ESPN.com – NHL – Buccigross: The right and wrong of the NHL

ESPN.com – NHL – Buccigross: The right and wrong of the NHL:

We are slightly past the midway point of the season, and just a season and a half removed from the end of hockey’s total eclipse of the heart: the dark, season-long lockout.

Never before has the game and its fans been put through the wringer more than over the past 30 months, since the Tampa Bay Lightning won the Stanley Cup.

As the game still looks to move forward, as it still seems to be in a state of flux, maybe it’s a good time to take inventory of what we have here. Maybe it’s a good time to ask the questions that many ask of themselves and their investments, relationships, CD collections, jobs and futures.

What is right and what is wrong with … the NHL?

I’ve been bitching that the media’s been driviing the criticism of the league this year, well beyond the actual seriousness of the problems they’re harping on.

So I feel like I should be fair, and point out John Buccigross’s latest column, which is a solid and fair look at the good and the bad; Buccigross is one of the top informed and fair critics of the league, one that I listen to, even when I disagree.

As to his down points — I don’t agree that we need higher scoring — but I won’t say he’s wrong. What I think we need right now is some stability to see how the existing changes shake out. The game is faster, higher energy, more interesting with or without more goals, and I think that’s waht the fans really want, not a 16-15 lacrosse score. but I could be wrong, and if a well-played 4-3 or 3-2 game isn’t enough, then go ahead and make the nets bigger, or shrink the goalie gear more, or attach electrodes to the goalie so he gets a shock if he skates out of the crease… whatever works. But before you do — make sure the current set of changes aren’t enough, and that we’re not just making more changes because we don’t know when or how to stop changing things…

Oh, and having argued that the NHL is better staying with versus and growing the audience together rather than looking to return to ESPN as a small player in their suite of sports — the only significant argument I can think of against that would be that Buccigross is at ESPN. And that’s a significant thing to consider….

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  • Josh

    That’s the crux of my argument that the NHL needs ESPN or at least an ESPN production crew. The reach numbers are similar, but the problem is that I can’t stand watching the Verses coverage. I have Center Ice, and earlier this season I had looked at the schedule and decided to watch a particular game, only to find out that Versus had that game, so I litereally decided to watch a different game. It’s not end of world bad for the hockey fan who has center ice, but bad production quality will kill them trying to gain new fans.
    One final thought — I’d like to see the NHL try and better use the fans it already has before pushing so hard to get new ones. A lot of the gimmicks they toss around to get new fans are putting them at odds with the fans they had, and not really gathering new die hards to replace them. If higher scoring was the issue, indoor lacross would have already replaced them. What *should* be the league’s top priority is getting an HD Center Ice package out there in which:
    1) No local blackouts if your local market is not broadcasting the game.
    2) A target of 85% of the games shown are in HD.
    This means working with and perhaps even investing in the cable and satelite providers to get the means, but as for the ends, I’d pay a pretty good premium for such a package, and I’m sure that a lot of their solid fan base would as well. hockey gains so much from HD that it’s worth a premium.