The best use of a soccer field is a good, fast, (and somewhat violent) game of Lacrosse!
Mark
Posted on 02/09/2005 6:37:29 PM PST by SamAdams76
Last week, espn.com, the Internet site for all-sports TV station ESPN, asked its American subscribers to weigh in on the NHL lockout. "Do you care that the NHL is expected to cancel the 2004-05 season?" they asked.
Of the 146,514 responses, 73% said "No."
Given what we north of the border have been surmising over the past few months, that percentage is not terribly surprising. Hockey coverage in the States is as hard to find as cricket coverage in Canada. It's a boutique sport at best.
What is surprising is that many actually responded. Were they giving away free cars?
We in Canada love and care about hockey in a way unmatched around the globe, but I'm starting to doubt if Canadians care as deeply as we think about the current labour dispute. Given his or her druthers, every hockey fan in this country obviously would choose to have the NHL back on ice and back on our TV sets. But in light of the equally obvious fact that it's not going to happen anytime soon, I am sensing little in the way of passionate outrage that you might expect of a people deprived of their game.
Lockout conversations tend to peter out after a minute or two, simply because there's not a lot to say. Once you get past "Are they coming back?" and the obligatory negative response, talk turns to more urgent matters, like the price of kids' sticks.
So, what in the name of Gordie Howe is going on here? It certainly isn't that we don't care, because down deep we do.
My own belief is that in an age of unfathomable player riches, not to mention ticket prices, the public has disconnected itself from the people who play and run the game.
Trevor Linden may expect us working stiffs to appreciate the principle behind his association's stalwart refusal to accept a cap on their salaries that would reduce the average salary from $1.8 million US to $1.3 million, but the truth is nobody I know can relate to such thinking.
If you can believe the industry numbers, there is a $2 billion pie (shrinking with each passing day) to be divided. How can such an economic reality get lost in the semantics of "salary cap" and "linkage" and "cost certainty."
For heaven's sake, at $1 million a year a middle-of-the road NHLer will gross more in two seasons than about 90% of the population earns in 40 years of working.
In the realm of professional athletics, hockey players have managed in general to maintain their image as "real" people; good guys, humble and as well-grounded as the small towns where so many are from. But in recent years, it has gotten so that the only people who can afford to go to watch them play are rich and well-connected themselves.
Because it's hockey and because it's Canada, folks will cheer for the sweater (whenever that sweater reappears). They will pine quietly for the game they love but care little for the "plight" of the millionaires who play it and the billionaires who own the teams.
As this charade of a negotiation drags on yet another week, each side rooted to the same patch of ground it occupied two years ago, the players and owners will continue to wage their little war through the media for the hearts and minds of the people in the street.
As far as we can tell, though, those hearts and minds already have moved on.
I think that in keeping with their playoff structure, they should wait until sometime in May, announce a one-game schedule with the winners of each game going on to the playoffs. One game first round playoffs, and 3 game 2nd and later round playoffs.
What the hell, introduce something new into the game as well. Start letting the ice thaw at the start of the game. When it becomes to slushy to play, the game is called with the winner being the team that's ahead.
Actually, no. This weekend The Michigan Striped Weasels, errrr, Wolverines come to town for a weekend series. Thank The Lord for hockey apart from the NHL! Game-On!
The best use of a soccer field is a good, fast, (and somewhat violent) game of Lacrosse!
Mark
We aren't on the same page. There is no duty for the NHL to negotiate in GF, so we're not talking about that standard which would be actionable.
However, the NHL is purporting to be actively negotiating with the players, which they are not. They have hardly budged. That is perfectly fine. But don't tell me how hard you're negotiating when all you're actually doing is basically resubmitting your same offer over and over.
MLB doesn't have a salary cap. Apples and oranges
Hockey isn't a sport .
Actually, I think the NHL will fold and new league replace it. Bad TV contracts go away, any old business just disappears including overly paid players.
I would like to see hockey do the following:
Drop ticet prices to the level of say.. baseball.
Drop the BS over fighting and let the guys duke it out as they used to. No pansies allowed on the ice please.
I've actually watched lacrosse on TV. As I said, i'll mwatch most anything. It was surprisingly fun.
mwatch=watch
MLB needs one.
Re: MLB - I would not be opposed to stiffer penalties for breaking the limits, but I hate the cap, which is absolute.
I think if you've got the money and are in a window where you have a few years to contend, that team ought to be able to tip the scales for a few years.
The Yankees don't just tip the scales, they knock them over and set them on fire. I think they exceeded the spending limit by over $100 million last year? The problem right now is the penalty is stiff enough to deter most teams, but not the Yankees. I think a better system would place a progressive penalty for violating the limit which gets steeper each successive year the team exceeds the limit.
I have had some AAA hockey league experience as a devotee of the short-lived San Francisco Spiders. I can't afford good seats at a Sharks game, but got decent seats at the antiquated Cow Palace for the Spiders. The team sucked for the first month, but caught fire after a trade, and ended up winning more games in their first (and only) season than the Sharks won in their first two.
IHL hockey wasn't NHL hockey by any means. But after being forced to watch college and amateur puck on cable, a downgrade to the AHL may not matter.
I used to live for baseball season. Despite the ineptness of the management of my Giants year-by-year, I would go to breezy, dumpy Candlestick Park just in case the G-men happened to win one when I was there -- after all, even the worst teams win about sixty games a year.
What nearly killed my love for baseball was the way that striking major leaguers boldly predicted that fans would come crawling back. I felt like I was being treated like a battered wife, slinking home to cook dinner for some profane A-shirted bum. When Selig dictated that the players flip third out fly balls to the fans, it was a small gesture, but I accepted it. I am still a baseball fan, but the owners and the players have damaged our relationship forever. It will never be the same.
I have noticed that hockey players have no such arrogance. That's keeping me hanging on.
Detroit..the vanising, shrinking city..with a clown prince of a mayor..as an aside, the RedWings' home white uniforms..most beautiful of any sport
Eddie Shore!
bump
That's absolutely true, but there's something to keep in mind here: The unique nature of competitive sports is such that "normal" economic principles cannot be applied to a professional sports league.
In the auto industry, the predatory nature of competition works just fine. If Ford and General Motors can't keep up with Toyota and Honda, then the first two will lose market share to the latter two. Under a worst-case scenario, the first two may even go out of business. Such is the nature of capitalism.
The problem in sports is that the competition is the product, which means all of the teams in a league must walk a very fine line -- they have to adhere to souond business practices and function in a normal competitive manner from a financial perspective, but at the same time they must ensure that their competitors remain, well, competitive!
I'm not a huge fan of a salary cap in general terms, but there is no question that a league comprised of teams with disproportionate levels of financial strength does not have a strong future.
John Kerry actually played NHL hockey for the Leafs in Cambodia during the winter of 1969 when the Mekong had frozen over.
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