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Loading ...Those of you who aren’t citizens of the Caniac Nation (est. 1997), please help me out here.
Then read this article, and do the following:
1) Tell me if you think either of them bash the team.
2) Tell me exactly how they bash the team.
3) Tell me if you detect an anti-Hurricanes bias from the writer, irrespective of your feelings about Raleigh and whether or not we “deserve” a team (a subject on which I will rant later).
NOTE: I will not pay attention to any answers from Hurricanes fans. I want the outsiders’ perspective.
I’m a pretty optimistic person so I may have overlooked something minor but both articles looked pretty objective to me. The few opinions that were presented were mild and backed up; this quote comes to mind: “Yet the Hurricanes have taken the unconventional step of acknowledging concerns they might move in their latest advertising slogan: ‘Here to Play, Here to Stay.’”
If anything, the second article is a wake up call for ‘Canes fans to get their butts to the games. The team has to be able to market the product to businesses as well as fans and the only way to generate those revenues is to have people in the seats looking at all those corporate logos. If anything, I would say that the author is interested in keeping the team in Raleigh; whether this is because he loves the team or because it gives him a stable job is up in the air based on just these two articles. The most dedicated fans tend to be the most critical of their team and that needs to be taken into account when reading a disparaging article too.
The main person I see writing about my Predators is John Glennon of the Tennessean. He’s OK but he often borders on being a sycophant to the team execs. While this helps promote the team in some ways I think it lets the fans down when the team does not meet inflated expectations. I think that this sort of attitude (not just from Glennon) is what helped cause attendance at Preds games to decline despite a fairly steady improvement in the standings every year.
Regardless of our opinions of the coverage, I think we need to be glad we get any. Jes Gőlbez posted his experience with finding hockey news in the San Jose area (Parting Shots from the Bay Area) and it wasn’t pretty. While I prefer less sugar coating, I will take what I can get.
Hi again!
If you want negative press, try this: Buccigross: How the East plays out. John Buccigross loves hockey and is very impartial team-wise; his comments on the chances for the Hurricanes this season are quite harsh though.
Enjoy! (Or just smack me
Short answers to your questions:
1) No.
2) See #1
3) No anti-Hurricanes bias. It looked like statements of fact to me. However, I do not know enough about the Canes situation to know if the facts are all true. When you’re a rabid fan of a team with a history of struggles (see below for my qualifications), any less-than-glowing descriptions of the situation can easily be interpreted as bias. However, in my experience the rule, “Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity.” almost always applies.
For the record, I am a Blues fan. Most season previews are picking them to finish 15th in the West.
I’m a Rangers fan, and, believe me, I know biased hockey coverage (both sycophantish and bashing). These articles seem pretty objective, assuming, as another commenter states, that the facts given are accurate.
How is it bashing a team to point out that season ticket sales have fallen? I don’t get it.
Bashing? What? Now, I’m not one of those sorts that thinks all American fans are hockey-ignorant, but your media coverage often is. This is some of the better American home-team hockey writing I’ve seen.
Incidentally, I’m an Oilers fan.
Those articles are OK if you stop to consider they are just sportswriters that were told to write about Hockey.
The best thing that ever happened to Hockey was the internet. Hell, I live in Hockeytown and used to have to get all my news three weeks late from the Hockey News. Once the wings are out of the playoffs the newspapers in Detroit stopped covering the Stanley Cup. If it wasn’t for Hockeynight in Canada, I would have gone crazy. Average Hockeytown fans are pretty ignorant about hockey, and the sportwriters like it that way. hang in there, the Hurricanes have a fine organization (Detroit Based, by the way), I have a Hurricanes shirt and Hat and when I wear it I am constantly asked what it is for.
and
Take good care of Ray Whitney, his whole time here we had terrible coaching, he never got a chance.