OT: NHL Realignment

I really like your effort and breakdown, but I highly doubt the NHL would give up 3 teams from each conference. The NHL would not ever give up the New York Islanders ever either. They were one of the most historic and successful teams to ever play in the NHL. They haven't been good for a number of years, but thats like the NE Pats sucking for the next 15 years and the NFL decides to get rid of them (maybe that not a great example, but you get my point). I think the NHL needs put together a checklist or criteria for deciding upon which NHL teams should stay, which teams should be relocated, and which teams should just be terminated. If a team stays then the league needs to work with the NHLPA, and ownership to market its product better to create more fan support and revenue. If a team gets relocated then it has to go to a hockey rich market where there will be a lot of support and the team will have a much lower chance of failure. If a team gets terminated, which I think is a great option for no more than 2 teams per conference, then the NHL can reassign those players to different teams. This will raise the skill and talent of the league because more teams dilutes the talent pool. A more talented league means a more competitive league and a better product to market. Who wants to watch Tampa Bay versus Detroit? The answer is no one. Who wants to watch Chicago and Detroit with Chicago getting Lecavalier and Detroit getting St. Louis out of the termination of Tampa as a NHL franchise? Along with this, I think the NHL needs to adapt its rules a little bit to create a better product (and this is coming from a hockey purist that threw a coffee cup through the TV when Fox put that red beacon/streak on the puck to follow it). I think the rink needs to be widened by 5 feet and goalies pads needs to be shrunk (god they are huge, look at 80's and 90's equipment compared to now). This will create more offense, more goals, more excitement. All of this should lead to an increase in fan support and a more prosperous NHL (or so I hope). Discuss

The possibility of the NHL completely giving up on a team is ludicrous, and I highly doubt any teams will just be terminated. No major league has ever contracted, and it would make a bigger mockery of the NHL than it already is. I agree that the league might be better served with fewer teams, but I think we've already gone past the point of no return with 30 teams. The economy would have to get really bad for enough owners to bail on the league. I think the six division, five team format works well. The geography works well as it is. If Phoenix and/or some other southern teams are moved, I think it would be great if more teams were in the West. Winnipeg obviously want a team, and how about Seattle or Salt Lake? It would allow some teams like Nashville and Detroit to join the East, which would ease traveling for them.

You cannot arbitrarily drop teams. If the NHL had the money it takes to contract teams, they wouldn't have any financial worries at all. Me, I'd add two teams. Get it up to a nice even 32, and a few teams probably need to move as well, like the Panthers, maybe the Coyotes and Devils maybe the Thrashers and Predators, although in all cases I really think a team needs to stay in a town for about 20 years before you can really judge it - let a generation of kids grow up with the team, that's how you build a lasting fanbase. Anyway, 32 teams, eight divisions of four just like the NFL. Add Las Vegas, Houston, Seattle, Hamilton, Milwaukee, Kansas City, whichever two have the best plan. Organize the divisions in whatever way seems geographically the best, and whatever way gets the Wings in the same division as the Leafs and Blackhawks. Then the first round of the playoffs would be the two best teams in each division going at it. Bettman wants to boost geographical rivalries, this is the way. Afterwards re-seed all teams by record, then do it again til the Cup Finals. Oh, P.S.: anyone expecting the owners to approve anything where the number of games goes down is insane. That's four lost home games in the above plan. A sold-out home game is worth about a million and a half of revenue.

I see your point about the skill level as compared to the 70's and 80's. But I think what jmblue means is: Overall talent would improve for every team, if there were less teams.

I actually thought about this the other day after hearing Valenti talking about it, and I think going back to four divisions is the way to go. Like someone above said, have the first two rounds be within the division to keep rivalries alive and the ridiculous time zone differences to a minimum. The wrench I'd throw in would be to reseed after round two. You have the four division champs and seed them 1 vs. 4 and 2 vs. 3 so the matchups would be mixed up and the east coast teams would have equal opportunity to have 10:30 pm starts. Going just by the map, this is how I'd do it. West Vancouver Edmonton Calgary San Jose LA Anaheim Colorado Phoenix (or whatever they become) South Dallas Nashville Atlanta Tampa Bay Florida Carolina Washington North St. Louis Minnesota Chicago Detroit Toronto Columbus Buffalo East Montreal Ottawa NY Rangers NY Islanders Boston Philadephia Pittsburgh New Jersey I don't have the energy to figure out how to make an 82 game schedule out of that. Biggest point being it would make the playoffs a lot cooler if you were guaranteed to play local teams for the first few rounds like they used to and the lack of "conferences" would make the semis cooler.

They got rid of the conference and division names because those were too old-fashioned and they thought that changing them would bring in new fans. Boy that sure worked well.

is that Bettman's long-term strategy has failed. His plan, since the 90's, was obviously to sell the NHL to the broad majority of the United States, not simply Canada and the pocket hockey hotbeds in the United States in New England and the Great Lakes. It all boiled down to TV markets, and that's why we have hockey teams in places like Tampa, Miami, and even Columbus (prior to the Blue Jackets it was the single largest TV market in the country without a major sports franchise). In theory, more exposure to Americans with buying power meant better ticket and merchandising sales, and across the board Canada's population and economy, at least in the 90's, didn't compete. Why it didn't work was that the media never bought in, partially because of the labor stoppages, etc., but really because they never got the ratings that the NHL promised. ESPN didn't drop the NHL because they don't like the sport-- they dropped it because they could get more people to watch NBA games and Baseball Tonight than NHL hockey. So who's to blame there? Probably the marketing of the league as a whole-- but it's pretty hard forcing something on people that they just don't have a need for. Selling hockey to the MAJORITY of the deep South was no easy job, and no matter how hard they try to tell us otherwise, it just hasn't happened, and I doubt that it will. So after the lockout, ESPN dropped the NHL, and Bettman's worst nightmare came true as the national relevance of the brand, or game, dropped to new lows. And at that point it was twice as bad because in the process of selling the game south of the Mason-Dixon line, Bettman alienated many of the diehard fans who originally made the sport what it was. Hockey is and always will be a part of Canada, and for the most part he packaged it up and moved it South for more money. And it failed. It's surprising that Canadians aren't more bitter about it, really. Say what you want about Balsillie's deal, but there's no question that the passion for hockey in southern Ontario is ridiculously larger than that in Phoenix. Or Miami. Or Tampa. Or even New Jersey. Imagine if Goodell suddenly decided that the future of football is in Europe, and slowly but surely started changing the game to make it more appealing to them. What kind of message does that give to Americans? And then what happens when the league fails over there? I think, at this point, what's best for hockey is to re-connect with its core fan base. It seemed for awhile there that Bettman was so concerned with making hockey the #3 sport in America that it became the #2 sport to many diehard hockey fans. I wouldn't be the Michigan fan I am today if I was still into hockey as much as I was 15 years ago. Bettman should reach out to these people and make the most money he can off of them, and when he does reach out to new markets he should be branching off FROM these established venues rather than cutting off the limb to grow elsewhere. The American South has not given up NASCAR to follow the NHL-- Now go back to Canada where they're begging for it. And besides, that Winnipeg Jets logo was killer.

I have ever read on how to save the NHL. http://www.slate.com/id/2175024/pagenum/2/ How great would those last few games of the regular season between last place teams be if it meant if the winner would be an NHL franchise? TV history.

...they would do away with geographically classified conferences altogether. The NFL and MLB don't classify conferences geographically. If the NHL were to get rid of geographical classifications, travel costs and fatigue would even out for everyone. You would then have a NY team and an LA team in each conference. Go back to the old names Wales and Campbell or create new ones: Howe and Gretzky, e.g.

drop the kings, sharks, and canucks. they always choke in the playoffs and they aren't realatively new teams.