Sports

Nothing beats the commercials (especially the date one and the escalator one), but these ads around Boston are pretty great.

I may not be a Bruins fan, but I sure love their marketing campaign!

Thanks to @bruce_arthur and @texas_gal for the images. Let me know if there are more out there!

The 2011 Winter Classic was to be played at Heinz Field on Jan. 1, 2011 at 1 p.m. ET between the Pittsburgh Penguins and Washington Capitals.

Rain delayed the game until 8 p.m.

For Ontarians, the game might as well been cancelled because we won’t get to see it on Hockey Night in Canada.

The hockey gods at CBC have decided instead to show the Sens-Leafs game, which starts at 7 p.m., in its entirety for Ontario CBC stations. The rest of the country will leave the game at 8 p.m. to go to Pittsburgh. Which means if you live in Ontario, don’t like the Leafs or the Sens, or simply just wanted to watch the Winter Classic — you’re outta luck (it’s lucky my Pens-loving mother moved out of the province in November then).

So why is the Winter Classic not on CBC? There are a few things I don’t think the brass at CBC Sports really thought about before re-making their schedule for tonight:

1) CBC Toronto is the only station many Ontarians get in HD

Sure, I can watch the game on a station from out west or out east beause I have the cable package, but I can’t watch them in HD. Same as streaming from cbcsports.ca — no HD there. (And I’d have to plug my  computer into my TV or sit with my laptop on my lap for 3+ hours.)

2) The Leafs and Senators both suck

And I’m a Senators fan! But this is the sad truth — going into Saturday night’s game Ottawa was 24th in the league, Toronto was 28th. The Pens are the second best team overall and the Caps are sixth — you do the math.

Add into that Crosby and Ovechkin, and it’s a no brainer. Seriously, CBC, my cat could have made this decision for you.

But perhaps the CBC is betting that when Ontarians have a choice of watching good hockey or bad hockey, they’d rather watch the bad hockey.

3) Ontario has the highest population in Canada

Don’t be surprised when the numbers come back and Saturday afternoon’s repeat of the 2008 Winter Classic beats the real thing at 8. By forcing Ontario to watch the Leafs-Sens, the public broadcaster is throwing ratings away.

I will not be streaming on CBCsports.ca or watching a station out west. My household has decided we’ll watch the NBC feed — which means no Elliotte Friedman or other top-notch CBC commentators. I’m quite disappointed by this, but it’s a sacrifice I’ll have to make.

Update: Ontarians with HD can watch the CBC Vancouver feed on Rogers channel 582.

What do you think of CBC’s decision not to show the Winter Classic on CBC proper? Will you watch it elsewhere or will you suck it up and watch the Battle of Ontario battle it out for who sucks least?

I used Storify to document the Twitter reaction to Pat Burns’ death tonight. It was interesting to see how people went from skepticism to acceptance in just under an hour.

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