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Hockey voice Jim Hughson must be wondering about the CBC.
He agrees to a six-year contract extension one week and the next they make him work a double shift.
Actually, the idea of announcing two games in one day for Hockey Night in Canada was Hughson's.
Tomorrow, he and game analyst Craig Simpson will call the 3 p.m. EDT Colorado Avalanche-Edmonton Oilers game at Rexall Place in Edmonton.
Then they will board a chartered flight to Calgary to announce the Minnesota Wild-Flames game at 10 p.m. EDT.
"I spotted it on the schedule in September and thought, 'I want to do that, baby,' " Hughson said yesterday. "As soon as we talked about it at the start of the year, it seemed like a natural."
Hughson has worked doubleheaders in baseball and called two games in one day at the Olympic hockey tournament, but this is different.
Hughson and Simpson will be announcing two NHL games in one day in two cities. It's never been done at Hockey Night and perhaps nowhere else.
Another likely first is Hughson calling four NHL games in three days. Last night, he worked Rogers Sportsnet's telecast of the Vancouver Canucks-Oilers game. Tonight, it will be Wild-Canucks in Vancouver for Sportsnet, and then the two Hockey Night games tomorrow.
"It won't be difficult," he said. "The travel between Edmonton and Calgary is easy. And the teams involved are all in the Northwest Division, so Craig and I are really familiar with them."
A more taxing schedule, he said, will be next week, when he will be in St. Paul for a Canucks-Wild game on Friday, followed by Flames-Oilers in Calgary on Saturday and Flames-Canucks in Vancouver on Sunday.
The work and travel involved in calling hockey for two networks, Sportsnet and CBC, was one of the reasons Hughson chose one over the other.
Starting next season, he will work exclusively for the CBC for the duration of its six-year contract with the NHL.
Hughson said he chose the CBC largely because it owns rights to the NHL's postseason.
"What Sportsnet could never offer was the Stanley Cup playoffs," he said. "We're no different than players in that you want to be working on the last day of the season."
Hughson will succeed Bob Cole as the lead announcer on Hockey Night, but not until next season, when Cole's workload is reduced. The extent of that will depend on the CBC's success in hiring a new play-by-play announcer. Broadcasters in leagues outside the NHL have been advised that résumés are being accepted.
In addition to hockey, Hughson will call Toronto Blue Jays games this year. If the CBC buys a package of 2009 Jays games, those assignments would push Hughson's annual salary to something approaching $500,000, sources say.
Jack's options
Sportsnet's move to drop NBA and Toronto Raptors telecasts after this season has analyst Jack Armstrong looking for work.
Sportsnet has offered Armstrong a position as a basketball insider, but he will look around.
"The folks at Sportsnet have been great to me," he said. "But it was disappointing to hear we had lost NBA rights as well as Raptors rights. At this point, I'm going to survey the landscape and see what comes next."
Armstrong is an engaging personality, has good rapport with Raptors voice Chuck Swirsky and, as a former coach, knows of what he speaks. In addition to his work in Toronto, he is also a game analyst for U.S. college games carried on ESPN, Comcast and MSG Network.[-rule-]
TFC coverage
Toronto FC's regular-season schedule will be televised by three Canadian networks. The CBC will carry 14 games and the all-star game, Sportsnet 11 and The Score five. Sportsnet will air the opener, on Saturday, March 29, at Columbus.
Announcer Gerry Dobson and analyst Craig Forrest will call the games for Sportsnet. For the CBC, Jason De Vos, the former Canadian team captain, will join announcer Nigel Reed as the game analyst. Two telecasts, Toronto-Dallas on Oct. 11 and Toronto-San Jose on Oct. 25, will be tape-delayed on the CBC, but carried live on CBC Country Canada.
- The CBC will distribute tomorrow's 7 p.m. EDT Toronto Maple Leafs-Ottawa Senators telecast to Ontario and the West. Boston Bruins-Montreal Canadiens will be seen in Quebec and the East. We'll nitpick and say Bruins-Canadiens should receive wider distribution. Two weeks from now, Bruins-Habs could be a playoff matchup and the CBC's best hope for a large audience in the first round.
- Scott Moore, the head of CBC Sports, launched a blog yesterday at www.CBC.ca/sports/moore. Dan Tavares, the manager of CBCSports.ca, said the blog will be a place "where CBC users and viewers can voice their issues and concerns."
- Sportsnet's coverage of the Canadian Interuniversity Sport men's hockey tournament will begin tomorrow at 1 p.m. EDT with Saskatchewan against New Brunswick.
