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NHL Season cancelled


ejp626

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I guess I'm surprised there isn't a thread on this already, or a different NHL thread didn't jump to the top. I wouldn't call myself a huge hockey fan. In fact, I am not much of a sports fan at all, but I can watch basketball and as a distant second hockey. But I did grow up in Michigan, so I have fondness for the Red Wings, and was really glad that Yzerman finally won a few Stanley Cups.

Anyway, I think it is a shame that the NHL couldn't resolve its labor issues and get the season started. I'm pretty doubtful that the NHL can come back in its current form, since it was always so low on the public radar to begin with. ESPN is threatening to not even show hockey if it comes back next season, since the replacement programming they've come up with does better than hockey. The best players are off in Europe anyway, and all the marquis players are in their early 40s and are ready to retire.

So there are a lot of suggestions kicking around. Mine is to scrap the NHL and only return teams to Canada and northern US cities, and call it NHL classic.

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What I read was that of the roughly 700 NHL players, about 400 are playing in Europe right now. The players that the public has actually heard of Lemieux, Yzerman, etc. did stay in the U.S. but are at the very end of their careers. The future looks very bleak for the current NHL. I do hope that whatever else happens, they pry the Blackhawks away from Bill Wirtz, who is one of the worst owners around (of course, I hate the Hawks, but they still deserve a better owner).

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Hockey was the last professional sport I had much interest in, so I'd like to thank the owners and players for finally completing the freeing of my mind from this silly sports junkie phase that lasted most of my adult life. What the baseball owners and players began in '94 is now complete, and I'm quite happy that I no longer have to buy any silly hats or shirts, and can save time by skipping an entire section of the newspaper.

(And if you're wondering, no, I'm not joking at all...)

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I really feel sorry for those exploited ice hockey players .

In Germany, some well paid ice hockey pros managed to get unemployment benefits meant for seasonal workers, because they didn't play during the summer. The law had to be changed to prevent that.

Edited by Claude
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Yes and in spades. It's my favorite sport. I played the game for 15 years and I've watched it and followed it for many more than that. My brother and I grew up playing in the basement with a roll of electrical tape and a couple of hand me down sticks.

If anyone's interested, the real problem stems from the league overextending itself and trying to become a "national" sport instead of solidifying its position in the upper Mid-West, the Northeast and, of course, in Canada. When you take an already shaky financial situation and turn it from 21 to 30 teams, put it into areas of the U.S. that don't know a hockey stick from a pogo stick and expect something good to happen, well, it won't and it didn't. Add to this the players own stupidity in demanding a bigger piece of the pie and the owners matching that stupidity by giving it to them and you have what you have now. To parapharase an old addage: "hockey has met the enemy and the enemy is hockey."

What am I gonna do without the Red Wings?

Up over and out.

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The fans (at least the ones sitting by me) seemed really obnoxious.

Wow, I've never heard that comment before. But then, out here we're used to Oakland Raiders fans, so even British soccer fans look calm and collected by comparison... :g

I don't even have to go to a game. Try riding NJ Transit home after a game.

Loud and puking. Whadda sport. Go team.

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Yes and in spades. It's my favorite sport. I played the game for 15 years and I've watched it and followed it for many more than that. My brother and I grew up playing in the basement with a roll of electrical tape and a couple of hand me down sticks.

If anyone's interested, the real problem stems from the league overextending itself and trying to become a "national" sport instead of solidifying its position in the upper Mid-West, the Northeast and, of course, in Canada. When you take an already shaky financial situation and turn it from 21 to 30 teams, put it into areas of the U.S. that don't know a hockey stick from a pogo stick and expect something good to happen, well, it won't and it didn't. Add to this the players own stupidity in demanding a bigger piece of the pie and the owners matching that stupidity by giving it to them and you have what you have now. To parapharase an old addage: "hockey has met the enemy and the enemy is hockey."

What am I gonna do without the Red Wings?

Up over and out.

Yes as well. Played as a kid and in a couple of adult leagues since. I think it is a great sport to play and watch in person, but I understand that not everyone feels that way. Apparently the players and owners do not share this understanding. :tdown

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Hockey was the last professional sport I had much interest in, so I'd like to thank the owners and players for finally completing the freeing of my mind from this silly sports junkie phase that lasted most of my adult life.  What the baseball owners and players began in '94 is now complete, and I'm quite happy that I no longer have to buy any silly hats or shirts, and can save time by skipping an entire section of the newspaper.

(And if you're wondering, no, I'm not joking at all...)

That's my story. I LOVED sports when I was growing up.

Between the strikes and the obnoxious, selfish players I have lost my love many sports. Also, high ticket prices haven't given me much incentive to head to the stadium.

It was also tough living in SoCal. I remember the Oakland fans being pissed when the Raiders went to LA and I understood there feelings. I stayed true to the Lambs (I mean the Rams) and eventually we got cheesed out of football altogether. Out of sight, out of mind I guess.

I used to LOVE basketball when it was a team sport. My dad played in high school and college and taught to appreciate great team play. I've never had any use for Kobe Bryant (even before the doings of the last few years).

The only team sport I really have any energy for is college football. These guys play with heart and aren't getting paid for it. I wonder if there's a connection. :ph34r:

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If anyone's interested, the real problem stems from the league overextending itself and trying to become a "national" sport instead of solidifying its position in the upper Mid-West, the Northeast and, of course, in Canada.  When you take an already shaky financial situation and turn it from 21 to 30 teams, put it into areas of the U.S. that don't know a hockey stick from a pogo stick and expect something good to happen, well, it won't and it didn't.  Add to this the players own stupidity in demanding a bigger piece of the pie and the owners matching that stupidity by giving it to them and you have what you have now.  To parapharase an old addage: "hockey has met the enemy and the enemy is hockey."

What am I gonna do without the Red Wings? 

Up over and out.

Yes as well. Played as a kid and in a couple of adult leagues since. I think it is a great sport to play and watch in person, but I understand that not everyone feels that way. Apparently the players and owners do not share this understanding. :tdown

As you can imagine, Canada is in a state of national mourning today.

Dave's assessment of what's wrong with the game is right on! One of the best summaries I've read, actually.

Hockey CAN be a good game to watch (perhaps the best for sustained flow and action). But with so many teams and so many mediocre players and the larger goalie pads, much of the fast-paced, high scoring excitement has been drained from the game. Far too often, the games are now low scoring, dull affairs.

I am usually pretty neutral in labour-management negotiations, and just wish they had been able to work something out. It didn't take a genius to see the compromise, but neither side was willing to make the move. But the truth is that over the last few years the players have made a killing. Salaries have skyrocketed. The average salary is now $1.8 million, probably 1 mil higher than 10 years ago. There is no doubt that has to slow down, and the players did make significant concessions. What the players apparently failed to understand is that the NHL's final offer, while hardly what they had hoped for, is FAR better than anything they will get offered in the future.

Edited by John Tapscott
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Nowadays I only really tune in around playoff time; it was quite the ride following the Flames last spring. I think it's a shame that the season is cancelled, but both sides are greedy and most fans can't relate to that. They could've split the difference and made a deal but both Bettman and Goodenow are too stubborn. They had Gretzky on CBC news last night and he seemed pretty distraught over the whole thing. I think it was a mistake to expand into the southern U.S. in the first place; taking teams from traditional hockey markets like Winnipeg and Quebec City was stupid. Fans in Canada will come back quickly, most fans in the States will forget about hockey all together. This is an all-time low for the league.

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Again for those who are interested, here are some suggestions for a hockey makeover. I've broken these down into a not so radical group and a radical group.

Not so radical:

* Increase the size of the skating surfaces to international dimensions.

* Enforce the rules designed to deal with excessive clutching and grabbing.

* Move the goal line 12 to 18" furher away from the boards.

* Cut down the size of the goalie's pads.

* Put in rules to address the left wing lock or neutral zone traps.

* Reduce ticket prices

Radical:

* Get rid of the red line.

* Curve the blue lines so offsides is not called so frequently.

* Use a soccer-style shoot out to settle ties.

* Make the goals six inches wider and two inches higher.

The problem with any of these ideas, no matter how much they'd improve the game is that you've got to get them OK'ed by the old mossbacks who run the league. For that reason alone, none of this will probably ever happen.

Up over and out.

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No, I don't really care. I only feel bad for those little people who make their living at it. In the past, when I'd drive home at night and listen to the sports station, they might have a Rangers game and I'd groan. Now, without hockey it's nice not to have listen to that, except when they have on a Nets game.

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As an Edmontonian who grew up during the glory years when there were just a little over 20 teams and we still had the Nordiques in Quebec and the Jets in Winnipeg I am sad to see things come to this.

My only comfort is that over here no games are available on TV anyway.

There was talk a few months ago about Bobby Hull being involved in a new hockey league (WHL revisited?) looking to start next year.

A lot of NHL players might be willing to take big pay cuts to play in North America so this might be possible.

Take out the red line and regulate goalie equipment sizes and you might have a few more goals in the game.

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