Pace of Expansion..
rocky hockey said:
I'm as die hard of a fan as any of you , and at 37 yrs old i played hockey before most of you were born, But i to am starting to get a little perturbed at the things the NHL is doing lately.
it seems the league blamed there brush with a near league wide demise on just about everything except the real problems at hand. EXPANSION is what ruined the game in the 1st place, along with greed.
so many new teams no new talent how can franchises with no monetary capital or tradition compete in a league with teams who have been around for decades. Ill tell you how- clutch & grab etc., center ice trap.
The cold hard truth is that the NHL was a much better product in the 70's and 80's and maybe even the early 90's then it will ever be again.
The NHL as a whole let this thing get away from them gradually for 10 or 15 years and now, they are trying to right the entire ship in 3 months, it doesn't work that way and i do believe more of us old time hockey fans will alienate ourselves from the game more in the future, and you younger fans will have never gotten to see the game as it was meant to play.
Won't be long before they ask goalies to play in a jock strap, skates, and a yellow fruit of the loom undershirts
It was more tha pace of expansion that hurt the league than expansion itself.
At the end of the 1990-1991 season, there were 21 teams, but the start of the 2000-2001, there were 30 teams. That's basically an expansion team per season throughout the 90's.
SJ - 1991 - good market to get into, but the league's hands were kind of forced as the Gunds wanted to move the Stars there, but got an expansion team instead.
Ottawa and TB 1992 - markets turned out to be ok. TB, just some poor management decisions that kept them in the basement in their first decade. Ottawa, horrible start, but good drafted during that time enabled them to be the team they are now. However, these 3 teams ALL had Arena issues. SJ started out in the 10K seat Cow Palace. Ottawa played at the Civic Centre for 3 years and had financing issues and development issues surrounding the Palladium/Corel Centre. TB, started in the EXPO Hall, then moved to what is now Tropicana Field for the Devil Rays, before getting the St. Pete's Times Forum.
Florida & Ananheim 1993 - part of the NHL's plan to get big name owners, in Disney and Blockbuster involved. Both were fine markets in the beginning, but Florida needed an new arena as the Miami Arena had no luxury boxes, while things turned south in Anaheim after Kariya got his concussions.
5 teams in 3 years was a lot to deal with at the time, so the NHL should have been patient, and let these teams develop some youngsters with skill so that they could all play are more offensive style of game.
However, in 1997, the NHL decided to expand again, and extend the last CBA to get the last 4 expansion teams in.
That was the bad move. Should have resolved the CBA first, then bring on the new teams, not the Reverse. Especially when Hartford was on the move. They couldn't ended up in one of the expansion cities.
Nashville and Atlanta were going to be the toughest markets to develop of the 4 cities. Minnesota, if run properly, and they have despite the fact I hate their style of play, and Columbus, first pro team in the city and hockey weather should be ok long term, so long as Maclean manages the team better than he has. Threw too much $ around just prior to the lockout and got no results.
These 4 teams played defensively to compete with the other NHL teams, that's one of the reasons the NHL has to now crackdown on the obstruction enforcement.