The 2025 NHL playoffs have seen a lot of complaints about U.S. TV production. Saturday, those were about TNT choosing to use a remote announcing booth for the first game of the St. Louis Blues-Winnipeg Jets series. On Sunday, an ESPN broadcast of the Toronto Maple Leafs-Ottawa Senators clash (on ESPN2) took flak not for remote announcers (John Buccigross and Kevin Weekes were on site), but rather for their audio mix. Here’s some of that:
Viewers of Senators-Maple Leafs Game 1 have not enjoyed the audio experience on ESPN2. 🏒📺🎙️ #NHL pic.twitter.com/7v9LMwYC1V
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) April 21, 2025
It sounds like the commentators of this sens leafs game are on the phone with me while they have the game playing in the background. AUDIO IS ASS.
— Utahtism 🦣 (@Utahtism) April 21, 2025
@espn audio engineers need to figure it out!! 🤬
Most of their NHL broadcasts, including this Leafs vs Sens game, has atrocious sound mixing.
Not enough crowd atmosphere or on ice sound + announcers volumes fluctuating. #LeafsForever #LeafsNation #ESPN #NHLPlayoffs #NHL
— Bleeding Hedge🩸 (@bleeding_hedge) April 20, 2025
@ESPNPR can barely hear the arena on ESPN2. Commentator audio level way too high. I know it’s the leafs’ senile barn but damn help us out
— Simone (@V12Simone) April 20, 2025
The audio on the Leafs – Sens broadcast is just as bad as yesterday’s Jets – Blues. The crowd sounds way too low @Buccigross
— asvpbabycakes🥷 (@wholelottakaleb) April 21, 2025
Of course, audio mixes come with a lot of complications. Those can be affected by all sorts of factors on the broadcast side, and can also differ for individual viewers based on their particular way to watch. But it is interesting to see this level of complaint against an ESPN NHL production, and to see a complaint not about remote announcers (something that network has generally avoided, unlike TNT, but they have used remote production). And that does show that just having announcers on site doesn’t make a broadcast immune from criticism.
About Andrew Bucholtz
Andrew Bucholtz has been covering sports media for Awful Announcing since 2012. He is also a staff writer for The Comeback. His previous work includes time at Yahoo! Sports Canada and Black Press.