If the NHL does NOT participate in 2022
- Thread starter Jack Butler
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I'm glad I can watch my favourite NHL team like usual and tune into some Olympics at the same time personally. The hockey side is suffering for sure but that's ok because the NHL is still going without a break.
Also, nice to watch athletes that aren't winning the lottery jackpot salary wise every year they play do their thing knowing how much they must have trained for it.
I guess I'm old and maybe I'm not remembering correctly but I feel like when I was a kid the Olympics were all amateur athletes.
So non-hockey enjoying the Olympics, hockey enjoying NHL. Don't care that the NHL isn't there tbh.
Also, nice to watch athletes that aren't winning the lottery jackpot salary wise every year they play do their thing knowing how much they must have trained for it.
I guess I'm old and maybe I'm not remembering correctly but I feel like when I was a kid the Olympics were all amateur athletes.
So non-hockey enjoying the Olympics, hockey enjoying NHL. Don't care that the NHL isn't there tbh.
Canuck21t
Registered User
None of them are amateurs anymore anyway. Non-NHL players just come from other professional leagues. You must not like the sport of hockey then if you don't care to see the best players of the world playing in the highest caliber tournament.
The Jones Zone
Registered User
Other:
If NHL doesn't play, it's just really, really tough to watch
1980 will never happen again
If NHL doesn't play, it's just really, really tough to watch
1980 will never happen again
Chimpradamus
Registered User
You know there's a world outside of North America, right?
--
And this amateur nonsense has to stop. You know who the amateurs were historically in the olympics? Rich aristocrats who could practice sports basically full time, because they had the financial means to do so and didn't have to be paid.
Or are you implying you want to watch kids and beer leaguers play hockey? If you complain about the quality now, what the heck? You want to see plumbers and electricians play hockey in the olympics? Why? Because HF posters want to play in the olympics?
The NHL will continue with their Mickey Mouse tournament in pre-season, with players who haven't played a game in months. And I will care as little as the last time. There were discussions to form Mickey Mouse teams based on the origin of a player and not the citizenship. Sounds great, the sooner they drive this farce into the ground, the better.
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Getting a jab at the Chinese market overshadow everything, including Bettman's ego.
NyQuil
Big F$&*in Q
Jack Butler
Registered User
- May 3, 2014
- 441
- 0
The Olympics only allowed "amateurs" but the definition of "amateur" was open for debate. If I'm not mistaken, Olympic boxing only allows amateurs, and once you go pro, you cannot return to amateur status. (edit - apparently that rule was changed for the RIO Olympics) Of course, athletes need money for training, food, etc. so there is a soft definition of "amateur" that applies, not the dictionary definition. In hockey, amateur could be defined as anyone who has not played professionally for a tier 1 or tier 2 league, or someone that has not earned more than a certain amount.
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It's basically a perversion – sorry to use the harsh term, but it's fitting – to consider a competition of clubs, representing cities, in any way more important than a competition of nations on the international, world stage.
What can you say? It's an American concept that American cities are more important than nations from around the world. They have the money to support such arrogance. But it's arrogance, no doubt about it. I suppose it's too tempting, when you have the money to overpower everyone else and all other considerations, to confuse your own country with the entire planet.
See also the ridiculous moniker of "World Series" for another North America-only sporting competition, or the Oscars pretending as if they were truly rewarding the best movies of the year instead of American movies of the year, etc. It's the unwitting arrogance of big nations, and Russians are suffering from it, too (though in other areas), and I suppose nothing can be done about it. We must indulge our big brothers in their belief that their country is synonymous with the planet.
What can you say? It's an American concept that American cities are more important than nations from around the world. They have the money to support such arrogance. But it's arrogance, no doubt about it. I suppose it's too tempting, when you have the money to overpower everyone else and all other considerations, to confuse your own country with the entire planet.
See also the ridiculous moniker of "World Series" for another North America-only sporting competition, or the Oscars pretending as if they were truly rewarding the best movies of the year instead of American movies of the year, etc. It's the unwitting arrogance of big nations, and Russians are suffering from it, too (though in other areas), and I suppose nothing can be done about it. We must indulge our big brothers in their belief that their country is synonymous with the planet.
vorky
@vorkywh24
- Jan 23, 2010
- 11,607
- 1,374
Agree.
The same attitude is with the NHL & rest of the world. Like, there was no other hockey league outside NA. If the US was not the biggest economy of the world, the NHL would be nothing. And the US/the NHL has been losing their status, step by step.
Suntouchable13
Registered User
No, the perversion is the obsession over this tournament. It's boring as all hell. I just prefer NHL over international hockey. Bunch of made up teams who were just assembled for 2 weeks.
I can tell you what's for me, and I am pretty sure the same thing is valid for a lot of europeans from different countries, an international competition and why I love it so much.
First of all, nationalism or national pride has not much to do with it.
I'm not more proud to be swiss then I am proud of having dark hair ('cause we all know, better bald then blonde), I am not supporting the team because I want to see proven any kind of point. I like beating Germany, but not because I hate Germany, it's because for some reason I just like to beat Germany.
At the end of the day, international competitions mostly are an excuse to watch sport together with people I would normally not do that with, including strangers, organize gatherings and having something to talk about at the barber shop.
I have no problem goin to a bar alone when the national team of whatever sport is playing because I know that I will find someone there willing to share a couple of beers.
I love watching Dario Cologna winning the 15K together with my 2 yers old son and act all excited waving flags so he gets excited even though he has no clue about what sport is (or Switzerland for what that matters).
And after that going to work and say to the colleagues: " ah! You norwegians really suck at winter sports, you lost, we won the gold!"
You know, national teams are just an excuse to act stupid and have fun doing it.
For me.
Sort of.
...and that was the end of my stream of consciousness, sorry for interrupting.
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hockey is your only chance 
You know who's mainly to blame for any boredom this year, right? That's right, the NHL.
If any teams are artificially "made up", it's those representing North American cities in the NHL, because the players representing the clubs typically have no connection whatsoever to the city the club is representing. The club simply had enough money to buy those players.
National teams at least make sense in that the players playing on them typically were born in that country, so there's a natural connection to the team. In contrast, NHL teams are nothing but collections of mercenaries, aren't they? If it weren't for the money, they would never play where they are playing.
And, oh, if you're suggesting the NHL, like the European hockey leagues (you know? although it appears you perhaps don't), would be willing to interrupt its season several times each year, to facilitate national teams play, as has always been standard in Europe, I'm all for it. In Europe, national teams aren't "just assembled for 2 weeks" – it's a season-long affair for them, you know? It's one of the reasons why Slovenia has been able to defeat the US at this tourney.
I get you, but the same thing can be said for a competition of city clubs. So if we agree that watching sports is simply an excuse for "acting stupid", then sports on a multi-national level should have a natural preference over sports pertaining to cities inside a single country (or two).
Yeah, but the problem, at least when it comes to my experience, is that there is a lot of people that takes clubs way too seriously. Everything often turns in to really stupid stupidity. National teams sort of unify people under the same kind of funny stupidity, instead.
...but anyways I do not really disagree with what you are writing, I just thought I had something to say about your post but I forgot what straight away and got carried away by my own line of thoughts.
EDIT: I am just trying to understand why I love national sports so much even though the whole concept of "nationalism" is so distant from me as it could possibly be.
Same for me. I despise nationalism. I suppose it comes down to education – the culture in which you grow up. If you grow up in a culture that suggests there's nothing more valuable in life than money, then, of course, the NHL will be more important to you than the Olympics. But if you grow up in a culture (as I did) suggesting there's no greater honor than representing your country on the international stage (and I assure you that has nothing to do with nationalism – after all, internationalism was part of the official Communist ideology), then you will naturally value Olympics, and the World Championships, over any competition of city clubs.
I probably would prefer club teams if they would consist of local talent rather than mercenaries, now national teams are the closest thing we have to that even if the idea behind them is becoming increasingly anachronistic. Sport should be about achieving something as a community in good spirit, and competition at the same time also friendly and inclusive cooperation with other communities, uniting rather than dividing.
Am I allowed to display my displeasure for the ceremonies here, or is this just a pro-Olympic echo chamber?
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