What Changes Should Be Made To The NHL

[Langenbrunner15]

i just don't understand how hockey could not be a popular sport to watch.... i don't see how someone could watch basketall.... no offence to ppl who like the sport but persoally i think that nothing beats hockey.... so i don't understand how ratings could keep going down and that there is nothing being done to make them go back up.....

[Zamode]

Geez 7 is there anything about this country you like besides the bimbo on your avatar.

He likes bashing it and it's government and getting paid $.

['7']

oh boy, the the shrill feminazis of this forum is in full 7 bashing mode today....

Hartford did have some hockey history, it had success in the WHA, won the championship there an built a fan base. The Whalers were in the playoffs 8 times, though they only advanced once. But it's not like they were the LA Clippers or Cincy Bengals of the NHL. They're really no better off in Carolina than they were in Hartford. Only in Hartford it was in a hockey hotbed with many natural rivalries that could still develop. It was a mistake moving them to NC.

[Zamode]

oh boy, the the shrill feminazis of this forum is in full 7 bashing mode today....

No name calling, you IA!

They seem to have been well received in NC although I don't know how much of a full success they will become. Dallas seems to be the only city that has had both success and full fledged fan support. Teams in Florida, well, hockey in FL just seems like an oxymoron.

[teresa25]

What a pity 7 that you feel the need to result to name calling. And FYI I'm not a feminazi, just a hard working, conservative American tired of her country being bashed by people who want to enjoy the priviledges of living here while bitching about everything. If you are so unhappy get off your backside and either leave or get your citizenship and vote. Why sit around whining about what you don't like, but I guess that is part of your national makeup. This is my question for you 7 and I hope you will be man enough to answer it in a logical and reasonable manner. Why do you stay in a place you apparently dislike so much? Feel free to PM me so that we may have a mature adult discussion as opposed to your negative "I hate everything American" rantings. I truly pity you for you appear to be such an unhappy person.

[Triumph]

I'm glad that character assassination is still alive and well on this board.

['7']

it's clear that this teresa character has some sort of agenda and wishes to bring me down to her level.

a pitiful attempt to engage me in more political conversation, which is banned on this board. I hope the moderators suspend instigators like teresa who are looking for trouble.

what do you have against me discussing ways to make the canadian game of hockey better? If you really hate me, use the PM feature and just VENT! But trying to launch on all out flame war and ruining this thread is just ridiculous. get a life teresa.

I'm sure we can have a fine mature adult discussion when you've already started with the "you're avatar is a bimbo, you hate America, go away" smear campaign. jeez, have you been prepped by Leeds? Do I have any reason to waste my time with you?

[teresa25]

Touched a sensitive area did I 7. Since you feel the need to whine to big brother to get me banned because I'm picking on poor little 7 I will PM you. And on that note may I say, I'm proud to be associated with Jimmy Leeds.

[HellOnICE]

1. Salary Cap

2. Touch up offsides

3. Move the nets back

[LIDevsFan1]

Atlanta: Kovalchuk, Heatley, Farkas, Nurminen, and Stefan

Tampa Bay: Lecavalier, St Louis, Richards, Kubina, Boyle, and Khabibulin

Nashville: Vokoun, Legwand, Timmonen, and Arkhipov

Florida: Luongo, Jokinen, Huselius, Bouwmeester, and Novoseltsev

Carolina: Vrbata, Cole, Tanabe, Vasicek, and Brendl

Those are all the excitement that are going to draw fans to see hockey in the South. Those are the product the NHL is selling.

I didn't read this whole string, but American kids are never going say I want to grow up and be just like Vukon or Kovlachuk. They are going to want to be Shaq, Kobe, Jeter or Jerry Rice. These are peoiple American kids can relate to. You can't market these foreigners to Americans. And the few that are, like Yao and Matsui, have a story behind them that Americans find interesting.

[teresa25]

Unlike basketball, baseball and football hockey suffers because it isn't a sport that every kid and America can go out to their backyard and play. While leagues for kids are growing here in Texas that is only in urban areas so small town kids aren't getting to play hockey. In Texas we can't flood our backyards and play hockey in the winter so the love of the sport isn't embedded while we are children

['7']

all I get from you is the typical "ugly american" rants that I've seen a million times on this forum, albeit from a select few. I'd rather not argue with a dumbed down version of Jimmy Leeds.

let's end it now, I'll put you on ignore and you can do the same.

[LIDevsFan1]

You didn't offer as a choice my #1 pet peeve---the length of the season. The only reason the season is so long is to gouge the fans for as much ticket revenue as possible. Thus you have tons of meaningless Dec-Jan-Feb games that only the most die hards can care about. I really beleive this (among several other things) turns off casual sports fans----it certainly turns some of the media off. Iknow die hards love the long season but I think a 70 game season with some more reward for reg. season success would at least get the casual hockey fan more interested and maybe put some life into the reg. season, which would stimulate more coverage, etc. Short sighted owners will never allow this to happen though.

[Derek21]

LIDevs, the season used to be 84 games long for a couple of years. I don't know how showing less games is going to improve ratings and draw more fans.

[LIDevsFan1]

LIDevs, the season used to be 84 games long for a couple of years. I don't know how showing less games is going to improve ratings and draw more fans.

one of the reasons football is so popular is that every game is an event and can define the whole season. I'm a Giants fan and I can remember every reg. season game from last season. I've watched hundreds of reg. season devs games in my life, I can remeber a handful (e.g., Johhny Mac in 88). If there's some juice to the game, people will be interested. Also, if there are fewer games, non-sold out buildings will play more to capacity more often because the people that go to 3-4 games per year will be crammed into fewer games.

[Derek21]

one of the reasons football is so popular is that every game is an event and can define the whole season. I'm a Giants fan and I can remember every reg. season game from last season. I've watched hundreds of reg. season devs games in my life, I can remeber a handful (e.g., Johhny Mac in 88). If there's some juice to the game, people will be interested. Also, if there are fewer games, non-sold out buildings will play more to capacity more often because the people that go to 3-4 games per year will be crammed into fewer games.

Hmmm... that's an interesting way to look at it. However, football is a much different sport compared to the other three. Those guys couldn't play more than the schedule they play now because it's too risky. Look at the pounding they take every Sunday. It's like fighting through a battlefield during combat.

I couldn't compare it to any other sport unless you want to say Rugby.

[LIDevsFan1]

I don't have the answer---all I know is a lot of people complain about the length of the season and the non-hockey media types often use it as an excuse to ignore or bash hockey. I can't say more people would go or watch if the season were shorter but I've never heard anyone say the season should be longer. What I would do is get rid of Western Conf. games (even the MOST die hard doesn't get stoked when we play the Flames (no pun intended)) and do an interleague thing like baseball where you play one non-conf div. each year (football does this also). This way, you get the Wings and Stars every couple of years and you lose the snooze fests of playing the Wild, Pedators, etc.

[Zamode]

I know I look forward to the Devils-Wings games every year. I don't mind the length of the season yet I wonder if it is the best thing because even up here, it really makes for crappy ice shortly after April arrives. Playing hockey in June seems odd and I can imagine they must have some special ways--or maybe not--to deal with the ice in the Southern states. It stunk just the other night in the clincher game 5.

[LIDevsFan1]

One more thing on the length of the season----its a seasonal thing also. If you're not a die-hard or a fan of one of the 7 teams left, you're not thinking about hockey---you're on to baseball, golf or whatever. If the clock were moved back a month, at least the playoffs aren't competing as much with baseball, basketball and golf. At least in the northeast, if its 40 degrees out, I may watch a Sat. afternoon game. Now that its 50-60, unless the Devs are playing, forget it. Smae thing in the beginning of the season---you have football and baseball playoffs. Move it back two weeks and at least you get rid of baseball playoffs and the weather gets a bit colder.

[Derek21]

Interesting suggestions LIDevs. One of my issues with this league is whatever happened to the Original Six teams playing more games.

Teams like the Rangers and Detroit sometimes only play once and that's not right. They can even not be scheduled because of all the darn expansion.

I would make a schedule that emphasizes own conference more.

So, how do you change it?

Right now, this is how it is:

Each team plays division rivals five times a year. For the Atlantic Division rivals, that's only 20 games. That is far too few in my opinion.

Each team plays its own conference rivals in the other two divisions four times each. So, if you totaled up games against the Northeast (20) and Southeast (20), that's 40 games outside their own division!!!!!

That's what's wrong with the current system. How can there not be twice as many rival games in your own conference than your own division?

That's ridiculous.

If you total it up, that's 60 games in the conference but only 20 are emphasizing your own division.

That leaves 22 against the other conference. Far too many.

The Kovy Suggestion:

80 Game Season Consisting Of The Following:

-Division rivals play each other 10 times for a total of 40 games.

-They stay in conference and play the other two divisions 3 games each for a total of 30 games.

This leaves 10 games against the opposing conference. A normal amount.

This format would emphasize Division and Conference play a lot more than the current format which has far too many ticky tack games which don't have much significance.

Any thoughts???

[Z-Man]

The NHL already approved the new schedule for next year with 6 games against each team in your division. The new setup is:

6 games vs. each team in your division: 24

4 games vs. each team in your conference: 40

1 game vs. each team in the other conference: 15

The NHL said that the other three games will be decided on a team by team basis (i.e. rivalry/history games vs. other conference teams).

I know Nashville and Atlanta are scheduled to play each other because of the geographic rivalry (3 1/2 hours apart). I'm sure Toronto will continue to play Vancouver, Edmonton and Calgary twice a year.

The new schedule is definitely an improvement. But then again, 1/2 of the west teams will never come to the CAA. Depending on which teams will not make the trip, there might be some good games that won't happen in Jersey (Colorado, Detroit, Dallas).

[Zamode]

Not bad, Derek. I think the whole SE division and some of the expansion teams should be eliminated. I'm all for more Western Conference games.

[NJDevs4978]

Okay might as well contribute my idea (assuming we have to have 82 games and 30 teams for the forseeable future ):

8 games in division (32 overall)

3 games against each other conference team (30 overall) OR 4 games against each team in one division and 2 games against each team in another, rotating yearly (still 30 overall)

2 games against the teams of one intraconference division (10 overall), again rotating yearly

1 game against other intraconference teams (10 overall)

I don't think the intraconference games are that bad in moderation anyway. Each team should play once with a few playing twice so you might get a couple of good matchups twice a year. Besides, there'd still be more division games than conference games and more conference games than intraconference games.

[Nieuwy25]

Hasan -

I assume you mean "inter-conference", not "intra-conference"? Intra-conference is within your own conference, and you're talking about outside your own conference, right?

If the NHL does go to a more unbalanced schedule, I really wish they'd pull Dallas out of the Pacific division. They really should be in the Central. Travel times and late game times are hell.

[NJDevs4978]

Yep, NJDev I messed up the wording on that. I meant out-of-conference.