Article on Jays Television Numbers

I read with interest this Star article on the Jays television numbers staying strong this year despite the Jays being out of it:

"Except that viewership across all Sportsnet channels is up 21 per cent compared to 2012, while Jays audiences are down only slightly from last season’s record highs despite the team’s poor play."

"Last season the Jays finished with a 73-89 record, and their games drew an average of 540,000 television viewers, up 7 per cent from the previous season and 25 per cent over 2010, according to Rogers.

Before this season many baseball observers labeled the team a World Series contender, and that optimism translated into inflated early-season ratings. This season’s first regular season attracted a record 1.4 million viewers, compared with 1.3 million in 2012."

"By last August, when it had become clear the Jays wouldn’t contend for a playoff spot, viewership dipped to an average of 437,000 per game. Last month, with the Jays again out of contention, ratings fell again but to an average of 475,000 per game."

I was wondering about the comparison with the CFL. The Jays have 162 regular season games per year, so last year the Jays had 87,480,000 total viewers across all games last year. The  CFL has only 72 regular season games per year. Just using an estimate of 600,000 viewers per game that's 42,000,000 viewers total which is significantly less than the Jay total.

A couple of points about that. The CFL numbers are biased towards Alberta and Saskatchewan while the Jays would overwhelming be balanced towards Ontario. Income for Albertans and Saskatchewan people are considerably higher than those in Ontario, so a CFL viewer on average is probably worth more based on location. I would guess the Jays may also have a slightly older audience which isn't worth as much, but I have no data on it.

The CFL's current television deal pays $40 million per year. Using that number for the Jays, the Jays contract would be worth around $83 million, although since Rogers owns both SportsNet and the Jays, there really isn't an open market. Further for both leagues I didn't include playoff games just to keep things simple. The CFL has a bit of an edge there in the sense that the six teams always make it, while the Jays have no guarantee. I also didn't include the pre-season games, where the Jays definitely have an advantage and TSN only broadcast two this year.

With Ottawa joining the league next year, that increases the number of CFL games to 81 per year. Potentially adding an Atlantic team would bump that to 90 games per year.

Ticats At Stamps Loss

I was quite annoyed after watching the Ticats lose to the Stamps in Calgary on Friday night, that I waited for a day to write about it.

The Cats played well for most of the game and were ahead until right at the end. There were numerous instances where the Cats could have made a play that would have led them to win, but just couldn't made the play. It is always annoying as a fan, when your team is ahead late, but the other team always goes on the third down (because they have to) and ends up winning. Sometimes some more aggression on offense in those situations would guarantee the win. Toronto won, but as I'm writing this, Montreal is about to lose, so the weekend wasn't a total disaster.

Bo Levi Mitchell impressed me, although he didn't do a lot early. Certainly he's excellent for a third string quarterback. I can't even remember the Cats' third stringer.

Burris had a decent game, going 26 for 39 for 408 yards, two TDs but two picks. Gable had a great game, rushing 9 times for 53 yards, but had a massive 108 yards on only six catches. When was the last time a Ticat running back had over 100 yards receiving? Beats me. Gable is turning into a special player. Get your jerseys people!

Fantuz also had a good game with six catches for 96 yards and a TD. Ellingson only caught three passes for 57 yards. Likely he's drawing more coverage.

A good effort for a road game against a great team, but the fact they could easily have won is frustrating.

Montreal didn't look good tonight versus the Lions and will not have Anthony Calvillo next week in Moncton amongst other injuries. So the Cats have an excellent shot to put some distance between themselves and Montreal and come closer to locking up a playoff home game. Here's hoping they don't blow it late versus Montreal in New Brunswick.

2013 CFL Predictions Week 12

Hamilton at Calgary
There's a few facets in this game. Hamilton has looked good of late, especially their offense. They beat BC last week, but haven't beat any other good teams. Calgary is at home and have been hot, but they are starting Bo Levi Mitchell in place of their various injured quarterbacks. Tate and Glenn are listed as backups, although what that actually means is uncertain. Mitchell has looked good, but against the rather woeful Edmonton Eskimos. Despite the home game, I'll take the Ticats and their hot offense.
Ticats 31 Stampeders 26

Winnipeg at Edmonton
Battle of the suck teams! Winnipeg is coming off a victory over Saskatchewan, while Edmonton can't seem to win a game. Both teams are crap, but I'll take the Eskimos based on the home field advantage. Plus Mike Reilly hasn't really played that bad, considering his offensive line.

Toronto at Saskatchewan
The Riders will be annoyed after to losing last week to the lowly Bombers in the Banjo Bowl. They have lost middle linebacker Rey Williams for the season, which will hurt somewhat. The Argos are still stuck with Collaros at quarterback while Ricky Ray's shoulder heals. I'll take the Riders over a backup quarterback at home easily.
Riders 33 Argonauts 20

Montreal at BC
The Alouettes are lucky that this game isn't a night game and won't have to deal with playing late. Montreal is also forced to go with backup Tanner Marsh due to Anthony Calvillo's concussion. Montreal's defence is good, but has collapsed late, like last week's debacle against the Argos at home. Travis Lulay hasn't been particularly fantastic for the Lions, but has been decent and they are at home. Expect at BC victory.
Lions 29 Monteral 22

Toronto Argonauts Must Move From Roger's Centre By 2018

Here's the definitive Globe and Mail article on the subject. The Blue Jays want to install natural grass in the Dome and that precludes the Argos from playing there. I assume that for Grey Cups, the grass is removed at the end of the baseball season and thus Grey Cups in November can be played there.

So the Argos have to find a new home. MLSE has already mulled buying them and having them play at BMO Field. The Argos could play their potentially 11 games a year there on the natural turf without too much damage (rugby is already played on it), however MLSE could put back in artificial turf. That could make CFL haters the Red Patch Boys and former Toronto mayor David Miller* crazy, however Toronto FC has sucked its entire existence, but with and without grass. As I already mentioned in another post, having the Argos play at BMO on national television would boost the value of the naming rights.

Potentially the Argos could try an ultra cheap bare bones stadium somewhere or other. Really the Argos need a small stadium around 20,000 seats they can fill and the CFL needs the television money. People will watch the Argos on television but they won't watch TFC. Maybe the Argos could partner with the rugby and cricket folks for a stadium.

One thing to consider with television is that the CFL needs the Argos. They may be willing to fund $5 million per year over 20 years to help with a new stadium. Perhaps the Argos could partner with a developer and have some condo towers integrated with the stadium and get some money that way. This issue will probably simmer for a few years and then heat up.

*At least current Toronto Rob Ford is a CFL supporter, even showing up at a game in Saskatchewan.

CFL Points Average For, Against and Total, 2006-2013, Over Under

I did one post looking at the average points scored per game, including the home and away numbers and the total numbers (for over under bets) for 2012. I've now gone and calculated the numbers from 2006 to 2013. Why not farther back? Because Ottawa was still in the league in 2005 and I would have to alter a few things. I'll get to it eventually. The regular season numbers bounced around a bit more than I expected:

Year  Away  Home   Total
2006   22.6     23.7    46.3
2007   21.9     27.0    48.8
2008   25.9     30.6    56.4
2009   24.7     26.4    51.1
2010   23.9     28.4    52.3
2011   23.8     26.5    50.3
2012   23.5     28.3    51.7

The average total points scored ranged from a low of 46.3 in 2006 to a high of 56.4 two years later in 2008. So keep that in mind for your over under bets.

Ticats.ca Article on Defensive End Brian Bulcke

The Ticats website has an article on non-import defensive tackle Brian Bulcke returning this week to Calgary after playing his first two seasons there. Bulcke has turned out to be a great free agent signing by the Cats, a non-import defensive starter in the middle of the line.

As Bulcke has turned out to be a great player, I've been wondering why Calgary didn't resign him. He comes from a good school in Stanford and majored in mechanical engineering so he's no moron. He has good size at 6'4" and 280 pounds. In his first year he had 11 tackles and a sack, while last year he had 18 tackles and two sacks so one would expect that his third year would show further improvement.

I then went and looked at Calgary's depth chart for the first game this year and saw that the Stamps started non-import Corey Mace at defensive tackle. So the Stamps were already set there. The Stamps only started one non-import on defense, so it was unlikely that the Stamps would start two non-imports on the defensive line (which would be pretty wacky). So in a way the Cats were lucky that Calgary probably couldn't keep Bulcke with Mace, especially if Bulcke wanted to start.

The Cats were a good destination for Bulcke considering they like going with two import offensive tackles as starters, meaning someone who could possibly start on defense would be given a decent shot.  

2013 CFL Power Rankings Week 11

Finally some excitement and bigger changes in the power rankings than the past few weeks.

1. Calgary Stampeders
Managed to turn the difficult trick of winning back to back games in the CFL, something no other team did this week. The Stamps managed to do it with Bo Levi Mitchell at the helm which is impressive in the sense that the Stamps have by far the best quarterbacks overall in the CFL (even if Drew Tate has a bit of glass jaw). Cornish had another solid game this week and the Stamps showed they can get by without Nik Lewis.

2. Saskatchewan Roughriders
No one really expected the Bombers to win the Banjo Bowl. Maybe they might keep it close in the Peg, but the one win team would eventually lose to the one loss team. Surprising that the Riders would give up so many sacks, but even good teams are going to have bad games now and then. Durant had a bad day passing and Cory Sheets was just OK. The Riders are still a good team, just not invincible.

3. Hamilton Tiger-Cats
Maybe a bit of a homer pick, but the Ticats offense is humming and the defence is coming together. Perhaps more important, the Cats actually have a healthy starter at quarterback right now. The Cats have great receivers including rookie Greg Ellingson and Gable is emerging as one of the better backs in the CFL.

4. BC Lions
The Lions also have a healthy starter in Travis Lulay, although to be honest, Lulay hasn't been that great this year. He hasn't been terrible, but no one is saying his name for most outstanding player. The Lions have a decent defense, and are always tough at home. That's something.

5. Toronto Argonauts
Things were looking poor early for the Argos and backup quarterback Collaros, but they managed to storm back and win against a tough Montreal defence, without star receiver Chad Owens. The Argos have a decent roster of receivers now. Especially valuable is non-import Durie. The defence had five sacks (albeit against a backup) which never hurts. Toronto is definitely better with Ricky Ray as the quarterback, but they're still OK without him.

6. Montreal Alouettes
I really thought the Alouettes were going to beat the Argos back to back and cement their place as one of the CFL's better teams in 2013. Instead backup Tanner Marsh regressed to the mean of backup quarterback play and the Alouettes collapsed rather spectacularly. The Alouettes have a good defence, at least until the end of games, but their offense looked rather feeble, especially their running game. Things aren't looking good for Montreal the rest of the season without Calvillo.

7. Winnipeg Blue Bombers
The Bombers aren't the worst team in the CFL! I didn't think that would be case, but there you go. With Buck Pierce being traded to BC, Goltz at least has a chance to develop as the starter. The Bomber defence looked good against Saskatchewan this week which is also a good sign. The Bombers won't make the playoffs this year, but they may win some more games this year.

8. Edmonton Eskimos
I thought the Eskimos had a chance of winning this game, but couldn't get it done. Reilly is getting a lot of experience, but Edmonton's offensive line, is well, offensive. Allowing seven sacks just isn't that conducive to winning and keeping your quarterback healthy. Until the line improves, it will be difficult for the Eskimos to win.