SI.COM article: NHL needs to reexamine its alliance with Olympics

[Jazz]

... and do you have any proof, numbers, stats, articles or anything to show that, in some way, the Olympics have benefited the NHL in some way (financially) ?

Because that is the bottum line to the NHL.

And my counter-arguement is there is long-term benefit to consider as well, not just the short term monetary gain. That is (and you have not yet responded to this, so I will re-iterate) there will be more hockey players from different parts of the world for the NHL to draw from.

Since the Nagano, you have seen hockey players from countries never before represented in the NHL (ala the NBA): France (Huet), Austria (Vanek), Japan (Fukufuji (LA prospect in their farm team)), Belarus (Kostitsyn), and I will guarantee that within 4 years, you will see new players from Denmark, Hungary, and Slovenia.

The Olympics is the only time when hockey is shown in primetime in some countries (like the 2 examples above of members from Croatia attested to).

 

[Phanuthier*]

I understand living in Canada doesn't help feeling the Olympic hockey vibe, but what can you do? Go back to not sending NHL pros, not win gold for 50 years, and whine how you don't have pros there? For the 4 years since Nagano to SL City, it was a matter or pride to regain that gold from the Czechs.
Ask the players how they felt about it.
And if Iginla, as you say, feels lukewarm about it, then he shouldn't play. It's that simple.
It's not like Canada would suffer without him, with Staal and co. waiting on the taxi squad.

I honestly didn't know Canada hadn't won a gold in 50 years until they mentioned it in 2002.

Yes, the Czech's showed pride. Some guys don't. Smyth does, Kiprusoff doesn't. Lemieux does, Scott Niedermayer doesn't. Or just look at how many Russian players have declined invitation.

 

[Jazz]

....I understand living in Canada doesn't help feeling the Olympic hockey vibe, but what can you do? Go back to not sending NHL pros, not win gold for 50 years, and whine how you don't have pros there? For the 4 years since Nagano to SL City, it was a matter or pride to regain that gold from the Czechs. ...

Yes, it was....

The more I think about it, for the sake of future Olympic participation, if would be better if Canada will not win this year...that way the country could get hyped up for it again for 2010. I hate saying that, because I really want Canada to win on European soil....

 

[Phanuthier*]

I have Anze Kopitar drafed 11th in last year's draft, for example.
Vanek's in Buffalo already.

You'll see more and more players from "obscure" hockey countries emerging, until one they they're not as obscure.

That's great, but how exactly did that benefit the NHL?

 

[Epsilon]

... and do you have any proof, numbers, stats, articles or anything to show that, in some way, the Olympics have benefited the NHL in some way (financially) ?

Because that is the bottum line to the NHL.

Here's a simple reason: it helped the owners end the lockout, in terms favorable to them. They got the meat and potatoes (salary cap, revenue sharing), and the players got to pick the sides and veggies. This was one of them.

 

[Phanuthier*]

And my counter-arguement is there is long-term benefit to consider as well, not just the short term monetary gain. That is (and you have not yet responded to this, so I will re-iterate) there will be more hockey players from different parts of the world for the NHL to draw from.

Since the Nagano, you have seen hockey players from countries never before represented in the NHL (ala the NBA): France (Huet), Austria (Vanek), Japan (Fukufuji (LA prospect in their farm team)), Belarus (Kostitsyn), and I will guarantee that within 4 years, you will see new players from Denmark, Hungary, and Slovenia.

The Olympics is the only time when hockey is shown in primetime in some countries (like the 2 examples above of members from Croatia attested to).

Is getting a couple extra players worth teams sacrificing their season, and for some (ie. Ottawa, as above) blowing their chance at a cup that they haven't had in the 14 years they've been in the league, and it'll be another 10 if they lose Hasek or Redden for the rest of the season?

 

[Phanuthier*]

Here's a simple reason: it helped the owners end the lockout, in terms favorable to them. They got the meat and potatoes (salary cap, revenue sharing), and the players got to pick the sides and veggies. This was one of them.

The Olympics helped end the lockout?

And wasn't this an issue the NHL pursued just as much as the players?

 

[Jazz]

I have Anze Kopitar drafed 11th in last year's draft, for example.
Vanek's in Buffalo already.

You'll see more and more players from "obscure" hockey countries emerging, until one they they're not as obscure.

That's great, but how exactly did that benefit the NHL?

Easy, more stars to market around, both locally and back in the "obscure" country...it starts a positive cycle.

You don't think Buffalo is happy to have Vanek?

 

[Epsilon]

The Olympics helped end the lockout?

And wasn't this an issue the NHL pursued just as much as the players?

Everything I read made it sound like it was something the players wanted in the CBA.

 

[Phanuthier*]

Everything I read made it sound like it was something the players wanted in the CBA.

Yes, and it was what the owners wanted too.

Who pursued the idea of the NHL participating in the Olympics to begin with (1998)?

 

[Jazz]

Is getting a couple extra players worth teams sacrificing their season, and for some (ie. Ottawa, as above) blowing their chance at a cup that they haven't had in the 14 years they've been in the league, and it'll be another 10 if they lose Hasek or Redden for the rest of the season?

Players can get injured during the NHL season as well, so no difference there...

Beside, with the big ice, there are not as many hits anways, so the chances of injuries are less....how many season ending injuries did we have in Nagano and Salt Lake? I don't recall any.

 

[Phanuthier*]

Easy, more stars to market around, both locally and back in the "obscure" country...it starts a positive cycle.

You don't think Buffalo is happy to have Vanek?

So to have a couple extra stars in the league, 4-5 teams risk gutting their 1 in 30 year chance of winning the cup?

I'm not saying there's no benefits, don't get me wrong. I'm saying the benefits don't nearly outweigh the costs of teams that might be risking their season if one of their star players is lost due to the Olympics. This is why I think that, should there be no immediate (2 years) results, this is the last time we'll see the NHL in the Olympics.

 

[Phanuthier*]

Players can get injured during the NHL season as well, so no difference there...

Beside, with the big ice, there are not as many hits anways, so the chances of injuries are less....how many season ending injuries did we have in Nagano and Salt Lake? I don't recall any.

The injuries don't happen due to the Olympics... they happen after. Things like fatague and travel could and have lead to injuries after the Olympics.

Example of season ending injury: Mario Lemieux, 2002.

 

[Jazz]

The injuries don't happen due to the Olympics... they happen after. Things like fatague and travel could and have lead to injuries after the Olympics.

Example of season ending injury: Mario Lemieux, 2002.

Mario was already injured in 2002, and he admittedly paced his season to participate in the Olympics (he got flack in Pittsburgh over it). He did play a couple of games after Salt Lake before packing it in...

 

[Phanuthier*]

Here's a link:

http://proicehockey.about.com/library/weekly/aa030602a.htm

While the chance is minimal, it would be very big risk to send an injured player (ie. Kiprusoff, Niedermayer) to go play a gruelling Olympic schedual overseas, then come back.

Your topic you presented in this thread that owners should not worry about their investments for the "greater good of the game" - the fact of the matter is, if you are a contending team, a team that has a 1 in 30 year shot of winning a cup, there is no way you send your key players if they are injured. NHL owners have every right to be concerned with their investment.

 

[Chimpradamus]

... I think this is the NHL's last kick at the can. There's no use sending them to Vancouver.

Are you kidding me? Europe is forced to sell their best hockey players to NHL teams for coffee money. Until the new contract, the European club selling a newcoming world star got like $12,500 for giving away their player. That's coffee money. No wonder why the Russian League thought also the new contract was pure crap (which was only slightly better, or slightly less worse). "Ok, except for the coffee money, we will give you this wine opener as well."

You can see them play every night, season after season. And you can't let us Europeans see our own players for 2 weeks every 4th year? What's wrong with representing your country in a world competition? In NHL, teams switch residence in no time, nothing is worth anything if it isn't for the all precious $.

 

[jekoh]

Since the Nagano, you have seen hockey players from countries never before represented in the NHL (ala the NBA): France (Huet),

France was represented by Bozon before Nagano

And Belarus by Tsyplakov

 

[Corto]

Your topic you presented in this thread that owners should not worry about their investments for the "greater good of the game" - the fact of the matter is, if you are a contending team, a team that has a 1 in 30 year shot of winning a cup, there is no way you send your key players if they are injured. NHL owners have every right to be concerned with their investment.

I don't think anybody's saying you should send injured players.

Every other sport in the world does it... Allow their players to play for their national teams. Why should hockey be any different?
Handball for example, which is pretty big in some bigger as well as smaller European countries, as well as the hockey countries of Sweden and Russia, has a break in the middle of the season to play either European or World championships.
I guarantee far more injuries happen there than at the hockey tournament in the Olympics.
Footballers have pretty meaningless friendless a few times in the season and players get injured.
And Chimp does have a point... Best European players play in the NHL... And while I'm sure the popularity of hockey wouldn't drop in Canada if the European clubs asked for football money for player transfers (which you still may see with Russians), I think some of the flavour would be lost if there were no Europeans coming over to play anymore.

This isn't 1980. It's simply not healthy for a sport to stay secluded and apart from the rest of the world.

 

[Chimpradamus]

I honestly didn't know Canada hadn't won a gold in 50 years until they mentioned it in 2002.

Yes, the Czech's showed pride. Some guys don't. Smyth does, Kiprusoff doesn't. Lemieux does, Scott Niedermayer doesn't. Or just look at how many Russian players have declined invitation.

It's not a good thing the NHL players are becoming more and more like the NBA diva sissies. "Boo-hoo, I don't get any money for this, I don't want to play! I want another ferrari."

Players should know it's a priviliege doing something you love as a job and earning tons of money for it. You don't give them the right signals by telling them "forget about anything but you and your salary."

In most parts of the world, the national team, in EVERY sport, is the biggest thing. You take pride in representing your country, you don't consider it "a goddamn extra duty which you don't get any extra $$$ bonus for." Sadly, in hockey, this is changing to the worse.

Philadelphia is whining like hell on Forsberg not to play. I don't think they get what an honour it is to him to represent his country. He won't play if he doesn't feel 100%, but I think it shows something that he didn't care one bit about them whining on him, he still made his own decision. Ask Mats Sundin why he has jumped into every single crappy World Championship in spring when he has had the ability (after Toronto has been eliminated and he feels like ****), which is every year in some small country, with little status. He does it because he considers it an honour to represent his country and he knows how much it means for his fellow countrymen. Even if he could need the rest and he is tired, he still goes there. And we love him for it. Mats Sundin is considered much bigger than Niklas Lidström and Markus Näslund for example, because he has represented and performed for his country so much more (especially in Lidströms case, it's kind of unfair, since Detroit always advances so far and he almost never have any opportunity).

We need more Mats Sundin and less Kobe Bryant athletes.

 

[helicecopter]

Personally, I think they ought to just take hockey out of the Olympics. There are 6-7 countries that are competitive on the men's side, and 2-3 on the women's. Not enough.

Just in case you didn’t notice, Latvia tied US the other day and yesterday Swiss beat Czech Republic. AND Belarus was 4th in the last Olympics. Besides, countries like Kazakhstan, Latvia, Belarus, Switzerland, Germany..are only going to furtherly improve pretty soon..

 

[helicecopter]

Because I know the profit of the NHL in 1994 was growing fast - almost to the level of the NBA's - but from 1996 - 2004 (included a World Cup and 2 Olympic tournaments) the NHL saw its dwindle, and in many markets, go spiralling off into the crapper.

Yeah, I guess the NHL was real successful from all those international tournaments, right?

So….what?
For what we can know numbers would have been even worse without Olympics and WC..

From 1995 through 2004 the NHL product on the ice has been sucking, that’s the first reason for the bad spiralling.

Another good reason could be their pathetic marketing program..

Everyone (unbiased) really thinking that taking part at the Olympics is not going to help the NHL in the long terms must be really shortsighted.


The point is to do it properly. Cause if you make the best players play 120 games in 240 days they are going to be too tired to show how good they are when the casual observer is watching. That’s’ a valid point for the NHL alone, too.

Example: suppose i am not an hockey fan and I am going to watch a game at the Olympics cause someone told me the bests in the world are going to be there.
That night the big stars are playing their 4th game in 5 days along which they had to recover from the jet leg too.. and that after playing a lot of NHL games in the few days before. Potential result: the stars are exhausted and they suck, so I come away from the game thinking “ Yes, this new (for me) game is funny but, are these the best players of the NHL? Not a big deal..â€

 

[helicecopter]

I think if this one doesn't do boost the NHL to any recognizable level, this is the last time we'll see the NHL in the Olympics

lol, the next Olympics are in Vancouver and you really think NHL stars won’t be there?

 

[helicecopter]

I think they should see about switching hockey to the summer olympics

Agreed on the rest of your post, but not on this one.
Hockey is one of the biggest things (and in some countries THE sport) at the Winter Olympics. In the Summer Olympics would be lost.. and wasted.

I think what could be improved is the timing of Winter games as a whole.
During the Summer games a lot of people is on vacation or can plain vacation if they want and has the time to care about, watch and attend the games. In February most people works and won’t do that. On a side note, through the second half of February till its end (when Olympics finish), people is already desiring Spring more than snow, and in some potential hosting places at the end of February snow and ice are often running out already..

My thought is that they should play the Winter games from, say, December 22nd through January 9th.

But I know there would be a problem to solve for hockey, with the ongoing World Junior Championships..

 

[Jazz]

France was represented by Bozon before Nagano

And Belarus by Tsyplakov

Ah yes, Bozon I forgot about...thanks.

I purposefully left out Tsyplakov and Salei (Belarus) because they were brought up in the old Soviet system and just happened to be from Belarus. The new crop of players are entirely developed by the Belorussian program

 

[HockeyCritter]

The Olympics helped end the lockout?

And wasn't this an issue the NHL pursued just as much as the players?

The IOC was the driving force this time …….and Vancouver pitching a fit.