4, down from 5.7 from the previous 13 week measurement period. Talk radio suffers during December, because listeners switch to music during the Christmas season. As well, the high profile talk hosts take holidays.
Another pass to Colin Campbell
The NHL’s senior vice-president of hockey operations, Colin Campbell, the guy who hands out suspensions, deserves condemnation for his incompetence and disregard for the safety of NHL players (one of whom is his son).
But, for years, the hockey media, with one or two exceptions, have given Campbell a pass on the issue of head shots. This week, in perhaps the most brain dead decision I’ve seen an NHL executive make (which is saying something), he decided not to suspend Matt Cooke for his attack on Marc Savard. I saw no hard hitting commentary in the national media on this, except for a column by Steve Simmons of the Toronto Sun. No commentary at TSN.ca. Not a peep out of Pierre LeBrun at ESPN.com. The CBC’s Scott Morrison, who marches lock-step with the NHL, thought the non-suspension was the correct call. “Meantime, perhaps the players, knowing the distaste for those kinds of hit, will smarten up and police themselves by resisting the temptation,” he wrote. Yeah, right. That’s certainly going to happen.
At Yahoo! Canada, Puck Daddy voiced a degree of disapproval. Greg Wyshynski wrote, “Cooke earned himself another suspension in our eyes, but obviously not those of the NHL. The situation will be rectified in 2010-11, but try telling that to Marc Savard. No, seriously, try to: He’ll nod off in the middle of the word ‘rectified’ thanks to Cooke.”
Greg Brady, co-host of AM640 Toronto’s afternoon show, sent out a tweet this morning reporting that NHL general managers, in Florida this week for meetings, stayed at a hotel that didn’t carry Versus in the rooms. Several grumbled about having to leave the hotel to watch the Versus telecast of Monday’s Dallas Stars-Washington Capitals game, one of the best of the season. The fact that the NHL chose to partner with a cable channel, Versus, which is not available in many U.S. bars, restaurants and hotels, is just another product of the lamentable Gary Bettman legacy.
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Bill; I gotta take exception to your Fan590 comments. The Bullpen with Mike Hogan is perhaps the most intelligent sports show on the Toronto airwaves. He is able to handle all sports, not just hockey. However, when the Gameplan hits the airwaves, I either switch to 550 out of Buffalo or CFRB. Whether it's McLean, or Armstrong, their banter is nauseating
I'm still scratching my head over this line "…for years, the hockey media, with one or two exceptions, have given Campbell a pass on the issue of head shots." Post over an article, published two days earlier, titled "Media pushed NHL and general managers to move on head shots".
with out daily presentations of high school media club announcers maybe the spin doctors felt it was safe to start with the revisionist remembrances from the olympics.
i think we all agree whatever ratings numbers experienced at the end should be credited to the athletes and the strong medal push at the end.
and the gold medal game… they could have made it a pay per view event at the last minute and somehow the numbers would have been there….
this morning i got a reminder of how bad it was… not being a big F1 fan i had to watch Sportsnet and its show for scores… bad, bad, bad too wordy and two announcers hard to listen to.. so wordy is a bad thing
Hey, wasn't Keith Pelley the genius behind 'Guys TV" and 'Gallagher', two of those worst in-house productions in the history of TSN. He must have pictures on somebody, 'cus anyone else would have fallen off the radar by now of they had their names associated with those two bombs. Once again, the ability to schmooze and hit the ball into the fairway supercedes any actual TV skills. Sad really…
Anyone notice how after the gold medal game faded to black, and the inflatable beavers were packed away, there was no keith pelley post-games press conference to say how great the numbers were, how much money we made, how we revolutionized the games coverage? Oh yeah, because we lost money. Oh, just get the pr flacks to say we'll make it up in vancouver. As the Insider has said on this board- anyone figure out how much it must have cost to have the 1,400 staffers out there working? Crazy. Another spin job. Why can't they just be like NBC and admit they lost money on these games? See ya in London…
In spite of the feeble efforts by mass media pushers to try and keep pulling the wool over the eyes of marketers, the fubar rationale of television ratings, how they are measured and calculated and what they mean in terms of impressions and consumer behavior, has long been swept into the same dark corner as creationism and flat earth ideology.
Aside from the shoddy methodology that underpins ratings measurement, were the reported “record ratings” attributable to “the very high quality of the Vancouver Olympic telecasts?” Not accordingly to the vast majority of comments on this blog (and according to the majority of comments in numerous other forums for that matter). So if it wasn’t Mr. Pelley’s Foxification (“I Believe – in the gutsy performance – for this great country – please take off your shirt”) of the coverage, what was going on?
• No counter-programming – all non-Consortium outlets offered up throw-away content during the Olympics
• Historically high ratings in host countries due to the “patriotic duty” to watch regardless of real interest (this also explains the high ratings the Grey Cup gets)
• Much higher than usual female reach as compared to what is the norm for sportscasts – fuelled by a: female-friendly content (figure skating) during prime time presented on the outlet with the largest reach, and b: female dominance (good for them!) in the Canadian medal haul
Since the ratings (record-high or not) won’t translate into a profit for the Consortium and most likely will result in a monumental loss, from a business perspective this model doesn’t (and never did) make sense. If the often misunderstood and hardly ever justifiable concept of a “loss leader” (ask GM and Chrysler how well that worked for them), where something is sold below cost in order to promote trial use by non-customers with the expectation of conversion to regular use and subsequent loyalty, was the rationale behind the Consortium’s bid, this experiment has failed miserably. According to the post-Olympic ratings of programming by Consortium participants as reported by Mr. Houston, there is zero evidence that any of these Olympics viewers have been converted.
But wait; there is London in 2012! If the Consortium believes amortizing and rationalizing the costs over 2 Olympics can achieve break-even, they will be in for a rude awakening. Ratings (and ad revenue) for London won’t come near the ones for Vancouver, because:
• No patriot viewers
• Time-zone shift (fewer, if any, live events in prime time)
• No Canada-friendly events (as in curling, (women’s) hockey, freestyle skiing, snowboarding and short track skating in Vancouver) in London and hence no “owning the podium”
Since there won’t be a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, it wouldn’t surprise me at all if there were friction among the partners in the Consortium. The reported end of the Pelley fiasco will be just the first of a long list of changes prior to London.
"Since there won’t be a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, it wouldn’t surprise me at all if there were friction among the partners in the Consortium. The reported end of the Pelley fiasco will be just the first of a long list of changes prior to London."
And then you and your CBC pals can produce the Olympics again, "Insider". Oh, awesome! Can't wait to hear Jeff Marek and company shine and make those Rogers-CTV guys look inexperienced. GIve it up already, dude.
By the way, I love all the different opinions here. Someone who hates Mulliniks and likes Fletcher, when I hold exactly the opposite view. Hey, that's what it's all about. I just hope Buck Martinez can handle play-by-play. He's an unquestioned excellent colour guy, but PBP is different. I hope we don't wind up wishing we had Jaimie Campbell back.
Buck Martinez would have to be REALLY bad for me to want Jamie Campbell back.
Buck Martinez is a consumate pro in the booth who's worked with the best PBP men in the business. I have all the confidence in Martinez successfuly making the transition.
Personally I'd like to see Martinez as the main analyst, with Rob Faulds as the play by play. Why they ever replaces him with Campbell in the first place is beyond me.
Re: changes at The Fan – I'm not a big Jack Armstrong fan though he is a basketball wizard. But he and his predecessor Chuck Swirsky were obviously told by Nelson Millman that they had to be "upbeat" so both of them holler and pretend to be spectaculary excited about the most mundane of things, just so we'll think something important is happening. I can't stand the afternoon show.
I actually really like The Game Plan. I like the hosts, and I also I like that they actually talk basketball and baseball, unlike the first part of the day which gets so heavy on the hockey stuff.
I think William is right, the first part of the Fan's day needs changes. I'm also not a fan of the Hockey Show – I find it a bit boring. And yeah – McCown's show is untouchable. He has his irritating moments, but overall I think it's the best show on Toronto radio.
So if I understand this correctly, you took the lazy way out and E-mailed a question on a very important matter (E-mails are only for trivial matters) instead of actually calling his Crackberry to ask him directly.
You were then able to publish the intended nonresponse from his office, which is all you get when you ask for an E-mail response to an important question. Everybody prevaricates or just ignores the question. Whereas somebody prevaricating over the phone is easy to spot, and if they hang up on you, you can report that.
This is Journalism 101, Bill.
Why are emails only for "trivial matters"? Precisely which journalism school did you go to, guy-who-posts-anonymously-on-the-internet-under-the-name-of-a-former-PM?
Rubbish. Email, as anyone knows, is absolutely a most acceptable tool for any journalist or in this case blogger. You may have noticed that email is a pretty standard way of communicating. I also suggest Bill probably called and got nothing. I think the email response back is pretty arrogant and self serving. You'll hear back from him in May? 2 months from now?? That response to a long-time journalist? Crazy. I seem to recall the guys at the consortium always being in the media when they won the rights. Now they are no where. Zelkovich had a quote from some publicist saying "we'll break even over vancouver/london" and that "no taxpayer's money was spent". What a joke. Are these people for real?
No! Rance Mulliniks is returning? Sportsnet got rid of Jamie Campbell, why not continue with the unbearable babbling Mulliniks. Darren Fletcher is much better to listen to than Mulliniks.
Tabler puts me to sleep,and has the personality of a dish rag.Fletch is good, but how Tabler keeps his gig baffles me.
Toronto, Toronto, Toronto. Aren't there other cities in this country?
I agree, spread the news across the country (although the data William culls may not be nationally available). Mr. Houston is one of the best sports media critics we have and I assume because of logistics and connections he tailors his comments to a pro-Toronto review. I'm not complaining as I enjoy his thoroughness and level-headed honesty (even if he sometimes goes all monster-ish on self-loving, ear-splittingly loud hacks like pierre magwire). If anything, I'd love to get a bit more RDS data/stats/news as they cover the 2nd biggest province in Canada. All in all Mr. Houston deserves a round of thanks for his work.
No, there aren't.
I beg the new FAN GM to please end the "Tips from the Tipster" segment. The guys voice is possibly the most annoying thing I've ever heard, and his put on accent needs to be slapped out of his mouth. I love how he barely ever mentions how well he did the previous night and who the heck is he anyways, is it just some normal dude with a side job?
I was always under the impression that "Tips From The Tipster" was an Ad for Pro-Line. Much the same way Saul Korman does his own commercials and just babbles for 30 seconds. If I'm wrong, so be it, but that's always the impression I got.
I'm with you, Kevin. I'm pretty sure it's an ad too. It airs on Team 1200 in Ottawa, too, and there generally isn't a whole lot of shared content between the two stations.
I think it airs on all stations that air Prime Time Sports. It even airs on the three Rogers news stations in Saint John, Moncton and Halifax during PTS. Sometime you hear the very end of it when watching the show on Sportsnet as they come back from commercial too.
Thanks Kev, that probably explains why it's so lame its a government run organization so its probably just some public officials nephew collecting a check.
Seems like most of the hockeyt media has what is these days termed a "man-crush" on 'Coley"…..for sure, they all seem to kiss up to the clown.
This means two things: 1) the losses for the consortium are much larger than we are being told and 2) he sees the writing on the wall and is getting out before it really sinks
Right on!
I don’t know what “insider” Mr. Houston is talking to, but he/she sounds an awful lot like a spin-doctor for Mr. Pelley.
The reality is most likely much closer related to what is going to be a disastrous bottom line for the Consortium. As predicted, the bills are coming in fast and furious and the consequences of the feeding frenzy that saw broadcasters, pseudo-broadcasters, wannabe-broadcasters, reality show participants, interns, water boys and dancing girls shipped to Vancouver by the truckload are now being calculated.
Combine that with ad revenues below expectations caused by the panic-driven flurry of discounts, rebates and freebies for advertisers that were flying around after the first week’s disappointing ratings plus the over-the-top rights fee and the flow of red ink will be enormous.
Since Woodbridge (Thomson family), Teachers’ and Bell have a natural aversion to losing money; it goes without saying, that there must have been a knock on the door of Mr. Fecan looking for an explanation.
Since covering his ass is Mr. Fecan’s single demonstrable talent, it should come as no surprise that this cover is now appearing in the form of Mr. Pelley. So let there be no confusion, Mr. Pelley’s reported decision to move on to “write his own ticket” is a classic case of jumping before being pushed.
Interesting. I am wondering how much CTV/Rogers will lose Vancouver alone. Estimates say between $20 – 40 million? Are there any truths to the rumours that there is friction between CTV Globemedia and Rogers on how to organize or rather cost cutting for the London games?
LOL, sure. I think I'll trust Houston's reason over this ranting from a guy who BBM conspired to inflate already record numbers.
How are things over at the CBC, Insider? Still bitter over there, I see, if your rant is any indication.
He is definitely spinning this positive his way. The whole thing is going to be blown up with the losses they incurred. They are trying to hide behind the big ratings near the end. But the gold medal game could have been on Global, APTN or the Food Network and it would have still got a big rating. Doesn't make you a genius. We all predicted this on this board, Bill include. Big losses, big changes, big spin from these guys. Almost makes you want CBC back.
RE: USA and Versus … and due to a pissing match between the US #1 satellite TV provider DirecTV and Versus owner Comcast [owner of the Flyers and soon to be running NBC], Versus hasn't been on DirecTV this season. Bad all around.
Bill – should we expect a post on the new FAN GM, and what changes to expect?
Mike, just heard about it yesterday. Will try to get something today.
thanks for the update Bill. Like (probably) many others, i don't check back on one of your postings and just subscribe to the comments instead (and sometimes regret it). As a result i miss a lot of your updates. Perhaps you might consider just making new posts rather than updating existing ones. There is very little risk of you clogging up the internet by posting too many times.