NHL tries to spin a new Web

YouTube deal may lure fresh interest

YouTube's video-sharing Web site already lures millions of viewers with a broad spectrum of niche programming that includes everything from old Lionel Richie music videos to raunchy college dorm pranks.

The National Hockey League is banking on YouTube surfers to watch a stream of hockey highlights that the league hopes will boost fan interest in the sport. The NHL announced its new partnership with YouTube Inc. last month, marking the first content agreement between a major North American pro sports league and the California-based company.

YouTube's "NHLVideo" channel made its debut Thursday, featuring video clips provided by the league and complementing the full-length broadcasts of NHL games available on Google on a 48-hour delay basis. The NHL will get a share of the advertising revenue generated from ads placed alongside the video clips, but the deal speaks more to the league's public relations efforts.

The NHL and YouTube declined to reveal how much ad revenue could be generated by the NHLVideo channel.

"It's a way for the league to reach out to sports fans and just other people who may not be as familiar with how our game has changed over the last couple of years. It's a great way to show off what's going on on the ice," said Keith Ritter, president of NHL Interactive Cyber Enterprises, the league's digital group. "It gets our content in front of people, especially young people who don't spend a lot of time watching television."

It also could serve as a clampdown on fans uploading copyrighted NHL video to YouTube. Touting itself as the largest video-sharing site on the Web, YouTube has served as a haven for fans' homemade highlight reels. A fan's clip of a spectacular goal last season by Washington Capitals wing Alex Ovechkin has drawn more than 26,000 views, while a collection of Pittsburgh Penguins defenseman Brooks Orpik's biggest hits, for example, has generated more than 20,000 page views.

Not to be found, however, is a clip of Orpik's hit that broke the neck of Carolina Hurricanes wing Erik Cole.

Other leagues have forced YouTube to yank fans' uploaded videos off the site, claiming copyright violations. An NFL spokesman told The Toronto Star, for example, that YouTube recently agreed to take more than 3,000 clips featuring NFL game footage off the site.

Under the terms of its deal with NHL, YouTube will filter out unapproved video clips and give the league the option to remove them. Kevin Donahue, YouTube's vice president of content, said the NHL may decide in many cases that from a promotional standpoint it would serve its interests to keep fan-made clips up and running.

"The NHL can either say, 'Yeah, I want that taken down,' or 'Leave it up because it's a great promotional value,' " Donahue said. "What's interesting is that they are making a programming commitment to deliver a significant amount of video clips that, to their benefit, will make more people aware of the games going on through the season."

On a Web site that drew about 30 million unique visitors in October, the NHL-sponsored "Plays of the Week" uploaded on YouTube had drawn more than 83,000 page views by Friday morning.

Another highlights collection on NHLVideo, titled "Best Hits of November," had drawn more than 81,000 page views by Friday.

Overall, the NHL videos rank well below uploaded sightings of Paris Hilton or video clips of English Premier League soccer in terms of page views.

Yet marketing professionals and academics who study online marketing opportunities called the NHL's partnership with YouTube a smart move.

"I think the appeal of YouTube is it's not a 90-minute or two-hour broadcast of the games. It really packages the excitement and action on ice in small, kind of digestible segments," said Andy Rohm, a marketing professor at Northeastern University. "With the younger demographic, we're dealing with a generation that's kind of characterized by media-consumption ADD. So it's really, I think, a smart vehicle with which to reach these people."

Gary R. Stevenson, the founder of OnSport, a Raleigh-based sports marketing and television consulting firm, said it's too early to predict whether the partnership could pan out as a money-maker. But the deal opens up a new avenue to promoting the sport, he said.

"The league needs as much exposure as it can get," said Stevenson, the former president of the marketing and media group of NBA Properties. "Generally something that's on YouTube would be a sensational play or a sensational goal, something like that. Anything like that, that's just like being on a highlight show.

"So can that create enthusiasm and excitement? Yes. Can you track that directly to ticket sales? Probably no, but the more exposure, the better for your sport."