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NHL World Cup of Hockey: Jersey Ads have High Starting Price

By Diana Driscoll

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Having the NHL World Cup of Hockey back on a permanent basis starting in 2016 is beyond exciting. It is a chance for all the best players in the world to come together and vie for a shot at the championship. It will be sanctioned by the NHL and will follow its rules so all of us diehard NHL fans will not have to worry about re-familiarizing ourselves with the IIHF or Olympic procedures (that’s a relief).

Well, I was searching about the tournament today (sure, I’m a little ahead of the game, but I like to be informed) and I found out something I am not excited about. The NHL is going to have the players wear jerseys with the names of sponsors and advertisements displayed on them, like the ones you see in the European leagues. Yuck—I despise these. They are loud and distracting and, I don’t know about you, but when I see U.S.A., I want to see it by itself, front and center. I don’t want it to be convoluted by sponsors and advertisements I will neither care about nor bother to even read their names.

What’s even more ridiculous is that the NHL is starting the price for advertisements at $8 million. OK, so this has got to be a joke. I don’t know if the league’s top brass understand that they are the National Hockey League and not FIFA. They don’t have the kind of pull around the world as other leagues do, even though hockey is quite popular overseas.

According to TSN:

"Two people familiar with the matter told TSN the league and union have been pitching on-uniform advertising for several months now. While some sponsorship deals have been agreed to, no company has been willing to meet the asking price for jersey ads at the Toronto-based event scheduled for September of 2016.“Someone paying $8 million? It’s just not going to happen,” said a marketing executive who has been pitched by the NHL and NHLPA. “They think they’re going to get a global financial services company like Visa to pay that much, but it’s just not going to happen.”"

Sure, they say that the ads are going to mesh well with the jerseys, but I don’t believe that. Clearly, with any business it is all about the money, and I get that the NHL is going to do all it can to milk as much money out of this tournament as possible. (TSN estimated it will make more than $100 million from it).

But the league may have lost sight of the fact that these jerseys are not just team jerseys—they represent countries. They are patriotic. They are much more than just a jersey. You didn’t see any advertisements on the World Cup jerseys and I don’t want to see any on these. I feel as if it devalues the name of the front of the jersey and that is not something I am OK with.

These players are supposed to be representing their homelands, not getting fans to switch to Vonage or help Visa increase its profitability ten-fold.

Aside from the fact that I dislike the idea, I just feel the NHL is overreaching here (with the rumored starting price). I think they need a reality check.

Unfortunately, it seems like this will happen one way or another. Will companies pay $8 million? I highly doubt it. But the League looks like it wants to test out advertisements on jerseys for the future as it is something all four major sports leagues in North America are pondering. (Again, is has to do with money as the leagues believe they can make more than $120 million).

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The NHL has expressed that they don’t want to be the first league to start the trend and I am honestly hoping that no other league has the guts to pull the trigger. I already have a problem with how the sports industry is becoming so corporate focused and players are losing sight of why they actually play the game. Not to mention, as a huge fan of history and the New York Yankees, I don’t want anything other than pinstripes on those jerseys.

It is the same for NHL jerseys. I just want the players to be representing themselves and their teams and that’s it.

Next: The Cost of Ovi

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