Good hot stove discussion on Province.com

[David]

I don't know about everyone else but the weekly giveaways emails I'm getting strike me as desperate, sad, and really out of touch. Couple that with the annual, bizarre offer to go on a cruise with Wally and Skulsky and the whole marketing scheme seems like just more of the same old, same old.

Hard to sell excitement on a team that went 7-11, and with a declining product overall in the CFL, it's going to take a serious change in the on field product for this to turnaround.

Does anybody have an example of a CFL team that's doing a good job with their marketing efforts (Sask not included)? Seems like the league is in decline across the board both on and off the field.

With respect, the club gets crucified on this board for not doing enough to create excitement, so I for one am not about to be critical when they decide to step up for 12 weeks in the off-season to give away prizes that include $1,200 in cash, a big screen TV, a $1,200 travel gift card, and a chance to win a car - in an effort to get fans in the stands. You can't have it both ways.

The cruise? Meh, not particularly my thing either, but I am sure there are some long time season ticket holders, sponsors, and friends of the club that will partake. Again, not something that bothers me.

Not sure of each club's marketing efforts. I do know however, that the Argos have the most effective Social Media presence of the 9 clubs. That's not exactly a widely held belief, it's a fact. #DoubleBlueMonday? Bowie song titles put to Argo images?? Effing brilliant!


DH

[B.C.FAN]

I don't know about everyone else but the weekly giveaways emails I'm getting strike me as desperate, sad, and really out of touch. Couple that with the annual, bizarre offer to go on a cruise with Wally and Skulsky and the whole marketing scheme seems like just more of the same old, same old.

I'm excited to look forward to the weekly giveaway emails from the Lions. I've never won anything from the team but there's always a first time. I haven't always renewed in time to qualify for the early-bird draws so it's like having a lottery ticket. I know I have a chance this year, as small as it might be.

For the same reason, I wouldn't read too much into season ticket renewals being ahead of last year's pace. That's mostly due to the immensely popular jersey giveaway, which had people lining up in the concourse in October to renew their tickets so they could get free jerseys. The monthly payment plan has also made it easier than ever to spread the cost over 10 months. With those incentives, the new $25 upper end-zone price point, daily radio ads and multiple daily tweets and Instagram posts to stoke the fires, I give the Lions an A+ for their off-season marketing campaign.

By the way, I've also been noticing the hometowns of the weekly winners of the season ticket-holder giveaways. They'are almost all from the suburbs, which reinforces my belief that that the core fan base is in the eastern suburbs and even farther east in the central Fraser Valley.

[Qman]

the province's lions coverage is a joke right now.
they have willis ... who it a columnist covering part time. with ewen as well but would rather be covering lesser sports like giants and stealth ... i guess both hate football.
You think ewen would want to step up and show he has the mustard to be a new crop of top beat writers that are active on social media like scott mitchell and kirk penton. The really need a football version of marc weber/kurtis larson ... i doubt a scott mitchell/kirk penton wants to move to vancouver.

[David]

the province's lions coverage is a joke right now.
they have willis ... who it a columnist covering part time. with ewen as well but would rather be covering lesser sports like giants and stealth ... i guess both hate football.
You think ewen would want to step up and show he has the mustard to be a new crop of top beat writers that are active on social media like scott mitchell and kirk penton. The really need a football version of marc weber/kurtis larson ... i doubt a scott mitchell/kirk penton wants to move to vancouver.

I agree for the most part. Ed Willes is a great columnist and always give the Leos and the CFL ink (not always flattering, but certainly no unfair or unjust criticism). You're right though about a beat reporter. Seems there was no succession plan in place when LU was given a package. Howard Tsumura covered the team when Lowell left, but he's a hoops guy through and through, and his first love is high school sports. Now I notice that Steve Ewen just started covering the club, someone with whom I associate "Vancouver Giants." I don't recall him ever writing about the Leos before. Not that he couldn't be good but he's one of the "less visible" sports guys over at the Province, and I am not sure CFL is his passion.

Ben Kuzma is a big CFL supporter, but he's firmly entrenched in the Canucks beat.


DH

[Hambone]

the province's lions coverage is a joke right now.
they have willis ... who it a columnist covering part time. with ewen as well but would rather be covering lesser sports like giants and stealth ... i guess both hate football.
You think ewen would want to step up and show he has the mustard to be a new crop of top beat writers that are active on social media like scott mitchell and kirk penton. The really need a football version of marc weber/kurtis larson ... i doubt a scott mitchell/kirk penton wants to move to vancouver.

When you say "right now" do you mean all season long or only over recent weeks? Quite frankly there hasn't been a whole lot to report on in Leo-land over the past 7 weeks since the news Tedford was leaving came down. There was the flurry of activity over a 1 week period prior to Christmas when Manny, Fraser, Fabien and Menard inked new deals. In the month since then the only newsworthy items were Olafioye's re-signing and the coaching staff announcement. 2 items in 4 weeks. These are the dog days of the offseason when usually there isn't a whole lot of any CFL news to report on. Saskatchewan is the exception. With the management and coaching changes and subsequent player personnel moves there they've generated more news than the rest of the CFL combined. That's not a good thing as it's a direct result of a team trying to recover from a disastrous season. I'm sure the Riders wish it was closer to crickets as it is in most other markets. Sometimes no news is good news.

[Hambone]

With respect, the club gets crucified on this board for not doing enough to create excitement, so I for one am not about to be critical when they decide to step up for 12 weeks in the off-season to give away prizes that include $1,200 in cash, a big screen TV, a $1,200 travel gift card, and a chance to win a car - in an effort to get fans in the stands. You can't have it both ways.

The cruise? Meh, not particularly my thing either, but I am sure there are some long time season ticket holders, sponsors, and friends of the club that will partake. Again, not something that bothers me.

Not sure of each club's marketing efforts. I do know however, that the Argos have the most effective Social Media presence of the 9 clubs. That's not exactly a widely held belief, it's a fact. #DoubleBlueMonday? Bowie song titles put to Argo images?? Effing brilliant!


DH

Agree 100% David. Seems Lions fans like to criticize them for not communicating or marketing and then dump all over them for communicating a marketing effort.
As for that promotion a few weeks back over on RF.com I had posted the details of it plus the jersey give-away as a rebuttal on some opinions that BC makes no efforts in areas of marketing. General response was "wow we didn't realize" and "gee the Riders never do anything like that".

Just like B.C. Fan I also look forward to the next draw email to see if maybe I'm the one lucky enough to crack the lower mainland stranglehold on the prizes.

As for the cruise I'm with you. Not my thing. That they continue to offer it indicates to me that there are enough folks out there who partake and quite likely the sorts of folks you're talking about. If they were only getting a handful of participants it likely would be dropped. So yes, not for me, but as long as it's drawing the desired level of interest to keep it going hell yeah.

I'm not a social media guy beyond Facebook and LinkedIn and I'm more a lurker than active participant. Based on the email communications I do receive from the Lions and the stories and videos they have on their website I think they do a very good job in those areas. During training camp I was checking out the vldeo reports on the Lions site and also checked out a few other teams. BC seemed to be well ahead of other clubs in that regard.

[sj-roc]

Not sure of each club's marketing efforts. I do know however, that the Argos have the most effective Social Media presence of the 9 clubs. That's not exactly a widely held belief, it's a fact. #DoubleBlueMonday? Bowie song titles put to Argo images?? Effing brilliant!


DH

Lions could have done the same thing with this Bowie tune:

[Spud387]

I think people here make too much of the amount of ink the BC Lions see in the paper. Is more better? Of course, but think of the medium and who will see it. Print media is dying, primarily because people are not subscribing to it anymore. Young(er) viewers/readers are not going to see the paper. The only correlation I get out of the Lions getting pages in the province is that those articles will also be online. The Lions need to be seen in social media, Radio, TV and online reporting. More is always better, but the Province/Vancouver Sun should not be the primary concern.

[JohnnyMusso]

Free agency is coming up in 3 weeks. I expect a little news before then from the Lions either 1 to 3 re-signings and a few players released. Will Lions be players in free agency? I have a feeling there will go after a few guys. They need to upgrade their talent and bring in some vets - just upgrading with US raw rookies is not enough to compete with the West. Right now, they will again struggle to make the playoffs. I expect Sask to be much better. No turtle derby this year.

[Qman]

the province's lions coverage is a joke right now.
they have willis ... who it a columnist covering part time. with ewen as well but would rather be covering lesser sports like giants and stealth ... i guess both hate football.
You think ewen would want to step up and show he has the mustard to be a new crop of top beat writers that are active on social media like scott mitchell and kirk penton. The really need a football version of marc weber/kurtis larson ... i doubt a scott mitchell/kirk penton wants to move to vancouver.

When you say "right now" do you mean all season long or only over recent weeks? Quite frankly there hasn't been a whole lot to report on in Leo-land over the past 7 weeks since the news Tedford was leaving came down. There was the flurry of activity over a 1 week period prior to Christmas when Manny, Fraser, Fabien and Menard inked new deals. In the month since then the only newsworthy items were Olafioye's re-signing and the coaching staff announcement. 2 items in 4 weeks. These are the dog days of the offseason when usually there isn't a whole lot of any CFL news to report on. Saskatchewan is the exception. With the management and coaching changes and subsequent player personnel moves there they've generated more news than the rest of the CFL combined. That's not a good thing as it's a direct result of a team trying to recover from a disastrous season. I'm sure the Riders wish it was closer to crickets as it is in most other markets. Sometimes no news is good news.

scott mitchell (stamps) and kirk penton (bombers) twitter feed is full of stuff everyday.

There is stuff to write on?
which positions should the lions target in FA?
which positions should lions target in the draft? who are the most likely players?
should the lions sign chick and dressler? why/why not?
....hire someone that can write anything anything other than "attendance was bad last year"

FYI: I think grand plan is for the province & sun to be merged into one paper. More massive cuts are coming. I think thats why LU wasn't replaced. Beamish will be the beat writer unless he retires too. I wish they would hire a young guy like mitchell/penton ... like marc weber does a great job for the caps

[Qman]

Free agency is coming up in 3 weeks. I expect a little news before then from the Lions either 1 to 3 re-signings and a few players released. Will Lions be players in free agency? I have a feeling there will go after a few guys. They need to upgrade their talent and bring in some vets - just upgrading with US raw rookies is not enough to compete with the West. Right now, they will again struggle to make the playoffs. I expect Sask to be much better. No turtle derby this year.

only way to generate interest in the off season and more ticket sales is sign name FAs.

Can't believe they aren't interested in chick ... their DL is worst in the league. Even if you overpay him by 50k, its work 5x that much in season ticket sales and still is a upgrade.

[TheLionKing]

Television coverage is a joke. Global's Squire Barnes is more interested in straightening his tie and chit chatting with the news anchor that report on sports.

[pennw]

Television coverage is a joke. Global's Squire Barnes is more interested in straightening his tie and chit chatting with the news anchor that report on sports.

Well actually Squire Barnes really likes the Canucks too ...alot. And the weather girls .

[Hambone]

Free agency is coming up in 3 weeks. I expect a little news before then from the Lions either 1 to 3 re-signings and a few players released. Will Lions be players in free agency? I have a feeling there will go after a few guys. They need to upgrade their talent and bring in some vets - just upgrading with US raw rookies is not enough to compete with the West. Right now, they will again struggle to make the playoffs. I expect Sask to be much better. No turtle derby this year.

only way to generate interest in the off season and more ticket sales is sign name FAs.

Can't believe they aren't interested in chick ... their DL is worst in the league. Even if you overpay him by 50k, its work 5x that much in season ticket sales and still is a upgrade.

Has anybody said they aren't? If I was to hand the title out for worst CFL DL in 2015 I think the Riders win that handily. After a slow start BC's DL was quite effective once Minter got healthy giving them Brooks and Minter in the middle. The pass rush really came around. After languishing around at the bottom of the league in sacks the Lions wound up 5th in sacks, only 1 sack behind both Edmonton and Calgary.

Back to Chick count me as one who won't be surprised if he doesn't sign anywhere and retires. He's in a rather unique situation family-wise. He's a type 1 diabetic who carries an insulin pump all the time. I believe he's a Mormon. He certainly has a typically large Mormon family. He just turned 33 in November and already has 8 kids aged 10 (later this year) and under right down to a newborn in December. He's at a point in his career where he's likely looking at no more than 2 more years if he can remain effective. He's well established living in Regina year around and was working on opening a fitness business of some sort. Does he leave his wife home to tend with 8 kids 10 & under for 6 months while he's off playing football in another city? Or does he pack everybody up to move to another city for 1 or 2 years. Can't imagine how much money it would cost to relocate from Regina to the lower mainland into something big enough for 8 kids. That Chick hasn't already signed shouldn't be taken as meaning nobody's interested. I think he is wrestling with deciding if continuing playing is worth it for his family. Leaving the wife to handle that brood by herself for 6 months doesn't seem to be an option and uprooting them may not be either.

Chick's still pretty good but isn't the beast he used to be, at least he sure hasn't been against the Lions. Last year in 3 games he mustered 4 tackles and 0 sacks. Late in one of the games at BC Place I recall searching the Rider defence looking for #97 because it dawned on me I hadn't noticed him at all, all game long. I thought maybe he was injured but sure enough he was there. It used to be Chick made an impact every game. Last year I found a few games where he was for lack of a better term ordinary but his own standards. He's getting up there where that shouldn't be a surprise. He's only 1 year younger than Brent Johnson was when he retired. Johnson was still playing well in his final year but he wasn't DMOP or All-Star Brent Johnson any more. I think that's where Chick is.

[Qman]

Ewen finally published something in the paper on the lions in the province today. Quick piece on Harris and Lulay.
Wish he did more piece's like this and was active on twitter ... at least someone from the province should say what their coverage plans are.

... no one cares about giants transactions.