A Day, A Week, Hemant, A Year

Hoops is a weekly talk show that is broadcast on Raptors NBA TV and on the Fan 590, a sports radio station in south-western Ontario. It’s hosted by Eric Smith, “The Coach” Jack Armstrong, Paul Jones, and Sherman Hamilton.

Whether it’s on the court or off the court … HOOPS has all the stories covered regarding the Toronto Raptors, the NBA, and basketball in general.

With the Toronto Raptors set to face the New Jersey Nets in the opening round of the playoffs, excitement among fans is reaching explosive levels. You could see the enthusiasm amongst the Hoops hosts as well as the fans calling in. About halfway through the show, there was a call from Edmonton and Eric asked him if he was getting a sense of excitement amongst Edmontonians, and out west in general. Not surprisingly the caller said that if it wasn’t for satellite TV, he wouldn’t know anything going on with the Raptors.

Being a big Raptors basketball fan living in Saskatchewan, I knew where he was coming from. Eric then pointed out that there was a lot of calls coming in from all across Canada, and wanted to try and hear from all provinces. So with that, I decided to call in and continue the conversation of the popularity of Raptors and basketball in general across Canada.

It took a while to get past the busy signal, but I finally got through to the screener. He asked for my name, where I was from, and what my question was. After realizing that I was extremely intelligent, and probably incredibly handsome, he told me that he would put me on next.

“We have Hemant from Saskatoon. Hi you’re on Hoops.”

Eric may have pronounced my name properly, but the graphic on the TV sure had the spelling somewhere out in left field.

On the Phone
Hemond from Saskatoon

Oh well, I guess it’s better than Herman T. So since I was live on national television and radio, I put on my game-face and got down to business. I told the guys that I wanted to continue the discussion they started with the caller from Edmonton earlier. I explained that when the Vancouver Grizzlies and Toronto Raptors joined the league in 1995, it sparked an interest with me in the NBA. But it didn’t take long for me to realize that it was very difficult to actually see any coverage of the games since so few of them were actually broadcast in this part of the country.

My interest in the league continued, but I wasn’t very dedicated or involved. Then when I moved to Guelph, just outside of Toronto, all of the Raptor games were broadcast giving me what I needed to really feed my interest. The six years I was there was awesome for getting my fill of Raptors basketball. Then when I moved back to Saskatoon last year, I explained that I was worried that I wouldn’t be able to follow the team as easily.

As the guy from Edmonton stated earlier, I reiterated that with the help of today’s cable providers, one can get coverage of the Raptors for the entire season. I did emphasize however, that there are still some hoops (no pun intended) that need to be jumped through in order to achieve this, such as pay a premium fee to subscribe to Raptors NBA TV.

The question I fielded was why does the Raptors organization tout themselves as Canada’s team, but for areas outside of the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) they are generally ignored by the sports media, and the sports networks make it so difficult to watch the team?

Out of everything the panel had to say in response to the question, Eric had the most intriguing statement. Actually, he started it off with a question to me.

In Saskatoon and area, do people tend to follow the Toronto Blue Jays, and get excited about the Major League Baseball season.

He already knew the answer, but he wanted me to answer it anyway. I responded with something along the lines of the following.

Yeah, I know a lot of people who follow the Toronto Blue Jays pretty religiously, and yeah, I think people tend to get excited about the baseball season.

Eric then when on to say that it took almost thirty years for that to happen. After ten years, the Blue Jays were ignored just as the Raptors are now outside of the GTA. He really feels that the same type of thing will happen with the Raptors – he just hopes (and me too) that it doesn’t take as long. I then asked the guys what sparked that interest in the Blue Jays to spread across the country, and the panel all agreed that it started to happen when the team began winning consistently, finding themselves at the top of the American League.

The call ended and I sat back to think about the conversation I just had. Even though it seems grim right now for interest in the Raptors to catch on in this part of the country, the guys over at Hoops seemed to have pointed out a little light at the end of the tunnel. And if their theory is correct, and the Raptors continue on this winning path that they have been following, the end of that tunnel may be closer than one thinks.