Yes I am Canadian. Yes I think the NHL has become a clown sport. Get off me.

Well I learned through facebook this weekend that the NHL playoffs are underway. I've been greeted with some scorn for being more interested in how the Mariners and even the Daegu Samsung Lions are doing than the Canucks, who are apparently in the playoffs. I'm really at the point where when I'm in Vancouver, I'm just happy when they get knocked out so I can go to a pub or have a conversation with someone without hockey dominating. I was annoyed that my visit last year coincided with the Canucks making the finals. But here's the thing. I used to be a passionate fan. I'm not a guy who has disliked the NHL from the get go. In fact I used to watch every game, listen to games through internet radio when I was out of town. I was glued to it. But back then it was a real sport, not some quasi-WWE with sticks. It lost me when it was locked out and came back with goofy, semi-enforced rules, ridiculous overtime and playoffs for all.

First off I remember when I was a kid a penalty was a rare thing. Maybe 2-3 a game. A five minute penalty (usually for fighting) was an event. These days there's more 4-3 hockey in a single game than I used to watch in a season. I mean, you get two minutes for diving but the guy that didn't hit you can still get two minutes for roughing? Let's all get shorthanded for half the game, it may generate more offense but it's more akin to WWE two on three tag team matches than the NBA or MLB of which it's compared.

Goons. There's always been guys who can hit (Flyers of the 70's anyone?) but it seems that the goon level is through the roof. Every month there seems to be some hit that ends a career or sends a guy to the hospital and everyone gets in a roar about how that needs to be taken out of the game. Except of course when it's there team. A four game suspension in the Stanley Cup Finals, not fair! (actually not enough if you actually want to get that stuff out of the game). MLB wanted steroids out of the game. First time use is a 50 game suspension of a 162 game season. FIFTY, for CHEATING. The NHL's average suspension for intentionally driving a man's head in to the boards? Well since there's no set standard we can't really have an accurate count, but 2-3 games seems the norm. I mean if you whack a guy over the head with a stick you are kicked out but anything else is trivialized. So why not throw Zdeno Chara out of the league? Money. He's the only chance the NHL has of making the highlight reels on ESPN.

Overtime. So the winning team gets 3 points, but if they take more than three periods to win the losing team gets one. So there's four points now? Shouldn't the winning team just get 2? That complaint aside overtime is so comically ridiculous it has to be a Vince McMahon idea. Tied after 3, lets do 4-4 hockey for five minutes, and if that doesn't work, a shootout. A Shootout? It's a joke in soccer and it's a joke in the NHL. I can only imagine if the NBA said, "okay, after four quarters we're going to play 2-2, and after that, a slam dunk contest". Or MLB, "so after 9 innings we're going to play 3 innings where you need 5 strikes to get a batter out and 5 outs and if that doesn't settle it, home run derby." If that doesn't sound stupid to you then you probably don't understand anything I've written, and may I suggest you go back to Monday Night Raw now. If it does, then why does it not sound stupid to you when the same thing is done in hockey? The NBA or MLB would never do that because they take themselves seriously. Gary Bettman does not treat the NHL the way Bud Selig treats MLB, as a serious sport. If he did they'd play til there was a winner, as is done in MLB or declare a tie game.

Playoffs for all. 30 teams, 16 of which make the playoffs? I mean I know the NBA does that too (and it's dumb there as well) but at least they haven't earned points by losing games. I mean, the playoffs are supposed to be the best of the best, not the mediocre of the mediocre. The entire regular season is essentially one long, gooned up, shootout filled playoff round. The NFL currently has 12 of 32 teams making the playoffs, MLB will have 10 of 30 as of this year (which has drawn a lot of criticism from fans). 16 of 30 is over half, in a playoff that runs from mid April until mid-June. JUNE. Who wants to watch hockey in June?

New rules every season, and selectively enforced. One year you can't have you foot in the crease, until its the Stanley Cup Finals, then it's no problem. One year you get overtime loses and ties, leading to teams with a 13-12-3-6 record, then you don't. Penalties for everything in the regular season, but none of it's called in the playoffs because we have to "let them play" (a tacit admission that the regular season isn't really hockey at all). So one set of rules applies in the regular season and another in the playoffs? Well no, but the rules are just selectively enforced in the playoffs, there by changing the nature of the game (no wonder the team that finishes first never wins the Cup, they played by regular season rules). In the NFL an illegal tackle is an illegal tackle, whether in the first game of the season or the Superbowl. By "letting them play" you open the league to constant criticism of cheating, bias officiating (American teams always win, must be Bettman) and suspect calls. The fact is, if the referees had a set of solid rules to follow and enforced them with consistency then there'd be no accusations like that. The same penalty should be called every time. Why is roughing not roughing after April? the only other "sport" where rules are not enforced the same every game? WWE.



So why has it all been done? In a desperate bid to win U.S fans over to the game. I mean, sure it does well in Canada and a few U.S cities in the northeast, but you'd be hard pressed to find anyone in L.A who cares (the Dodgers having an unexpectedly good start this year gets more attention than the Kings in the playoffs). Heck even in the northeast it's not like it's the big sport. Look at a city like Boston, the teams to watch are:

1) Red Sox
2) Patriots
3) Celtics
4) Bruins

But at least it's on the sports radar. But what about the rest of the U.S? Look at Dallas 30 years ago:

1) Cowboys
2) Rangers
3) Mavericks
4) we don't have an NHL team

compare it to today:

1) Cowboys
2) Rangers
3) Mavericks
4) we have an NHL team?

of course I could also throw in college football, basketball and baseball, NASCAR, UFC and possibly even Major League Soccer above the NHL... and Dallas is a success story. Phoenix, Nashville, Atlanta (sorry, Winnipeg now ;) ) are all proof that the league can set up outside of Canada and the northeast U.S, but no one will care. How many years have the Kings been in Los Angeles anyway?

The Onion gives a great "article" that sums up the U.S view of the NHL. All satire is based on reality.

But it's not like Americans don't take to new sports, the growth of UFC, NASCAR and arguably Major League Soccer all suggest that new sports can take off. While the growth of MLS has been minimal it does apply soccer rules consistently, so either you find it boring and full of diving or you don't, but either way it is what it is and it gets enough fans to justify more seasons and some expansion. No changing it every two years in a bid for new fans. UFC has offered real martial arts with set rules, weight classes and a structure for enforcing these rules. While it has been called glorified gladiator fights by some it does have set rules and tactics. Some matches are two guys rolling around on the floor making us all feel a bit uncomfortable with our own sexuality, but that's the nature of it. It has a set of rules it's been following since it came to the U.S and it's managed to build a solid fan base with its product.


As fans of the NHL as it existed for 70 years, the new NHL should disgust you. Is hockey better now than it was when the Montreal Canadiens were winning all those Cups in the 1970's? Are teams more fun to watch today than the early 80's New York Islanders or the mid-late 80's Edmonton Oilers? Heck imagine the 1988 Oilers in last years NHL finals. Rome or Chara would both try to break Gretzky's neck and Messier would be criticized for his clean body checks. The game that I grew up on has become a clown sport. I've been sold out by a league more interested in what fans in Phoenix think of its product than in what I do, despite the fact that I grew up supporting that product and those fans won't support it when given a chance. All of my favourite NHL memories, when I really enjoyed the game. 1992 Pittsburgh Penguins? 1993 Montreal Canadiens winning the Cup? 1994 Canucks run to the final?


I would throw in that this is the NHL I'm talking about, World Juniors, Olympics etc. still makes for a great hockey game and I'll get very excited about Team Canada doing well there. But until the next World Juniors, I'm more interested in watching Ichiro Suzuki than Sidney Crosby.