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TVA Sports: negotiate with Gary Bettman while telling him to get lost
Maxime Truman
TVA Sports: negotiate with Gary Bettman while telling him to get lost
Credit: Getty Images
I began my bachelor’s degree in sociology at UQAM in January 2001.

I left the program in February of the same year. It really wasn’t for me.

I went back to school – even though my father was sure I would never return – in September of the same year. This time, I was enrolled in a program that represented me 100%: business administration.

I will always remember one of my first classes when I was still wondering what the bacc in admin would look like.

My prof told us right from the start something like:

“Welcome to what will be your journey in the business world. If there’s one thing to remember, it’s this: your personal values must always align with those of your company. Always ensure that what you say or do as an individual does not harm your company, and vice versa.”

This principle applies equally to owner-entrepreneurs and to employees, whether salaried or contractual.

And this principle, Elon Musk Jean-Nicolas Blanchet, a columnist and assistant sports director at the Journal de Montréal/Québec, did not take into account last night.

In short, Blanchet is paid to manage the sports department at JDM and JDQ, as well as to write texts that stir up passions, opinions… even controversies.

And he does it well! Because according to the objective described above, he stirs up reactions and controversies.

Except that yesterday, Jean-Nicolas wrote a column titled Get lost, Gary!

The column was first published on the websites of the Journal de Québec and the Journal de Montréal, but Quebecor’s strategy is to use the same content in multiple locations, so it also ended up simultaneously featured on the main page of TVA Sports. All this at 7:00 PM…

The column is still highlighted on the homepage of TVA Sports, by the way.

Although I can understand the guidelines used by Jean-Nicolas Blanchet (Gary Bettman stated that organizing regular Senators games in Quebec was complicated, further snubbing the people of Quebec), the title and the timing of the publication were at least questionable.

Blanchet is a guy from Quebec who lives in Quebec. And all the people from Quebec that I know – who love hockey – have digested their share of Gary Bettman and his lack of love for their city.

The problem is that last night, TVA Sports director Louis-Philippe Neveu was spotted in the same box as Gary Bettman, Bill Daly, and Marty Walsh at the Bell Centre…

And that between January 1 and March 1, only Rogers and TVA Sports can negotiate with the NHL regarding Canadian national broadcasting rights for 2026 and beyond. It was Gary Bettman himself who shared this info in Montreal, the day he praised Amazon and online broadcasting (which he believes is the future).

Make no mistake, this week, there are people at Sportsnet and TVA Sports negotiating – formally or informally – with the NHL…

Imagine Gary Bettman chatting/negotiate with TVA Sports at the Bell Centre and then receiving a screenshot from a member of his staff of a column titled Get lost, Gary! on the TVA Sports website…

How would you feel if you were in Gary’s shoes?

Let’s just say that last night in the Bell Centre walkway, it was a topic of discussion. Many found this article at least awkward and poorly timed. Why did a boss at the Journal decide to publish such a column on TVA Sports while other bosses are negotiating for the upcoming TV rights, rights that could dictate the future of the station?

In short, to return to my earlier introduction: why did the values and actions of a person employed by a company go against the needs of that same company?

I don’t know. And I find all this extremely awkward.

But in the end, we cannot accuse Quebecor of controlling the narrative, censoring its columnists and/or dictating the message that its employees must spread. Oh boy, no!

Yes, Stephen A. Smith has often criticized Roger Goodell, even though the NFL is presented on ESPN on Monday nights. But Smith has a superstar status, and the contract between the NFL and ESPN is already signed.

We will see if this has consequences and if it has embarrassed TVA Sports. It reminds me of Justin Trudeau criticizing another fierce negotiator in Donald Trump, but wanting to negotiate in harmony with him at the same time…

Publishing this column right in the middle of the 4 Nations tournament (held in Montreal and broadcast on TVA Sports) may not have been the strategy of the century. Even under the guise of defending freedom of expression…

But still, it’s the boss in me who just wrote that conclusion. The columnist in me would probably have published the column anyway, hehe.


Overtime

The CF Montreal faces the Philadelphia Union this afternoon in Orlando.

No images from this match will be shared and no one can access it (except with a drone, hehe). The request to play this match behind closed doors supposedly came from CF Montreal, according to the excellent Jonathan Tannerwald.

I will never understand why a club would want to hide its match like that.

Preseason games are broadcast in the NHL…

Practices at the CN Complex in Brossard are open to the public…

What is so important that it cannot be disclosed in a friendly match of CF Montreal?

Orlando City invited all season ticket holders to attend their game a week ago today. The CF Montreal, on the other hand, is completely shutting its doors.

You would need to explain it to me.

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