pappyline
Registered User
LOL. I find it amusing to see someone from the 80's posting on the HOH forum referring to 85-95 as the good old days.... and I haven't even started to scratch the surface.
I'd rather watch players ditacte the outcome of hockey game rather than politicians and refs.
Had players like Lemieux, Gretzky, Orr, Howe been given the same advantages players are given now and their scoring records accomplishments might have been magnified.
The game as a whole is faster now but is it really? It's faster because players just rush up and down the ice looking like zombies, they look like they are skating fast but in reality they are just simply playing a system. Dump the puck, chase it and make sure you at least pick up a point during the game.
In my mind I think the best hockey ever played was between 1985 and 1995.
Players were starting to get bigger and stronger, the goalies started to play the butterfly and were becoming more athletic and true game breakers but at least they had "soul", at least they played for the love of the game.
I think the first lockout hurt the league back in 1994-95 but even after that lockout things seemed fine, but the NHL decided that scoring was too high, so what did they do? They made all these changes that took away from the game.
What happened then is that they realized by the late 90's early 2000's that scoring had gone down way too much so then instead of trying to actually get to the problem, instead they completely changed the game.
Goalies don't fight anymore, star players don't fight their own battles, penalties are called like it is a joke now.
Players might be improving physically and the evolution of modern athletes is something to behold, but the result of this has actually made the sport regress.
The sad part is I don't see an improvement anytime soon.
Old time hockey is long gone and so is the fun of the sport.
I think the state of professional sports and hockey in particular is a very complex thing that involves athletics, economics, greed.
Players are content making the big bucks and being thrust into the spotlight but the sad part is now the NHL is being run like Boxing, players are the victims (they are brainwashed into thinking they are the *****) and the GM, owners and Bettman are the manipulators.