Ticket Prices / Lions' Marketing

[Hambone]

The first thing that came to mind when viewing the WhiteCaps schedule/Lions potential dates was that they are setting things up to minimize the number of "change overs" and the related costs. So most of the time that they do a "change over" it is good for 2 games.

Good point Danny. Perhaps BC Place made it very clear to both tenants the cost of converting from football to soccer and vice versa is significant. Thanks to sj-roc's chart it sure is shaping up like all six home games in the fall will be back-to-back weeks. Lions will really need to be in the thick of the race for first place to bring back fans consecutive weeks like that.

I'm actually surprised to see the Whitecaps playing so many Saturday games next season. Haven't checked but thought they played on a lot of Sunday afternoons this past season.

Doubt you have to worry about 6 post Labour Day home games all being back-to-back. To do that would mean they only have 3 home dates before LD. sj-rocs graphic is suggesting the 11 "best dates" for the regular season and of course there only will be 9 games. There is a bit more flexibility that the chart shows. I do think because LD Classics the Lions will get a bye that weekend. Another bye at the end of the season on one of those back-to-back possible weekends would be a good possibility. The Lions will not get an all Saturday schedule as definitely TSN will want them for at least 1 or 2 Friday night dates to fill in the second half of a FNF double dip. I don't think anybody would complain about a schedule with a couple of Friday tilts. July 25th and Aug 8th would be decent possibilities for that given the Caps don't play until Sunday giving the schedule makers 13 "best dates" to work with out of the 20 weekends.

[sj-roc]

The first thing that came to mind when viewing the WhiteCaps schedule/Lions potential dates was that they are setting things up to minimize the number of "change overs" and the related costs. So most of the time that they do a "change over" it is good for 2 games.

Good point Danny. Perhaps BC Place made it very clear to both tenants the cost of converting from football to soccer and vice versa is significant. Thanks to sj-roc's chart it sure is shaping up like all six home games in the fall will be back-to-back weeks. Lions will really need to be in the thick of the race for first place to bring back fans consecutive weeks like that.

I'm actually surprised to see the Whitecaps playing so many Saturday games next season. Haven't checked but thought they played on a lot of Sunday afternoons this past season.

Doubt you have to worry about 6 post Labour Day home games all being back-to-back. To do that would mean they only have 3 home dates before LD. sj-rocs graphic is suggesting the 11 "best dates" for the regular season and of course there only will be 9 games. There is a bit more flexibility that the chart shows. I do think because LD Classics the Lions will get a bye that weekend. Another bye at the end of the season on one of those back-to-back possible weekends would be a good possibility. The Lions will not get an all Saturday schedule as definitely TSN will want them for at least 1 or 2 Friday night dates to fill in the second half of a FNF double dip. I don't think anybody would complain about a schedule with a couple of Friday tilts. July 25th and Aug 8th would be decent possibilities for that given the Caps don't play until Sunday giving the schedule makers 13 "best dates" to work with out of the 20 weekends.

You read my intent correctly, Hambone. Indeed not all of the dates I marked will be used and there will almost certainly be a second bye week next year with nine teams. Being Thanksgiving long weekend, Week 16 in my chart might be a good time to take it. I'd rather not take it too late and def wouldn't want to take it in the last week of the season. Much has been made of the extra week layoff hurting a team's chances when hosting the WF and if we finish 2nd we'd create an equivalent scenario for the WSF, or even worse, compound matters if we finish 1st and get three weeks off before the WF. Best to maintain a steady schedule rhythm IMHO as you head into the playoffs. Some might suggest that an extra week layoff could be useful to heal up some key injuries but this is a post-hoc argument that you can't really make until long after the fact when this situation becomes clearer.

I agree we won't see things shake out as well as I've suggested in the chart; it's basically a best case scenario. FNF has simply become too big for TSN for us to get out of hosting any less than at least 2-3 of these. For every Sat I've marked, the Fri the night before would also be amenable as far as BCP availability goes. And of course there's also a possibility of getting stuck with a summer Thu game again. But on the whole, I'd say Skulsky and most people with a stake in it would prob prefer to get as big as possible of a share of the Sat dates I've marked. I also agree with the suggestion that there seems to be a deliberate attempt here by BCP to minimise the number of Lions<->Caps changeovers with the possibility of so many back-to-backs from both teams, particularly in the fall.

[Hambone]

You read my intent correctly, Hambone. Indeed not all of the dates I marked will be used and there will almost certainly be a second bye week next year with nine teams. Being Thanksgiving long weekend, Week 16 in my chart might be a good time to take it. I'd rather not take it too late and def wouldn't want to take it in the last week of the season. Much has been made of the extra week layoff hurting a team's chances when hosting the WF and if we finish 2nd we'd create an equivalent scenario for the WSF, or even worse, compound matters if we finish 1st and get three weeks off before the WF. Best to maintain a steady schedule rhythm IMHO as you head into the playoffs. Some might suggest that an extra week layoff could be useful to heal up some key injuries but this is a post-hoc argument that you can't really make until long after the fact when this situation becomes clearer.

I agree we won't see things shake out as well as I've suggested in the chart; it's basically a best case scenario. FNF has simply become too big for TSN for us to get out of hosting any less than at least 2-3 of these. For every Sat I've marked, the Fri the night before would also be amenable as far as BCP availability goes. And of course there's also a possibility of getting stuck with a summer Thu game again. But on the whole, I'd say Skulsky and most people with a stake in it would prob prefer to get as big as possible of a share of the Sat dates I've marked. I also agree with the suggestion that there seems to be a deliberate attempt here by BCP to minimise the number of Lions<->Caps changeovers with the possibility of so many back-to-backs from both teams, particularly in the fall.

I think the CFL has already stated it will be a 20 week season which would mean 2 byes per team. Unfortunately that does mean some teams will draw the straw of no game in Week 19 or 20. If my suspicion comes through that BC gets a bye on Labour Day due to a desire for LD Classics (Edm/Cgy, Ssk/Wpg, Ham/Tor & Mon/Ott) then odds are pretty good their other bye would be either very early in the season or very late. I do support the train of thought that bye weeks do more harm than good unless a team does have some key injuries to deal with.

While fewer changeovers are obviously more cost efficient for BCP I doubt they would hold many of the cards when it comes to their two anchor tenants. That's just part of the business of running such a facility. I wonder if the length of conversion time relates to trying to get it all done with very little OT? I doubt they have crews working around the clock unless the teams want to cover any OT.