Is hockey slowly becoming an aristocracy? (Need help answering this question)

[Fig]

I think it boils to nurture rather than nature. Hockey genetics doesn't make sense to me. Look at the players who are twins and one did well, the other sucked (Russell, Lundqvist etc.). Look at brothers that are the same (Hamilton, Weisblatts, Granlunds etc).

For genetics and wealth, rich multi generation hockey families like the Tkachuks or Stasny, you also have others like the 3 Reinhart brothers and their dad or the Nylanders. Not everyone automatically succeeds with similar genes and wealth.

IMO it's not that hockey is in your blood, it's that its in your regular activities growing up and you are good at it.

 

[Machinehead]

"Becoming"

 

[Pointteen]

Of course it is.
That's just what happens when something is expensive in a Capitalist market.
Especially when it relies on impacting the environment.

 

[Torspo21]

• Aleksander Barkov (uncle was a pro in Finland and Russia)

Just to correct you, Aleksander Barkov´s father was a pro in Finland, Italy and Russia, not his uncle. Aleksander Barkov senior.

 

[holy]

Yo there’s even this guy on the Habs with the last name Romanov, like bro, how much more blatant is it gonna get?

 

[Confused Turnip]

Yo there’s even this guy on the Habs with the last name Romanov, like bro, how much more blatant is it gonna get?

No matter how many likes this gets it will remain under-rated.

 

[ricky0034]

I do wonder how much of a factor having family members that were involved in the sport is in elite athletes choosing to go into Hockey at all as opposed to something else like Soccer or Football

 

[Fantomas]

It's almost as if someone who has the genetic make up to make it to the NHL's relative would have a similar genetic make up...

I really dislike this kind of nonsense.

We're not seeing more family dynasties in the sport because of superior genetics. We're seeing them because these players come from wealthy families and are getting better opportunities to succeed than almost everyone else.

 

[Jumptheshark]

For context:
I'm involved in public policy, and there's a phenomenon that social scientists and economists have noticed in the past 30 years: a consolidation of opportunity, resources, social capital, and institutional knowledge by ~10% - 20% of the population. A class Richard Reeves calls the "dream hoarders." I'd be happy to speak more broadly about this in my DMs if you are interested, but I'm making this post because I think it applies to the hockey world as well. Basically, I don't think it's true anymore that hockey is just a rich, white guy's sport. It has become controlled by a select, shrinking number of families.

I remember 10 years ago how big a deal the Staal and Sutter families were for being so ingrained in hockey. And everybody could name the handful of brothers who played in the league simultaneously. Now, it seems like every other NHLer (and every high end prospect) has a family member who was a professional athlete either in the NHL or in Europe. I.e. the likelihood of a boy making it to the NHL is becoming more and more dependent on whether or not he was born to a family who has already made it.

The little project I'm undertaking is trying to figure out how much more common it has become over time for any given NHLer to have professional sports ties. What I am currently doing is looking at the Florida Panthers rosters in 2021, 2016, and 2011, and going through the players to see if they have any of these familial connections. EliteProspects has a great feature that helps with this.

Obviously I'm not going to do this for all teams, but if you are interested in answering this posts' titular question, look up your favorite team's roster in 2021, 2016, and 2011, and let's see if there are any trends that can be found.

Florida Panthers 2021.....33% (11/33) have a family connection

• Spencer Knight (cousin is a female pro)
• Kevin Connauton (brother was an NCAA Division I)
• Gustav Forsling (brother was a pro in Sweden)
• Radko Gudas (father was drafted by the Flames, sister was a Czech Olympian, brother-in-law is Michael Neuvirth)
• Mackenzie Weegar (uncle played in NHL)
• Keith Yandle (uncle worked in NHL front offices, brother played in ECHL)
• Aleksander Barkov (uncle was a pro in Finland and Russia)
• Grigori Denisenko (brother is a pro in Russia)
• Mason Marchment (father played in NHL, cousin played in AHL, cousin is a female pro)
• Owen Tippett (cousin is Mitchell Stephens)
• Alex Wennberg (cousin is a pro in Sweden)

Florida Panthers 2016.....35% (13/37) have a family connection

• Roberto Luongo (brother is an AHL goaltending coach)
• Brian Campbell (brother played in ECHL)
• Erik Gudbranson (brother played in AHL)
• Jakub Kindl (brother is a pro in Czechia)
• Dylan Olsen (uncle was a pro in Germany)
• Aleksander Barkov (uncle was a pro in Finland and Russia)
  
• Nick Bjugstad (uncle played in NHL)
• Connor Brickley (father drafted by Kings, cousins played in AHL)
• Jiri Hudler (father was a pro in Czechia)
• Jussi Jokinen (brother was a pro in Finland)
• Greg McKegg (uncle played in NHL)
• Kyle Rau (brother played in NHL)
• Reilly Smith (brother is Brendan Smith)

Florida Panthers 2011.....18% (7/40) have a family connection

• Tyler Plante (father and brother played in NHL)
• Keaton Ellbergy (cousins are Shane Doan and Carey Price)
• Niclas Bergfors (brother was a pro in Sweden)
• Michael Frolik (brother was a pro in Czechia)
• Mike Santorelli (brother played in the AHL)
• Cory Stillman (son is Riley Stillman, father played in the NHL)
• Stephen Weiss (uncle is NHL coach)

That is one team with 31 teams you need to breakdown atleast 10 teamx

 

[SepticFish]

This is not unique to hockey. Baseball has seen a recent boom of top prospects that are second generation, and then you have guys like Steph Curry in the NBA and Patrick Mahomes in the NFL who are sons of pro athletes.

The Rise of Baseball’s Second-Generation Players

MLB Is Increasingly A Father-Son Game

 

[ovythegiraffe]

I kinda feel like in hockey it makes a big difference how early you start playing and how much you're able to play as a kid, as it's pretty unique skills that you need with skating and handling the puck with a stick. Other sports like soccer football and basketball come more naturally as kids are running around and throwing things anyways. So if you have a father or somebody else who's taking you to the rink all year round since 3 years old, you've got a huge advantage compared to a normal kid who's going to the pond 3 months of a year.

 

[NightMist]

I really dislike this kind of nonsense.

We're not seeing more family dynasties in the sport because of superior genetics. We're seeing them because these players come from wealthy families and are getting better opportunities to succeed than almost everyone else.

The problem with that idea is that there is no evidence that we are seeing more family dynasties.

 

[Zenos]

I really dislike this kind of nonsense.

We're not seeing more family dynasties in the sport because of superior genetics. We're seeing them because these players come from wealthy families and are getting better opportunities to succeed than almost everyone else.

This. Certainly there's some genetic advantage - studies related to other sports (mostly cycling) suggest that aerobic fitness (VO2 max) is about 50% heritable, the combination of slow-twitch (endurance) and fast-twitch (sprinting) muscle fibres is about 45% heritable, and strength and muscle mass is more than 50% heritable. So it's definitely not negligible.
But hockey (obviously) relies on a number of other attributes like agility and balance (which are apparently more "trainable" skills), not to mention the mental / or tactical aspect of the game.

I think it's mostly about environment in the case of these kids. They have the wealth and the opportunities; the right role-models, coaches and motivators (their own parents and their parent's circle); and probably a decent bit of name recognition and downright nepotism too.

 

[Pointteen]

I really dislike this kind of nonsense.

We're not seeing more family dynasties in the sport because of superior genetics. We're seeing them because these players come from wealthy families and are getting better opportunities to succeed than almost everyone else.

Bingo. Calling it genetics is hiding behind Capitalism's blatant impact on the entire world.
Eugenics is just Fancy White Supremacy is just Colonialism.

If hockey was about genetic talent, we'd get to cheer on the name Gretzky again.

 

[Rec T]

Genetics may have a small part to play, but unless it was a hundreds of year long breeding program where the children of elite athletes breed with the children of other elite athletes ... yeah, probably not as big of an impact.

Also, your selection criteria needs to be tightened up quite a bit. Having a cousin who played a year or two in a low level minor league really doesn't say much either way. Personally, I'd limit it to father/brother/1st cousin playing in either NHL/AHL/KHL/their country's top league. I would not include college or high level developmental leagues as the players there all tend to be playing against their peers rather than across all ages.

I think though that the biggest impact on players has been touched upon already in the thread - proximity to expert help/guidance. Young kid is out back banging away at pucks, dad (former high level player) comes home from work, sees that the kid is holding the stick slightly wrong & corrects him right then & there. Something that may not have otherwise been noticed for another year or two with regular coaching/camps where the attention is divided among a much larger group of relatively incompetent players, each with a lot of faults that need addressing. Brothers/cousins playing against each other with the same tip pool from dad/uncle are going to be playing at a much higher level of pickup game at a much earlier age, making them that much better compared to their peers from a couple of streets over who didn't have access to that constant minor tweaking of 'x' or 'y'. Magnify that over 6-10 winters/seasons & the differences really start to stand out.

 

[Bevans]

For context:
I'm involved in public policy, and there's a phenomenon that social scientists and economists have noticed in the past 30 years: a consolidation of opportunity, resources, social capital, and institutional knowledge by ~10% - 20% of the population. A class Richard Reeves calls the "dream hoarders." I'd be happy to speak more broadly about this in my DMs if you are interested, but I'm making this post because I think it applies to the hockey world as well. Basically, I don't think it's true anymore that hockey is just a rich, white guy's sport. It has become controlled by a select, shrinking number of families.

I remember 10 years ago how big a deal the Staal and Sutter families were for being so ingrained in hockey. And everybody could name the handful of brothers who played in the league simultaneously. Now, it seems like every other NHLer (and every high end prospect) has a family member who was a professional athlete either in the NHL or in Europe. I.e. the likelihood of a boy making it to the NHL is becoming more and more dependent on whether or not he was born to a family who has already made it.

The little project I'm undertaking is trying to figure out how much more common it has become over time for any given NHLer to have professional sports ties. What I am currently doing is looking at the Florida Panthers rosters in 2021, 2016, and 2011, and going through the players to see if they have any of these familial connections. EliteProspects has a great feature that helps with this.

Obviously I'm not going to do this for all teams, but if you are interested in answering this posts' titular question, look up your favorite team's roster in 2021, 2016, and 2011, and let's see if there are any trends that can be found.

Florida Panthers 2021.....33% (11/33) have a family connection

• Spencer Knight (cousin is a female pro)
• Kevin Connauton (brother was an NCAA Division I)
• Gustav Forsling (brother was a pro in Sweden)
• Radko Gudas (father was drafted by the Flames, sister was a Czech Olympian, brother-in-law is Michael Neuvirth)
• Mackenzie Weegar (uncle played in NHL)
• Keith Yandle (uncle worked in NHL front offices, brother played in ECHL)
• Aleksander Barkov (uncle was a pro in Finland and Russia)
• Grigori Denisenko (brother is a pro in Russia)
• Mason Marchment (father played in NHL, cousin played in AHL, cousin is a female pro)
• Owen Tippett (cousin is Mitchell Stephens)
• Alex Wennberg (cousin is a pro in Sweden)

Florida Panthers 2016.....35% (13/37) have a family connection

• Roberto Luongo (brother is an AHL goaltending coach)
• Brian Campbell (brother played in ECHL)
• Erik Gudbranson (brother played in AHL)
• Jakub Kindl (brother is a pro in Czechia)
• Dylan Olsen (uncle was a pro in Germany)
• Aleksander Barkov (uncle was a pro in Finland and Russia)
  
• Nick Bjugstad (uncle played in NHL)
• Connor Brickley (father drafted by Kings, cousins played in AHL)
• Jiri Hudler (father was a pro in Czechia)
• Jussi Jokinen (brother was a pro in Finland)
• Greg McKegg (uncle played in NHL)
• Kyle Rau (brother played in NHL)
• Reilly Smith (brother is Brendan Smith)

Florida Panthers 2011.....18% (7/40) have a family connection

• Tyler Plante (father and brother played in NHL)
• Keaton Ellbergy (cousins are Shane Doan and Carey Price)
• Niclas Bergfors (brother was a pro in Sweden)
• Michael Frolik (brother was a pro in Czechia)
• Mike Santorelli (brother played in the AHL)
• Cory Stillman (son is Riley Stillman, father played in the NHL)
• Stephen Weiss (uncle is NHL coach)

How can you answer your question about the uniqueness of hockey if you don't look at any other sport, or profession?

You'd have to show that hockey is more nepotistic than other sports to support you hypothesis. You've only raised a single team, in a single sport, in a single decade. There's no support here for your assumptions. Even the slight percentage increase you alluded is driven by the denominator, not to numerator.

I also don't know why you've chosen to load your language by asking about aristocracy. You could ask this question in much less controversial ways. For example:

"Is hockey a more contagious profession than average?"

Relatives of doctors become doctors. Same goes for tilers and lawyers. People emulate each other.

 

[Drake1588]

A little bit. This hypothesis goes too far, but I do think two points are clearly true.

1) There's way too much nepotism in and around the game, giving relatives a leg up in an otherwise cutthroat and competitive field. It permeates the NHL hockey media, executives, coaches, players, etc.

2) It is also true that it's become far too expensive to develop your kids into young players with a shot at a NHL career. Expensive sport requiring both money as well as family infrastructure, a family travel team, essentially. Lower income, non-nuclear families have a much harder time.

Combine the two, and I see where the OP is coming from here, though I think the way that this is presented is a stretch. Solid subject for study, though. You can certainly make an argument and defend it.

 

[ChuckLefley]

I hate to tell you this, but it’s about getting older. You see the older you get the more you start to notice players you remember from your childhood having children play pro sports. It’s not just hockey, it’s all pro sports. You see they have good genes and often time great genes because a lot of pro athletes marry other athletes. Combine that with growing up at practices and games and you have the perfect coattail to become a pro athlete.

 

[Confused Turnip]

I do wonder how much of a factor having family members that were involved in the sport is in elite athletes choosing to go into Hockey at all as opposed to something else like Soccer or Football

This is definitely a big part of it outside Canada, hockey isn't really the default choice anywhere else I can think of? Might be missing somewhere.

I really dislike this kind of nonsense.

We're not seeing more family dynasties in the sport because of superior genetics. We're seeing them because these players come from wealthy families and are getting better opportunities to succeed than almost everyone else.

Why can't you accept that multiple factors are in play? Genetics is a huge one, you can't be a pro athlete without pro athlete genetics, and as more pro athletes are discovered the probability of finding one whose parents weren't or who is the first one in the line to roll those genetics gets lower. You also can't be a pro athlete without a culture that pushes you toward that particular sport and parents that support you being an athlete as opposed to say pushing you to be a doctor or something. You also can't be a pro hockey player without affording hockey. All these things matter a lot, most (including the genetics) are not optional.

 

[viper0220]

This is arguably a bigger reason. It costs a fortune to develop a kid into an NHL player. The Hockey News had a profile on it years ago and estimate it costs around $100,000 to do, and that number is only going up. Then consider that tuition to an elite prep school like Shattuck-St. Mary's is about $60,000 per year (similar for other schools, but that's the top hockey one), and consider that the type of people to both have the money and interest to do that are likely former players, it's only going to have a compounding effect.

I think this post nails, ice hockey is very expensive and only the rich can afford it. This is why it will never be popular in the US.

Kids who's dad played in the NHL will have a leg up because they have the money.

 

[Confused Turnip]

This. Certainly there's some genetic advantage - studies related to other sports (mostly cycling) suggest that aerobic fitness (VO2 max) is about 50% heritable, the combination of slow-twitch (endurance) and fast-twitch (sprinting) muscle fibres is about 45% heritable, and strength and muscle mass is more than 50% heritable. So it's definitely not negligible.
But hockey (obviously) relies on a number of other attributes like agility and balance (which are apparently more "trainable" skills), not to mention the mental / or tactical aspect of the game.

The mental aspects are also highly heritable. I don't have exact figures off hand but executive function (including stress and emotion management), IQ (aka processing speed) and the other pieces that determine this are heavily genetic.

 

[ChuckLefley]

I think this post nails, ice hockey is very expensive and only the rich can afford it. This is why it will never be popular in the US.

Kids who's dad played in the NHL will have a leg up because they have the money.

Weird, my wife and I are both teachers and our son plays high level club hockey. We certainly aren’t rich.

 

[Filthy Dangles]

Weird, my wife and I are both teachers and our son plays high level club hockey. We certainly aren’t rich.

You certainly need to set aside some block of income to support a kid playing travel hockey, but I agree with you that the 'you need to be filthy rich' thing is somewhat overblown.

It's not about needing to be rich as much as much as accessibility. Lots of locations require a long drive to the rink. Then you need all the equipment, maintain it (blade sharpening, buying new sticks). Finding ice time can be a hassle since it's so limited in most places.

Basically it comes down to being unable to just head to an ice rink down the block like you can with a baseball field, football field, basketball court etc.

 

[PlayersLtd]

I would say the (10 year) window of analysis is far too small to draw any legitimate conclusions, no?

But, wouldn't one expect this trend considering the growth of the athletics industry in general? The growth rate of the industry has outpaced the growth rate of the population (fair assumption) so naturally the connections within the industry are going increase as well.

For example- in the 80's there were far fewer hockey leagues, development programs, institutions etc... which meant fewer people entering them per X% of population. The popularity of the sport (or sports in general) has increased dramatically since then and with it so to have the leagues, programs, access to them etc... resulting in higher proportion of the population participating. Naturally, within this higher proportion there is going to be more overlap between the participants.

Lastly, the use of the term 'aristocracy' seems to be sensationalizing the issue and adding an unnecessarily negative connotation to the hypothesis and demonstrates a bias imo.

 

[PlayersLtd]

Weird, my wife and I are both teachers and our son plays high level club hockey. We certainly aren’t rich.

It's a juvenile argument to suggest hockey is reserved for 'rich kids.' It is certainly not very accessible to poor kids (like many sports) but the middle class is quite obviously very well represented in hockey circles.