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2019-20 Miscellaneous NHL/Hockey News Thread

Columbus has placed dman Seth Jones on IR. He’s out indefinitely with an ankle injury, sustained on Saturday when he crashed into the net. He returned to the game and scored the Jackets’ only goal in a 2-1 loss to the Avs.
 
Lots of places are run by a good ole boy network. Some are successful and some are not. Locally that's how SAS runs, I know because I worked there and they are successful.
 
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Lots of places are run by a good ole boy network. Some are successful and some are not. Locally that's how SAS runs, I know because I worked there.
Not all good ol boy networks are filled with dinosaurs who literally don't give AF about the health of their employees and discriminate between groups (teams) based on their own loyalties. This one is. You could make a convincing argument that we should (figuratively) burn down the NHL league office and start over with actual human beings.
 
"...the refereeing is atrocious" from the Ottawa head trainer. That in itself is the tip of an iceberg in terms of leaguewide acknowledgment of something nothing's being done about. It would be nice to get that talked about more.
 
MLB probably has plenty of dinsosaurs running their sport. They still are hanging on to two sets of rules (DH) even though the leagues have basically merged now.
 
"...the refereeing is atrocious" from the Ottawa head trainer. That in itself is the tip of an iceberg in terms of leaguewide acknowledgment of something nothing's being done about. It would be nice to get that talked about more.
I firmly believe that good officiating wouldn't be as "pliable" as these clods want, thus it's not a goal the NHL even contemplates. They don't want good refs. They want refs that will call the games the way that jerkwad Colie Campbell wants them called.
 
The NHL officiating has deteriorated to a point of cheapening the product and I'm not sure why any league would want that...but whatever.
Based on just the last 20 years, do you think the NHL actually cares about the quality of the officiating? Because ... if they do, they have a funny way of showing it.
 
Rule 1 of any successful enterprise is don’t rock the boat.
people like to complain. Refs are good and easy to complain about.
who cares, from a corporate view, who wins or loses? How much is being brought in from advertising, tv, etc? How many butts are in seats?
 
Rule 1 of any successful enterprise is don’t rock the boat.
people like to complain. Refs are good and easy to complain about.
who cares, from a corporate view, who wins or loses? How much is being brought in from advertising, tv, etc? How many butts are in seats?
That's the thing though ... how "successful" is the NHL in reality? Because the vast majority of the franchises are either unprofitable or barely breaking even. Yeah, franchise value continues to rise but the whole league is a cash vacuum with no real balance sheet game changers on the horizon now that you've probably maxed out expansion and managed to get your players to submit to a salary cap. Is there some sort of prestige to protect or something? Because this league is stuck in 4th place in North America and going nowhere fast under current management. Maybe that boat nobody wants to rock is a freaking bathtub.
 
It's going to be very hard for the NHL not to be #4 in the US. NFL, NBA and MLB are not going anywhere. MLB has a problem in that kids are not playing baseball as much now , many are playing soccer or hoops. Even with expansion it's still viewed at a northern/Canadian sport.
 
Well you can and should try. But the issue with poor referees is not something that is apparent to new fans. The game is not easy to understand and they’re clueless about what’s a good or bad call anyway. So bad refs bother the serious fans and we’re not going anywhere. Plus ALL sports are facing this issue in some caves much more spectacularly. I don’t think the ref situation is hurting growth significantly.

I still think they should fix it though.
 
NHL is way more popular than they were 20 or 30 years ago. They have tried to grow the sport and it worked. Doesn't mean they can get past NBA, NFL and MLB. Also I see no way NBA or MLB get past NFL in popularity. You have to have realistic goals. I could have a goal of marrying 20 year old swimsuit model. Don't think that is happening. :)
 
Well you can and should try. But the issue with poor referees is not something that is apparent to new fans.
I'm not sure that's actually true. I've got a couple of guys on partial plans sitting next to me at the PNC who told me they they had never watched hockey at all until late last season and they are both already mystified as to why NHL officiating is not only so bad, but more importantly why it's so inconsistent game to game. These guys have maybe watched 50 games in their lives and they instantly fell for the game, but this is really starting to bother one of them in particular. It doesn't take long and it doesn't take some sort of sporting savant to quickly recognize this as a significant problem. To think it's not impacting the growth of the league is dumb. Not calling you dumb ... Bettman and Co, not so much.

I know fans of other sports bitch and moan about officiating, but the NFL and NBA in particular have absolutely nothing to complain about. They at least get a baseline of competence. MLB umpiring is more erratic, but honestly everything about pro baseball has been erratic for years and they're certainly not a model anybody wants to copy.
 
I said this before, who wants to be a ref? the pay is good but there is constant travel. Not to mention abuse from fans even if you are doing a good job. I guess if you don't want to have a wife or kids and like travel it's a pretty good job. And you do get summers off.
 
I said this before, who wants to be a ref? the pay is good but there is constant travel. Not to mention abuse from fans even if you are doing a good job. I guess if you don't want to have a wife or kids and like travel it's a pretty good job. And you do get summers off.

Officiating in the NFL is a part time job, a lot of the guys are lawyers, insurance brokers, etc., something that allows them to take off on a Friday. Gene Steratore and his brother own a supply company. He was not only a NFL ref, he was a college basketball ref.
 
I'm not sure that's actually true. I've got a couple of guys on partial plans sitting next to me at the PNC who told me they they had never watched hockey at all until late last season and they are both already mystified as to why NHL officiating is not only so bad, but more importantly why it's so inconsistent game to game. These guys have maybe watched 50 games in their lives and they instantly fell for the game, but this is really starting to bother one of them in particular. It doesn't take long and it doesn't take some sort of sporting savant to quickly recognize this as a significant problem. To think it's not impacting the growth of the league is dumb. Not calling you dumb ... Bettman and Co, not so much.

I know fans of other sports bitch and moan about officiating, but the NFL and NBA in particular have absolutely nothing to complain about. They at least get a baseline of competence. MLB umpiring is more erratic, but honestly everything about pro baseball has been erratic for years and they're certainly not a model anybody wants to copy.


I've had two friends tell me they thought the games were "pre-decided" like professional wrestling and the refs were there to (eventually) break up the fights. (That they helped cause by letting players get away with cheap crap). Another friend gave up on hockey a few years back because he thinks the NHL just wants chippy, fight-filled games and doesn't care about competition.

I, myself, had many moments of "is this worth the frustration" until I finally decided to let it go and pretend that all the bad calls eventually work themselves out. (The real answer may surprise you!)

I'm not sure if the game is just too hard to call. We've all seen refs looking directly at an obvious penalty with no call. Whaaaaa?
I'm not sure the league has mandated that few penalties get called. As a fan, I find a game with a lot of penalties to be less enjoyable to watch.
I'm not even sure that the ole "they just want the boys chippy and in a mood to fight' reason isn't true.

Bottom Line" I do not understand why NHL Officiating is so bad and I do not understand why they don't attempt to do anything about it. I think it is reasonable to think they are losing more fans with bad officiating than they would if they attempted to improve it. And I find myself losing respect for the pundits who think everything is fine.
 
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