Ice Hockey

Discussion in 'Chit-Chat' started by Pecheur, Mar 30, 2004.

  1. demolidor

    demolidor Regular Member

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    From the vault :D

    [​IMG]

    June 20, 1994
    Hot Not
    While the NBA's image has cooled, the NHL has ignited surprising new interest in hockey
    E.M. Swift

    Let's see if we've got this straight. NBA basketball, as played by the Eastern Conference champions, the New York Knicks, is called "butt-ugly" and "thuggish" by USA Today, while the erstwhile black sheep of professional team sports, the National Hockey League, appears in the "Styles of the Times" section of The New York Times, where it is described as "hip," "sexy" and "cutting edge."

    The Los Angeles Times, citing a 30% drop in prime-time television ratings during the conference finals, denounces the NBA playoffs as "a game of mud wrestling" and host to "the occasional near riot," while the trade magazine Sports Licensing International gushes that "the convergence of an exciting sport, a new executive team at the NHL itself and a renewed marketing emphasis at NHL Enterprises has made hockey the place to be."

    Basketball, thuggish? Hockey, the place to be? Talk about your role reversals. When former NBA executive Gary Bettman took over as commissioner of the NHL last year, everyone predicted hockey would assume the NBA look: hip music in the stadiums; an influx of young, energetic marketing whizzes in the league offices; zippy new promotions. What no one foresaw, however, was the simultaneous and inexplicable NHL-ing of the NBA: on-court brawls spreading into the stands; a sudden and embarrassing franchise shift; bizarre, pugnacious behavior by out-of-control owners; outrageous refereeing gaffes; and spin-doctoring denials from the league.

    "Attendance was up, TNT had record viewership during the regular season, and the NBA Finals will be seen live in 117 countries," says commissioner David Stern, bristling at the suggestion that the bloom is off his league's rose. "The business of basketball is doing great. This was the year the naysayers said the NBA without Michael Jordan was going to fall off the face of the earth."

    No one is suggesting that the popularity of the NBA is in free fall. During the regular season TV ratings were virtually unchanged from 1992-93. Celebrities—Alec-Baldwin, Billy Crystal, Bill Murray—still stud the stands. Two expansion franchises, in Toronto and Vancouver, were admitted into the league after agreeing to pay record-breaking entry fees of $125 million each. And the estimated $300 million in retail sales that NBA Properties generated overseas showed that, internationally, there is life after Michael. But since the playoffs began, what has taken the plunge is the NBA's image as the rising star of pro sports.

    What passes for Showtime! these days is the snarling, elbow-throwing New York Knicks—egged on by that yapping court-side terrier, Spike (Put a Muzzle on It) Lee—muscling home 70 to 85 points a night against the Jordan-less Chicago Bulls, the low-profile Indiana Pacers and the charisma-less Houston Rockets. It was enough to make hard-court fans pine for the return of Bill Laimbeer, not to mention Magic, Larry, Michael, Isiah and Dr. J, one or more of whom, until this spring, had been in the Finals every year since 1980. "The Knicks' style of play is like Ohio State football," admits NBA vice president Brian McIntyre. "Three yards and a cloud of dust. It doesn't do much for the average fan."

    Actually it encourages the average fan to change channels, if he hasn't done so already. Even with the inclusion of a team from New York—the nation's largest market, at 6.68 million TV homes—NBC's ratings for the first game of the Finals fell 35%, to 12.6, from a year ago, when Chicago faced the Phoenix Suns. Imagine what they would have been had the Pacers, with their market of only 850,000 TV homes, made it to the league's showcase event. "We expected our ratings to drop," says McIntyre. "Last year's average rating was the highest ever, 17.9. It was the third straight year the Bulls and Michael Jordan were in the Finals, people knew them, and they were playing against Charles Barkley. We had a lot of dynamics in our favor."


    Continue reading: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1005307/index.htm

    You can actually read the entire issue I see which includes a bit about the '94 Canucks - Rangers Finals :cool:
    I guess this is from before the strike hit the NHL and threw it back in time :rolleyes:
     
    #41 demolidor, Jun 11, 2011
    Last edited: Jun 11, 2011
  2. demolidor

    demolidor Regular Member

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    Hockey is also the rage of the videogame market. The NHL game, created by Electronic Arts, has sold more than a million copies at $60 in each of the past two years, almost twice what the company's corresponding NBA game has sold, and comparable to the most popular basketball game on the market, Sega's NBA Jam. "It's big in England. It's huge on campuses," says Don Transeth, vice president of spoils marketing for Electronic Arts. "And a lot of these people are learning hockey through the video game."

    That statement, as self-serving as it may sound, was recently confirmed by a 17-year-old friend of ours, a basketball player, who said he was following the hockey playoffs because he'd been hooked by the NHL '94 video game. "If the boys in the junior class were to make a list of their favorite things," he said, "first would be sophomore girls. Second would be NHL '94. Everyone plays it." Where, he was asked, did the girls in his junior class rank? "Way down. Not even top 10."

    As yet ESPN's ratings do not reflect this surge in hockey interest. With the Rangers' games contractually not available on ESPN in the New York market (the MSG Network carries the games there), ESPN has averaged a 1.8 rating, minuscule by NBA standards. "Nobody should read too much into the ratings," says Bettman. "We were off TV so many years, we're in the rebuilding process. If we were still getting those numbers in five years, I'd be disappointed." The NHL also had six games televised this season on an over-the-air network, ABC, where it drew a lowly 1.7 average rating.

    The league's horizon is not bereft of its clouds. It, too, must negotiate a contract with its players union, which has been without one for more than a year. Hockey has also had to deal with the ire caused by a controversial franchise shift, from Minnesota to Dallas. There have been problems with ownership, most notoriously in L.A., where profligate Bruce McNall was forced to relinquish control of the Kings. And flagging attendance has plagued both the New York Islanders and the Hartford Whalers. But even Stern, Bettman's former NBA boss, is impressed with what's going on over at the NHL. "Hockey is doing well and, in percentage of its growth, will continue to do well," Stern says. "They should do well. They have a very good blueprint to follow."

    A blueprint that the NBA, by all appearances, had better take back to the drawing board.
     
  3. madbad

    madbad Regular Member

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    Go Canucks. Finish it in 6. It'll be tough to do it in Boston though.
     
  4. MilGauss

    MilGauss Regular Member

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    Boston Brewing! Molasses in Beantown are too thick to slither around for the Van boys. We'll see.
     
  5. Fidget

    Fidget Regular Member

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    Well, well Boston won.
    Sorry madbad, but that little Haligonian "rat" helped beat your team, again. ;)

    Timmy T looked a little tired at the end, though. Why didn't they rest him in the 3rd? They were lucky that Vancouver didn't try to injure him (although one guy sat down right on his low-back during that final power-play. Ouch!)
     
  6. madbad

    madbad Regular Member

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    OUCH!

    That's why they have 7 games, right? :p
     
  7. madbad

    madbad Regular Member

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    Dang right. The ice, if that's what you can call it, definitely resembled molasses.
     
  8. demolidor

    demolidor Regular Member

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    [video=youtube;D7g3RuoreRc]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D7g3RuoreRc[/video]
     
  9. MilGauss

    MilGauss Regular Member

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    It's not called beantown for nothing! Come on Van boys, get yourselves together and see how hard it is to tough it out on (in a Game 7) frosted molasses!
     
  10. demolidor

    demolidor Regular Member

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    This Day in Sports

    SI Vault: More Rangers

    1952 -- Warren Spahn of the Braves ties NL record with 18 strikeouts in 15-inning, 3-1 loss to Cubs
    1965 -- Reds' Jim Maloney no-hits Mets, but loses 1-0 in 11 innings
    1969 -- Reggie Jackson of the A's has 10 RBI in 21-7 win over Red Sox
    1992 -- Chicago Bulls beat Portland, 4 games to 2, to win NBA title
    1994 -- Rangers end 54-year drought by beating Canucks in Game 7 of Stanley Cup Final


    Read more: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/20...mi.heat.morning.jolt/index.html#ixzz1PGFnvgaD

    And I thought this series was exceptionally late :eek:
     
  11. demolidor

    demolidor Regular Member

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    Wasn't even on YooToob yet :rolleyes:. Good thing I'm a neutral here: don't like anyone on either team :D

    [video=youtube;Wx13OwN2Euc]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wx13OwN2Euc[/video]
     
  12. demolidor

    demolidor Regular Member

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    Well "neutral", neutral about the Canucks and don't like the Bruins so I guess i'm rooting for the Van Boys eventhough if there is no Sedin magic this time around they are truly the champion of meagerness (roughly translated from the dutch "kampioen van de armoede" i.e. champions because the rest was even worse ;)).
     
  13. demolidor

    demolidor Regular Member

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    :cool: Exciting match so far, worthy of Game 7. Too bad I can't keep my eyes open :eek:, let's see if a little powernap will work :D
     
  14. Fidget

    Fidget Regular Member

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    Boston wins the Stanley Cup!
    Not exactly what our Vancouver friends were hoping for. But still, it was an exciting series and the Boston team was deserving. :)

    There is no reason for Vancouver to hang their heads. I just hope that the media in Vancouver don't make Luongo the scapegoat. :eek:
     
  15. madbad

    madbad Regular Member

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    Boston was the better team tonight. Congrats Bruins
     
  16. demolidor

    demolidor Regular Member

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    [​IMG]
    The goalie, Tim Thomas, will continue on, but the 43-year-old, Mark Recchi, all but officially announced his retirement after Boston's 4-0 Game 7 victory.

    What a way to go out.


    ;) This series can be summed up in two parts: what happened before the Aaron Rome hit on Nathan Horton and what happened after the hit. Boston seemed dormant emotionally at the time, down 2-0 in the series and looking too much like "Mac" in the old Charles Atlas comic ad -- at least the pre-lifting Mac, when he got sand kicked in his face. The hit on Horton was a cheapie, but for Boston it proved ironically priceless. It gave them a rallying cry, and from there it was all different.

    Read more: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/20...ey.cup.finals.game.7/index.html#ixzz1PR3qJUWT
     
  17. george@chongwei

    george@chongwei Regular Member

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    Canada was in a terrible condition yesterday after an ice hockey game
     
  18. madbad

    madbad Regular Member

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  19. druss

    druss Regular Member

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    Are you referring to the loss or the rioting? Besides those in Vancouver, the fans across Canada were probably split between the two teams.

    Agreed, the antics of a few will always blemish the reputation of many. Out of the 100,000 spectators downtown only a few dozen rioted but it cast a black mark on the entire city.
     
  20. demolidor

    demolidor Regular Member

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    Haha: "got pics?" http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/mu...-canucks-fans-riot/content.1.html?eref=sircrc

    Fine them extra for wearing imitation/fake jerseys as well!
     
    #60 demolidor, Jun 16, 2011
    Last edited: Jun 16, 2011

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