CALGARY, Alberta — One week into the Blackhawks‘ season, the team’s new TV network has yet to reach a carriage agreement with Comcast. That appears unlikely to change before the home opener Thursday.
That scenario would’ve been tough to imagine a year ago, but the difficulties that Chicago Sports Network — which launched Oct. 1 as the new home of the Hawks, Bulls and White Sox — has encountered in negotiations with the area’s dominant cable provider has made it a reality.
CHSN hasn’t reached carriage agreements with streaming services Hulu and Fubo, either, and is not expected to ever reach one with YouTube TV, which has distanced itself from regional sports networks in general.
The network is currently available on DirecTV, DirecTV Stream, U-Verse and Astound/RCN, as well as via an over-the-air antenna — which many fans have found difficult to set up or get to work properly. Out-of-market fans can still watch the team on ESPN+, but the geographical area considered to be the Hawks’ market has expanded, leaving more people in the dark.
Hawks chairman Danny Wirtz, in an exclusive interview with the Sun-Times on Tuesday, recognized fans’ anger and emphasized his own dissatisfaction with the situation.
“Our goal has been, and continues to be, to ensure that our games are in as many fans’ pockets as possible, in whatever form that can take,” Wirtz said. “I acknowledge that, as we’re doing this interview, it’s not where we want [it] to be. We’re disappointed we haven’t reached full distribution of our goals, but we’re hopeful that we’re going to get there.”
This isn’t a unique challenge for the Hawks, considering the landscape for regional sports networks has descended into chaos nationwide in the past few years. Altitude, the network that airs Avalanche and Nuggets games, hasn’t been on Comcast in Colorado in five years. The Panthers, Penguins, Capitals, Ducks, Stars, Kraken and Golden Knights have all experienced recent changes to their RSNs, as well.
Nonetheless, the challenge has proved even more difficult to resolve than CHSN or any of its teams anticipated.
“We are negotiating,” Wirtz said. “We’re very flexible. Unfortunately, in these cases, it takes two sides to find the value in this, so that’s where we’re at right now. But I’m hopeful.”
Wirtz said he is pleased with the quality of the broadcasts and content CHSN is producing, including the work of new play-by-play broadcaster Rick Ball. The Hawks-Flames game Tuesday represented a homecoming for Ball, who called Flames games for Sportsnet in Canada from 2014 through last season.
The lack of carriage agreements, however, has impacted the Hawks’ bottom line. They’re generating far less revenue from the local-TV piece of the puzzle than they used to.
“What used to be more guaranteed media rights has shifted [to where] we’re sort of in control of our revenue based on ad revenue,” Wirtz said. “The model has shifted. We’re betting on ourselves that we can get back up there. In the short term, it’s a factor.”
One can’t help but wonder what side effects the Hawks’ lack of TV visibility could eventually have on other revenue streams, such as ticket and merchandise sales.
Making up the deficit
Wirtz credited Hawks business president Jaime Faulkner for constantly “trying to find new ways to generate revenue” to make up for the aforementioned decrease in one category.
That includes optimizing the profitability of preexisting revenue sources. An example is the Hawks’ corporate partnerships, which have been intentionally reduced in quantity — down from 190 partners in 2020 to 84 at the start of last season — in favor of deeper, more fruitful partnerships with a smaller group of companies.
That also includes discovering ways to monetize things that weren’t previously sources of revenue. An example of that is the Hawks’ new advertisement patch for Circa Sports, a sports betting company, on their red home jerseys. It will make its regular-season debut Thursday against the Sharks.
Wirtz said the Hawks had “stayed in touch with interested parties” since the NHL began allowing jersey patches in 2022. They ultimately decided Circa, which also advertises on the Knights’ home jerseys, was a “great match.”
Here’s how it looks: pic.twitter.com/x1A8EhTNmu
— Ben Pope (@BenPopeCST) June 25, 2024
Some fans, however, have complained not only about the Hawks putting an ad of any kind on their jerseys, but also about them putting a sports-betting ad. It could send a mixed message in an era where an increasing number of pro athletes — such as Senators forward Shane Pinto — have received massive suspensions for betting on sports themselves.
“We’re operating with a level of responsibility,” Wirtz responded. “Our family operates in the alcohol/beverage business, which is highly regulated and age-gated, and we’re really mindful about how we promote those products.
“It’s the same thing for legal sports betting. There’s very specific rules and guidelines, from the company handbook to the rules of the NHL, that players and employees and everybody have to follow. You have to take those things very seriously if you’re going to carry the partnership with the sports betting entity.”
It should be noted Hawks’ revenue situation is not expected to impact their hockey-related spending. Wirtz said at the NHL Draft in June that he’ll be happy to spend up to the NHL salary cap once general manager Kyle Davidson deems it necessary, and shortly afterward, the Hawks’ free-agent signing spree brought them within roughly $5 million of the cap already this season.
One year as chairman
It has been more than a year now since Rocky Wirtz’s abrupt death in July 2023, which elevated Danny Wirtz into his current role — not only overseeing the hockey franchise but also the Wirtz Corporation’s other holdings in alcohol, banking, real estate and more.
Wirtz said it has been a “transitional year,” but he hasn’t made many changes on an operational level.
“Every day is a different set of circumstances, challenges and places to be,” he said. “On some days, I am bouncing across industries, it feels like. But I’m lucky to have a team. If I need to put my head into one of the other businesses, I know that Jaime and Kyle have their hand on the wheel.
“If anything, I think we’re entering a much more steady state of the [Hawks’] business with our leadership team now in place. The things that Jaime and her team have implemented are now solidified in the business. Kyle, on the hockey side, is executing his plan and continuing to move the team forward in its development process.”
The so-called 1901 Project — a $7 billion, 15-year redevelopment plan for the parking lots surrounding the United Center — has unsurprisingly been Wirtz’s biggest focus. He said at an event earlier this month that a 6,000-seat music hall will anchor the first phase of construction, which could break ground next summer.