Sunday Blogging Countdown

What's the deal with pregame shows? It's long been a part of the sports-viewing experience that there's a program before the event, which usually tells you nothing new about the event. But for weekend-afternoon programming it's probably better than angry anything else on. And it may even be less stupid.

And pregame shows seem to be big business. I'm sure they're cheap to produce, with one small set and a few over-the-hill athletes and coaches. You don't need writers. You just need some big TVs behind them, and a supply of suits you can pay for with a quick endorsement of a men's store in the closing credits. And speaking of advertising, you can fill the pregame with ads much more easily than the event itself.

So I guess I can understand why American networks run their hours of NFL pregame every Sunday morning. And why Sportsnet is bringing Ron McLean out of semi-retirement to host Hockey Night In Canada. As many have pointed out, no one is going to watch the show because of him, but they might be more likely to watch the pregame, which is when the host does much of his work.

Oh, and I suppose I should do a requiem for George Stroumboulopoulos's time as host. As a politically-aware fan of indie music and sports, I'm one of the few people who will take his side in this. He did a good job, and the only negative things anyone says about him seem to be vague talk about style. So it's just another example of how hockey is a very uninclusive culture.

Anyway, pregame shows have always been - for all their flaws - avoidable. You can make all the jokes you want about the Super Bowl pregame show starting the previous Tuesday, but the fact is that you don't have to watch it if you don't want to. But not so much anymore: today I tuned in to watch the Toronto IndyCar race at 2:30, having skipped the pregame (okay, "prerace") show that was on at 2:00. And what did I see? a half-hour of interviews and discussion. Yes, they deceptively put the race broadcast in the guide as staying half-an-hour earlier than it did, thus fooling us into watching some of the prerace show we thought we'd skipped.

That sort of thing seems to be happening more and more. So I'm assuming there's a bit of desperation to get us to watch their cheap, profitable programming. A few years from now, You'll look in your cable guide and see a baseball game listed as being 6 hours long, and you'll just have to guess when it actually starts.