Smoke But No Fire:The Calgary Flames and the Bertuzzi Acquisition

The signing of Todd “Big Bert” Bertuzzi by the Calgary Flames is a controversial one.

And it’s one with which the Calgary faithful are not entirely comfortable.

Want an example? Take a look at the blog Red Mile: The Calgary Flames Blog:

“Ha Ha (nervous laugh)… I thought you said that the Flames just signed Todd Bertuzzi. That’s a good one. Ha Ha. Really… you’re killing me with your great jokes!!! ROTFL!!!”

(And that’s one of the cleaner examples I could find.)

Even my husband, a life-long die-hard Flames fan wasn’t entirely sure about this one.

After a night of really chewing the acquisition over he finally stated tersely: “Well, if he’s a Flame, and he plays well, I’ll support him.”

Why Is This Signing Controversial?

Typically, the signing of a signing of a former all-star forward for (US)$1.95 million for a year wouldn’t be a big deal.

But this isn’t typical. For those of you with only a passing acquaintance with the NHL, Bertuzzi is best remembered for an act of violence he committed while playing for the Vancouver Canucks in 2004. He slammed Colorado Avalanche player Steve Moore’s head into the ice in retaliation for an earlier hit Moore made on Canucks captain Markus Naslund. And Bertuzzi’s hit was a nasty sucker punch.

See for yourself: Here or here. (Warning: It’s rather brutal.)

Bertuzzi’s attack not only left Moore concussed but also with three broken vertebrae in his neck.

And now he’ll be back playing in the same division as the Canucks and the Avalanche.

Those games could be tense.

How the Flames Have Tried to Neutralize Negative Publicity

Despite the fact that this signing would not have been necessary had the Flames been able to hold on to Owen Nolan (newly-acquired by the Minnesota Wild), they have done a very good job handling the publicity around the acquisition.

Tactic One: Have a (Really) Good Guy Speak Up for the Bad Guy

It was clever of the team to enlist Jarome Iginla, a clean player, the captain of the Flames and a bona fide hockey superstar (check out his stats on NHL.com), to speak up on behalf of the acquisition of his former Canadian Olympic Team teammate Bertuzzi.

Iginla has offered strong vocal support for Bertuzzi. On the official website of the Calgary Flames, he stated:

“I think he is a character guy…He made a bad decision. It was a bad incident. It he could take it back, I assure you he would. I do believe in second chances. He should move on and I think we should too.”

Smart Tactic Two: Limit the GM’s Airtime After He Almost Derails The PR Initiative

The efforts to win over the Calgary fans were almost derailed by their GM, Darryl Sutter in a press conference. According to the National Post, commenting on the hit on Moore, Sutter stated

“That’s a long time ago…I had a traffic ticket three years ago. I hope there’s three or four fans who can forget that I went through a red light.”

That thud in the background was the sound of the team’s PR people collapsing in agony. Those situations are not really comparable – not unless Sutter ran someone over and ended their hockey career when he ran the light…

The Flames were lucky that random comment did not explode into a big story. But they seem to have learned their lesson. Sutter’s been quite quiet since then.

Smart Tactic Three: Reinforce The Captain’s Praise

Well-respected veteran defenceman Robyn Regehr has joined Iginla in praising Bertuzzi, reinforcing the key messages that the big, bad forward is now one of them, will be good for the team and should be accepted.

As he commented in a Calgary Herald story picked up by Canada.com:

“I know Todd a little bit from playing with him at the (2000) wold championship in St. Petersburg and also at the (2006) Olympics –he’s a good person…I Know there’s some negativity that’s surrounded him in the past. I hope the fans in Calgary can look past that and give him a clean slate.”

Will It Work?

So far it seems to be working rather well. There has not been a run of negative press nor has there been a wave of cancellation of season tickets. Fans may be cursing but they’re still with their team. So far the Calgary Flames have effectively put out the smoldering danger of negative publicity before it could become a raging fire.

Do you think this was well handled?  And how would you react if Bertuzzi was signed to your team?

Two Nations, Two Sports Messes and One BIG Need for Better Crisis Management

And now for something completely different….Sports and public relations.

Canada: HNIC’s theme departs and with it someone’s ability to manage crisis effectively

Up here in the not-so-frozen north, the whole mess is not so much with the NHL or hockey itself but with its mother network having first lost the rights to the Hockey Night in Canada theme and then whomever they asked to handle the ensuing PR having botched things so badly that even American comedians have picked up on the situation and have started making fun of it. (And, oddly enough, hockey isn’t quite so popular in the States, so if they’ve picked up on it there….oops.)

Colbert on HNIC

Stephen Colbert offered hilarious commentary on the whole HNIC situation last week. (Viacom, which appears to have a much less well-developed sense of humour, pulled it off YouTube. So this is a bit cumbersome, because this is copyrighted material and because of the aforementioned lack of a sense of humour, this has to be done in a round about way. You have to go to the Comedy Network’s site by following this link to the episode and fast forward to about 3 minutes and 30 seconds in to find the bit. But it is worth it.)

It’s a bit that simultaneously manages to make fun of both cultures, which is particularly rib tickling for someone who has spent half her life on each side of the Am-Can divide.

And what the fact that Colbert commented on HNIC means in terms of PR

But the fact that this bit exists is a very bad sign for whomever has been trying to handle the PR for this situation. They not only dropped the ball, but it has rolled downhill and gathered snow and now has turned into an avalanche. How did that happen? Were they not warned? What was their strategy for handling this supposed to be?

America: Does NBA stand for Now BSing America?

Talk about a mess. On the other side of the border, the issue isn’t just about music. It’s about corruption and it has the potential to be as big a scandal as the 1919 Black Sox fixing of the World Series if the allegations imparted are proved to be true.

[Please note: my take on this is rudimentary- for a really good examination of the Donaghy/NBA situation, you should go read Ironic Teachings's blog- he has a fabulous handle on this and is always a good read.]

The initial scandal

Tim Donaghy, a second generation basketball referee who officiated games for the NBA for about 13 years, resigned from the league when word came down that the FBI was investigating whether he bet on games that he had been officiating and whether his calls had affected those games’ point-spreads.

But he had a lot more to say.

As noted in the New York Post, Donaghy, who has also admitted to being a compulsive gambler, has claimed that executives in the NBA, seeking to increase playoffs-related revenue, sought to manipulate the games through the referees:

“Top NBA executives rigged playoff series to pack arenas and pump up TV ratings by ordering officials to shamelessly make calls that benefited favored teams, disgraced ex-ref Tim Donaghy charged in bombshell court papers today.”

The NBA’s response

The NBA has handled this by taking a position that can only be called “the best defense is a good offense.” But at least they are actually actively trying to counteract the allegations- not well mind you – but at least they are trying, as explained by ESPN’s website:

” ‘We welcome scrutiny here. This is something that should be scrutinized,’ said Stern, who called Donaghy a ’singing, cooperating witness’ and repeatedly referred to the former referee as a felon as he spoke with reporters for more than eight minutes near the loading dock of the Staples Center as he arrived for Game 3 of the Finals.”

Did it work?

Has this been an effective way to handle things? Apparently not if you read a sampling of the American sports press. The best summation may have been offered by Rick Telander of the Chicago Sun-Times when he stated

“If Stern can’t see what a mess he potentially has on his hands and how no one from inside the NBA should be part of any league influence-peddling investigation, then he has become blind to the real world. As the USA Today editorial summed up: ”The NBA has much more at stake than winning an argument with a felon, which, after all, should not be hard to do.”

No, it has its credibility at stake.”

How could the NBA have handled this better? Is a poor PR strategy better than no seeming PR strategy at all?

And how have the great and glorious pastimes of two nations come to this?