Why are other North American sports so much more popular?

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melbournemartin

melbournemartin

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Interested to hear your thoughts. I am talking about basketball, gridiron and baseball. I have a few specifics and then one general one at the end which I think could be the biggest.

Basketball
- Australia has played basketball for a while and ain't bad at it
- We have a reasonable league
- Good social activity with lots of junior participation and plenty of courts around the place
- Equally accessible for males and females
- Seen as a "cool" sport, with loads of popular references and top players like Kobe and LeBron being mega celebrities, more than any of our sportsmen
- Has a very well made and successful 2k video game series

American Football
- Seen as a tough sport, which appeals to football and rugby fans
- Like basketball, a "cool" sport which we are exposed to by many popular movies and pop culture references.
- Don't have any leagues of note but it's not uncommon to see people casually tossing an American football around

Baseball
- Played a fair bit at junior levels, including the similar softball
- Given we're a cricket nation, we don't have the "oh it's slow and boring" syndrome
- Again, many cultural references, although the players (at least in Australia) don't have the same profile as basketballers

All of them
The big one, for me, is that when One HD came on these three were all on free to air TV, but no hockey. Yes, One HD was a failed venture, but there was a definition connection with the rise in popularity of these American sports. Never before had I heard people in the school/university rooms saying "hey did you see that 3rd period of the Lakers game?" I even got into it a bit. The games weren't normally at prime time, but kids watch TV around the clock so that hardly matters.

Now there is still American football and I think baseball, but no basketball. I have never had Foxtel, but I assume they jumped on it because of the growing popularity.

Could ice hockey have been as popular?

Maybe not as much as basketball but as much as American football at least I reckon. Anyone who loves the toughness of football and rugby will appreciate ice hockey. It also has speed and skill. It's free flowing, with only a couple of timeouts per period. There are some things that go against it, aside from it never being on FTA tv. Australian cities have no ice or snow and no skating culture as such. The Australian ice hockey league would be comparable to anything in American football though and probably not much less than baseball.

I know later this year there are some exhbition matches between Canada and the USA. I'd ahve loved to have gone if there, despite what seem like expensive tickets. I'll be interested to see how Australia reacts to it.
 
At least in WA there is a much bigger gridiron league than there is ice hockey league. However, neither are particularly huge and are largely dominated by expats. Similar to the Aussie rules leagues in the US.

I think the main difficulty for participation is the expense of getting in to ice hockey. It takes a massive commitment. And it is impossible to get hooked like the Canadians can, skating in your backyard and shooting with old sticks.

In terms of supporters, I think hockey is getting more casual fans, however you hit the nail on the head in regards to a lack of coverage. Until we get more games on fox or some on FTA, you won't see a massive jump in interest.
 

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I suppose it is different in Melbourne where the Melbourne Ice have won the last 3 championships and regularly sell out their, albeit small, stadium of I think 1,000 or so.

Yeah we have no culture for it, I agree, but I don't think the ability to play a sport should be a pre-requisite for enjoying watching it. Even most football and cricket fans have no skill.

Coverage wise, if only people new of how good the sport is and that complete coverage is a ~100 dollar NHL Gamecenter subscription away!
 
melbournemartin said:
Coverage wise, if only people new of how good the sport is and that complete coverage is a ~100 dollar NHL Gamecenter subscription away!
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Not even, it's like $50 I think, plus there's plenty of streams and torrents about as well if you're "just browsing", and don't want to pony up for the cash.
 
Damon_3388 said:
Not even, it's like $50 I think, plus there's plenty of streams and torrents about as well if you're "just browsing", and don't want to pony up for the cash.
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I think it was just 50 this year because it was basically a half season. This was my first year on it though.
 
I only took a real interest in it a couple of years ago. I didn't hate the sport but it was rarely on TV, and when it was they weren't very good games. The rise of online streaming is probably the reason why I became a fan of it. I always appreciated the sport and was amazed at the skill, toughness and athleticism required to play it, something that coincides with Aussie Rules. I was always a big NBA and NFL fan, more so NBA but I wouldn't have thought a couple of years ago that ice hockey would become my favourite non-Aussie Rules sport.
 
Hawks1523 said:
The USA v Canada game may help boost the popularity. At hisense pretty sure at least one games sold most tickets
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I am not sure if the rosters are out yet but if it's anything like the NZ games a few years ago, there may be one or two current NHL players, a few recognisable old folk and the rest are just AHLers.

They also only had enough for 2 lines during those games and I think even one or two local kiwis played the boost the numbers. These aren't official games or anything and I was actually very underwhelmed when I read about it.

Apparently there was a good atmosphere and the games were close and played in good spirit, with most people walking away with a bit more enthusiasm for the sport. I'd definitely have gone if I were in Australia.
 
melbournemartin said:
I am not sure if the rosters are out yet but if it's anything like the NZ games a few years ago, there may be one or two current NHL players, a few recognisable old folk and the rest are just AHLers.

They also only had enough for 2 lines during those games and I think even one or two local kiwis played the boost the numbers. These aren't official games or anything and I was actually very underwhelmed when I read about it.

Apparently there was a good atmosphere and the games were close and played in good spirit, with most people walking away with a bit more enthusiasm for the sport. I'd definitely have gone if I were in Australia.
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I don't think it'll be anybody too exciting but the bigger arena will definitely let hockey fans bring along some friends to introduce them to the game. The chance to see a small handful of NHL players that will be there was enough for me haha
 
Not sure if I've interpreted the question right- do you mean why is hockey not as big as the other sports named-
a) in North America, or
b) in Australia?

I'll go with Australia. Just off the top of my head, no research:

Sports involving snow and ice are minority sports, given the limited geographic range of the alpine region, and climatic disincentives to create artificial sporting environments involving ice.

Less opportunity for people to participate- the other sports can be played in any weather, and/or outdoors.

The equipment has to be specially imported- expensive.

The iconic names of hockey (Orr, Hull, Gretzky, Lemieux etc) haven't infiltrated the sporting consciousness in Australia, whereas the big names from the other sports are well known (Ruth, DiMaggio, Jordan, Montana etc).

Lack of pay TV coverage.

The perception that it is too esoteric, and people may not wish to make the effort to comprehend the rules, styles of play etc.
 
Running Dog said:
The perception that it is too esoteric, and people may not wish to make the effort to comprehend the rules, styles of play etc.
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I understand fully what you were saying in your whole post and I may have had a massive advantage being brought up with the sport with my dad having played, but I find Gridiron and Baseball especially have FAR more complicated rules and plays than Hockey ever could have. And yet people have caught on with them. I think just exposing people to the sport and giving them a few basic pointers (like offsides etc) would have a massive impact on boosting numbers of interest. At the moment all people see on the news services are the fights and I would think that would turn a lot of people off right away. They see none of the skill and excitement of matches and they think all Hockey is is fighting and a little bit of hitting a rubber thing somewhere.

We have to change the perception here before it becomes anywhere near mainstream.
 

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I think it's a mix of popularity (or lack thereof), ignorance and general accessibility. And those issues are universal. I've always thought hockey is viewed almost majorly as a niche sport - both here and in the U.S., and probably most of the rest of the world too (with the exception of Canada and a handful of European nations). It is sort of an acquired taste, and not overly popular. I just don't think it lends itself to the casual sports fan all that well, and I'm talking about playing it, moreso watching it but I think there's a correlation there. Ice hockey is fantastic to watch, and you don't have to be good at the sports you enjoy watching, obviously, but it sort of helps. With ice hockey, you can't just pick up a ball and find a grass field and start having a go.

Personally, I can't ice skate or even rollerblade. I got into ice hockey through video games. But that's me. It would be cool if it were more popular. The Hipster in me kind of enjoys that it isn't though. I don't know, those are just my thoughts.
 
Being Canadian, I wanted to add my thoughts.

Hockey is a winter sport and Canada having outdoor opportunities to skate in the winter, it has become a large part of our culture. Because of our winter climate, we produce the best players in the world and have extremely passionate fans. The expense of organized hockey has become too great and a lot of parents (me included) are hesitant to put kids in hockey due to the costs. $200-300 for equipment if you go with cheap stuff, $500 for registration for the season and, if your child is good and makes the traveling team, thousands of dollars more due to travel every second weekend for games. If you have more than one child...yikes! My son plays in a floor hockey league in a gymnasium rather than ice hockey - very inexpensive and lots of fun.

When I was young, my parents could not afford to put me in organized hockey so, I played on the outdoor ponds and rinks as much as I could and, we played road hockey constantly. You CAN play hockey very inexpensively - we had hockey sticks ($10 each) and tennis balls and played in schoolyards, parking lots or in the street. We would play most days and many of us developed tremendous hockey skills by playing on the road. You still need to skate well for organized hockey but the rest of the important skills can be developed in the streets. In fact, using a tennis ball is the best way to become a good stickhandler - if you can control a bouncing tennis ball, a puck is easy.

Hockey is our culture and will always be the most popular sport in Canada. I think that it is nearly impossible for a foreign sport to become extremely popular in a different nation. I don't think hockey will ever be a big sport in Australia and I don't think Aussie Rules Football will ever be a big sport in Canada. 150 years of sporting culture has created our passion for the games it has and changing that is nearly impossible.
 
Admiral Afterworld said:
A more interesting question is why it's so below the other three in America.

Did they leave expansion outside the snow cities until football, baseball and basketball had been already well established?
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Simply because it holds little appeal to the African American and Hispanic/Latino communities of the USA.

It also does't have the College presence of the other 3 major sports in the USA.
 
Hawks1523 said:
The USA v Canada game may help boost the popularity. At hisense pretty sure at least one games sold most tickets
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There were a few gold tickets left for the saturday 15th june at hisense. I got one cos I thought I'm probably not going to Canada/US anytime soon. So it's a mix of minor league and a few NHL players?
 
Gus Poyet said:
Simply because it holds little appeal to the African American and Hispanic/Latino communities of the USA.

It also does't have the College presence of the other 3 major sports in the USA.
Click to expand...
Gus Poyet said:
Simply because it holds little appeal to the African American and Hispanic/Latino communities of the USA.

It also does't have the College presence of the other 3 major sports in the USA.
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It's not big with those ethnicities because it's not their culture. Same with NCAA - it is not part of American culture. Could it ever be? Perhaps but, baseball, basketball and football have a 100 year head start so it's highly unlikely.
 
Spursfan said:
There were a few gold tickets left for the saturday 15th june at hisense. I got one cos I thought I'm probably not going to Canada/US anytime soon. So it's a mix of minor league and a few NHL players?
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I can't find the rosters anywhere but the headliners appear to be Kyle Quincey and Zenon Konopka. They are NHLers no doubt but, certainly not star players. The teams will likely be filled with non-NHL professionals - should still be good hockey but not an NHL-level of hockey. Even the non-NHL pro leagues are pretty good.
 
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