November 21, 2005

Where's the Friggin' Hockey on The Tube?

Remember last year when the NHL decided to endear itself to fans by staging a year long lockout/strike? Well, you can say that pretty much killed hockey as we know it in the US. You know hockey is in bad shape when ESPN doesn't renew it's TV contract and the NHL negotiates a deal with OLN. Yeah, I never heard of OLN (Outdoor Life Network) either.

Since I still have a place in my heart for a good fight on the ice, I decided to try watching a few games on OLN. While my onscreen cable guide shows games I wasn't really interested in, I decided to check the games out. Guess what? Over the last 2 months I've tried to watch at least 5 or 6 games and ended up on some type of hunting show. Where's the hockey? I haven't been able to find any hockey on OLN yet even though it's supposedly on. I can't imagine it's a "blackout" situation since the games aren't even close to being regional.

I have no idea what's going on with OLN. Even the viewers who are lucky enough to get hockey aren't too impressed. According to TheGlobeAndMail.com:

But the main failure of the telecast was the location of the play-by-play camera. It was too high, up in the lofty cheap seats of Joe Louis Arena in Detroit.
What viewers saw were little men skating around below them. They were too far away, particularly for new viewers.

So anyway, I'll use my strong investigative skills to find out for all you readers I haven't bored to death, to where our hockey is.

Ummm, if anyone knows what's going on with OLN and the NHL, please leave us a comment (Investigative work sure is hard!).