I've been thinking about this today. It's a proven fact that Americanised sports make bucketloads of headlines off of things such as drafts, trades, free agency and drawn out post season. They also get like 70-80% crowds for basketball, 40-100k crowds for college football and a similar amount for nfl. So why then is our national game struggling to achieve 50% crowds for anything other then an All Black match? All we see in New Zealand is rugby being pushed in our face but my reasoning behind underselling of the crowds is due to 2 factors Super 15 rugby, Noone gives a shit about the other 2 countries teams NPC doesn't have the best players available Now no other sport in the world would commit such suicide in terms of losing local gate revenue when the public doesn't want to watch certain teams. So then why are we continuing with this farcical of a competition? Why not move the NPC in its place and have something which actually contains some rivalry? we could even implement promotion relegation? At the moment all the media attention to do with Rugby is only about the game and we are being oversold in this area. We need to bring something else to the table. Something which people will really get behind and be enthusiastic to create banter about. My implementation plan to correctly sell Rugby as a competition Replace super 15 with NPC to increase rivalries and crowd revenue Introduce a salary cap which is publically accessible Make free agency an actual part, we need to know who is off contract and shopping themselves around Allow people yet to play super 15 to enter a draft to create some public interest in lower level rugby Allow 2 foreign players per team and one franchise player exempt from the cap Is anyone else extremely bored with how content we are with the only hype around rugby being the actual playing of the game and the odd bit of controversy?
Don't things like hockey games, basketball games etc. not get aired unless there's at least like a 70% crowd? You also have to remember the American population is a shitload bigger than ours, so any american sports leagues will get the crowds. But to the point of the matter, whilst we're a rugby nation, I think the problem lies with the fact there's actually limited knowledgeable fans. As surprising as it may be it's astonishingly true. Everyone watches the All Blacks because it's the All Blacks, regardless if they know the difference between a maul and a ruck, they'll watch because we've been embedded to watch the rugby. They won't watch the NPC however because "nobody" gives a shit about it, so they're not embedded to watch it. I honestly don't think any competition change will affect crowds that much unless we see a shift in society's views. Rugby use to be a more social thing as well, everyone would go, it was the thing to do, now it's only the thing to do if it's the All Blacks or a rural team for a smallish town.
They are bigger but there is also a shit load more competition. Rugby has nobody to compete with here yet we cant even sell out our premier competitions
Why compare it to America when you could simply compare it to NRL or AFL? Far more similar to NZ in terms of market and also I'd say they're both comfortably better run than our domestic rugby.
Is it really though? I mean I don't watch the NRL but their average attendance is pretty similar to ours. Last year on average there was an attendance of 17346 per a match. This year it dropped to 15944 per a match. Whilst the Super Rugby figure does include Aussie/ Saffa games, they averaged 20384 people at a match this year. A figure of around 16000 would be pretty much the average for NZ crowds, possibly higher (with high Auckland crowds) So tbh they're both pretty similar. NPC is another matter.
Both those competitions, particularly AFL benefit from being pretty much the highest level of the game.
I'm not talking about Super Rugby. I don't think it really needs anything besides opening it up for more internationals to play in it.
Yeah valid point. Was more to do with the standard of hype in america contains way more variables then what nz rugby currently has.
Yeah, I agree with Rego and Afflai. There isn't really a problem with the game / format, your problem is very much constituted by population size when looking at the numbers for NRL as well. Your population is sub 5mil and you have many sport types that are decently supported (Union, NRL, AFL, Cricket etc.) and not everyone likes every sport type and will mostly only intensively follow 1 or 2. Afflai's point of allowing more internationally based players might also help raise the quality of the rugby again and the perceived "star" value of the teams that are being supported.
No NewZealand has nothing on par with rugby. It should be achieving 20k + crowds minimum for weekend games.
I see, makes more sense. I dunno it's a tough one, most definitely a fine line between the whole international players thing. I wouldn't mind the odd international player - always thought a player like BOD playing his last years out for an NZ franchise would get bums on seats (regardless of his ever decreasing abilities). The problem is the money. What international player with reputation would accept a massive decrease in money to play within a country (in most cases) they have no association with. There's no way we will ever be able to match the likes of the Top 14 teams in terms of money, ever. Then if teams try, they'll do so at the expense of mid range players/ pretty solid day in, day out players. I also don't want teams to get to the point where location is just where the games are played, it's what makes the NPC and to a lesser extent, the Super 15 feel so true. This isn't the NBA and never will be.
Well thats why I cant take rugby seriously. Why shoukd teams have the power to say who established players can and cant play for? Its a job for them and they should be able to acceot offers as they please.
For NPC games? or Super Rugby games. If you're talking about NPC games, you're dreaming. If you're talking about Super rugby games, we do a pretty good job at nearly achieving this. The Blues got a good 30,000 people to most of their games this season. The Crusaders would never achieve this since their stadium only fits 18000 (which they pretty much achieved most games) The Highlanders got some pretty decent crowds to begin with and if it wasn't for their terrible season they would have continued to do so, probably 18000 odd. The Chiefs probably averaged around 16000 and then the Hurricanes just haven't seen the crowds since the whole debacle. So tbh we're talking about a couple of thousand fans to fix the problem which is probably testament to a few variables. So nothing drastic needs to change.
Because everyone would end up playing for the Crusaders..... But tbh there is leniency....which once again can be shown by the Crusaders team.
Super rugby can definitely afford to lose revenue gained from attendance in order to gain more money from TV, advertising and sponsorship. It's not designed to get people through the gate each week, the travel distances alone put that out of reach, but leaving the Super rugby competition and going back to having the national competition as the pinnacle of club rugby would be disastrous financially, because you're cutting your potential audience significantly. The only reason it used to work back in the day is because it was an amateur sport. As far as drafts, salary caps, all-star games, finals series etc. all go, they all create more discussion, agreed. Different things work in different markets though, and you run the risk of alienating fans. They'd never want a grand final or draft system for the English Premier League for instance, and I doubt the NFL would ever fancy scrapping the Superbowl or college football. Plenty of codes have tried similar revamps in the past with varying degrees of success, but I can't see rugby going through a similar process soon. It's only likely to become more globalised with an Argentine, Japanese or Pacific Island team IMO.
This is the biggest reason and it's true for America too. The NBA is the pinnacle of the game, no one really cares about the World Championships. The MLB is, likewise, the highest level of the sport. And again with NFL - the winner of the Superbowl is the most important thing. Then you look at rugby in NZ and it's really all about the international game. The whole Super 15 is basically just a build up for the Rugby Championship and World Cups. Most NZers don't care who wins Super Rugby if the All Blacks are going well. Even take a sport like Football, which has a strong international competition, and in my view most people would be more concerned with their club winning than how their country is performing (though this rightly goes on hold every four years). So, for mine, it's the importance of the international game that is killing domestic rugby interest in NZ. We simply can't maintain interest in competitions that don't matter all that much. If they want big crowds for Super Rugby/ITM Cup they'd need to can all international rugby until the conclusion of both these competitions so that the best players were available for the duration.
I had no idea professional rugby was run by a slavery syndicate. There are already foreign players in Super Rugby (Tanaka, Lee-Lo, Leiua, Chiefs Fijian wing, Fritz Lee, Pisi, George Moaloa) etc. The problem is that most of these guys aren't high profile. This is because teams can't afford high profile players. The problem with having a draft is that you create all sorts of problems with development. Why would you develop a player if you don't get first dibs on them? From the NPC games I have watched it is pretty clear that is popular in the smaller regions. This is probably because these places have a lot of community engagement. I think a draft destroys that. The Super Rugby centres seem to get woeful crowds for NPC but that is because it is basically a development competition.
I think Jabba is on to something. Have a Super XV all star weekend. They do it in the NHL. The actual all star game sucks because everyone agrees to play easy so they don't injure anyone. But day 1 is skills competition. The events could be 20 metre dash - who has the best acceleration 80 metre sprint Longest punt Goal kicking competition Scrummaging competition where somehow the machine is loaded with incrementally harder weights. Benchpressing competition - who is the strongest player Beep test - who has the best fitness As for drafts - they are a lot of fun and could work sort of. You would really need to draft high school players for your ITM cup team. So it isn't super rugby doing the draft but the level below that. Young teenagers will have to be found homes to live in during the ITM cup season. Is this fair on the kids though shouldn't they get to live and play in their home town. Canada doesn't think so and you get drafted for the Junior teams when you are 16 years old the kids move all across the country to play all because they have stars in their eyes. Making the NHL means that much.
