I know, right? It's not like this tournament is supposed to be a greedy excuse for withdrawing from the Olympics or anything, the flak is completely unjustified.
Hitchcock - "The WC hockey is better than the Olympics."
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I know, right? It's not like this tournament is supposed to be a greedy excuse for withdrawing from the Olympics or anything, the flak is completely unjustified.
No matter how often it's called "best on best", it's NOT best on best if it doesn't involve all the best hockey countries - without gimmicks.
You can call a piece of horse dung a cake, but that doesn't mean I'll eat it. If you however wish to believe your own fantasy - bon appetit.
And I almost hope either of the gimmicks win so that even this thing's most ardent supporters suddenly turn their coats and call it meaningless. I'd have a field day quoting old posts.
This is exactly what's wrong with this thing - if it was legit, you wouldn't have to hope for something like this to happen in the first place.
Now it's exactly like you said - you have to pretend it's a real tournament.
Conspiracy Theorist
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Ben White
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I really hope you're right. Otherwise this will go down as one of the most tragical, laughable decisions in the history of the game. If it isn't already...
not sure why we discuss the validity of this tournament again. The topic is that World Cup hockey is better than olympics, which will be demonstrated on the ice once again.
More like in merchandising sales, TV ratings and other channels of profit but I agree this is just a thread for the cool kids to go "I thought it was a good idea before it became trendy!"
Zero Pucks Given
American Hero
Right. While it personally sucks that the tournament has 2 joke teams, I bet it will still produce some entertaining hockey.
Right now the teams are going to look a lot more like the teams did in Sochi than they will for the world shampionships.
And I'm for PARITY, I don't take any pleasure in seeing teams that lack depth so WOEFULL mismatched that they ( like the austrians prior to the last olympics) know they have no shot and go out ( alledgedly) boozing it up.
If it sticks in your craw, too bad. Team young guns and team leftover europe serve two purposes. Team young guns allows YOUNG upcoming players to play when if they had to wait their turn in countries with MASSIVE depth, it might be a two cycles or more before they crack the lineup. Team leftover europe is simply a way to offset several countries lack of depth. These countries can produce high end talent but they can't produce three lines worth, 6 D and a goalie. so their " stars" hold their own and the guys who drive taxis for a living get exposed and the team gets trouncced.
right now team young guns and team left over europe bring MORE parity to these games rather than being cannon fodder hoping their goalie goes god mode for one game.
And if you want the best PROFESSIONAL players to play best on best, here's an idea treat them like professionals and pay them. Buuuuuut NOOOOOOOOO the IOC can't do that now can they ? I hope you enjoy the nationalistic chest bumping in the next olympics from " god knows where" as the talent would be overcome by the world shampionships rosters.
I think that a lot of this " the world cup is a joke" nonsense is nothing more that the manisfestation of pure abject jealousy that the NHL holds the keys to the overwhelming amount of top end talent and as such they don't need the ioc or the iihf. And if they want to takee their ball and go home, they absolutely can.
if you don't like it don't watch. PLENTY of people in toronto will. And I hope its the death blow to the NHL's participation in the olympics so that all of you who whine and moan about it have but two choicces left, watch the best hockey talent on the planet or a bunch of no name jabroni's whose most important asset is that they drape themselvees in a flag, no matter how poorly they play.
it reminds me of the All-Star game.
Before: No one's gonna watch it, it's lame.
After: It was so awesome!
Cursed Lemon
Registered Bruiser
I've asked this from you twice, with no answer at all. Let's see if this makes you vanish again just like it did the two previous times...
The players are not complaining at all for going into the Olympics and not getting paid. Not one bit. All the moaning is coming from a bunch of suits who don't think their pockets are lined enough. Why are their corporate interests so important to you? Do they pay you to spew this crap?
I repeat, the PLAYERS don't complain one bit. Why should you, do tell?
And if I want to watch teams playing against each other with relative parity, I can watch the NHL as it is. This "nationalistic chest bumping" is the very thing that makes international hockey worthwhile. And gimmick teams, for the sake of more "parity" or not, have no place in it.
it wont be the all star game which absolutely ( even with the new rules) is an abomination.
but it probably still brings a tear to the eye of the "MOAR DANGLEZ" crowd.
If the World Cup becomes a financial success, it is entirely possible that they will withdraw.
The Olympics is just a tournament backed by billions of dollars of marketing and rich people trying to get richer.
Still undecided, if the World cup goes off well ( and if it IS only a cash grab I suspect that they have already made more cash than the last 5 olympics) then the path forward seems pretty clear.
The people who want it to be a dumpster fire are selfish and want the players to continue playing for free for their enjoyment. Methinks that isn't ( much to their chagrin) sustainable.
All of this could be avoided if the IOC opens their wallets. But its the NHL who are " money-grubbing lowlifes" and the IOC is some sort of saint for raking in BILLIONS is TV rights and sharing precisely 0.0% of that with the primary draw. But it's the NHL that is being greedy?????????
It must be nice to run a business where you get to keep ALL of the revenue, assume none of the risks and then on top of this but you get to stiff your employees under the canard of " national sport".
Pay attention to the teacher in class, he will go over proper vocabulary usage. Get on your phone during recess.
Thanks for the random shot at the Austrians. Boozing it up had nothing to do with having no shot against slovenia. If anything they underestimated slovenia so they boozed first. Prior to the Olympics this Austrian team didn't even make the Olympics (keeping in mind that in the english language prior to means before). The Austrian team put up 4 goals on finland. That's more than any other team and more than russia, Canada and the USA combined and also beat Norway soundly. If you want to beat up on a team, beat up on Norway or Slovakia because we finished ahead of them.
so thomas vanek ( alledgedly) playing hungover doesn't bother you ? It seemed to bother his countries ice hockey federation quite a bit, no ?
and you are making my point for me. Because the austrian team had not made the olympics prior, what do you think their relative chances were of winning ? 1:100 ? 1:1000 ? lower ? So they go into a tournament knowing that in all likelihood no matter how well they play they are nothing but cannon fodder for countries with depth. That's is what you want to hang their incentive to play well on ?
Had austria had MORE top end talent, their chances go up. The more they approach the depth of other nations, the closer the games get ( I don't think that any nation has a patent on top end talent, the best players from austria can play with the best players anywhere). This is the reason for team leftover europe. More depth = more parity = less cannon fodder teams hoping for their goalie to go god mode = more competitive games.
the players are under contract so what they complain ( or don't) about is moot. The people who OWN those contracts ARE complaining. Complaining about a lot. complaining about how olympic participation has NEVER given them or the league a jump, complaining how they have to shut down their regular season to accomodate these games, complaining about potentially losing a star player in a playoff run. complaining about how after getting the shaft at EVERY turn ( including the inability to use the games to promote their players) that they get to walk away with the grand total of bubkis.
if the players wanted to put riders in their contracts that let them leave their teams to participate in the olympics, they are free to do so. How many have ? If the answer is zero, then if they go they are in breach and they are very much putting those guaranteed contracts at risk.
I'm just wondering if you support all forms of endentured servitude, or only those that happen below the 5 rings ? the five rings who are getting FAT off NHL talent for essentially finding someone to drive a zamboni.
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