Ice guys finish last

Myriad problems put hockey's future in doubt

Invariably, one sport becomes everybody's whipping boy. Usually, it's baseball. Now, though, it's hockey. The National Hockey League is attracting so much criticism these days, you would think it was France. The game is put down as too defensive, all hooking and holding, and not enough scoring. Its economy is a mess. Either the players are overpaid or the owners are idiots. Or, usually, both. Two teams are bankrupt. Ticket prices are too high, but, on the other hand, too few eyeballs choose free hockey on TV. And over all this looms labor negotiations, which could shut down the season that begins in October of 2004. If that sounds far off, labor and management are already full of ire, distrust and invective for one another.

Oh yes, and then there's the Canadian dollar.

The easy part should be improving the game. The league has made rules in the past few years to help increase scoring, but, for some reason, the referees won't enforce them. I'm sorry, I don't understand that. Further, it's obvious that the goalies are larger and more agile but they're all so padded they look like the Michelin Man. It's a wonder the puck ever makes it between the pipes. In 1982, Wayne Gretzky scored 92 goals. Could he have posted half as many in today's conditions? Until the NHL takes care of its product, it is hard to feel sorry for the league.

For its financial difficulties, however, one must be more sympathetic. Poor hockey. It really isn't fair. Who would have ever thought that such a wonderful spectator game would be such a disaster on television? But so it is. The speed is, somehow, lost on the screen. The fighting looks slapstick. And the puck. The puck is too small and too elusive to follow, especially on those rare occasions when it actually does get into the net.

The only other vigorous 20th century institution that televised so poorly was Lyndon Johnson .

So, while other sports thrive on TV and dine out on TV money, hockey lives beyond its means. We have a situation where each NHL team makes $5.7 million from national TV revenue and pays an average player salary of $1.6 million, while each NFL team makes $77 million in national TV revenue and pays an average player salary of $1.1 million. That is, an NHL team makes barely 1/14 of what an NFL team does from national television, but its average player salary is 31 percent more than that of the NFL. This is not a recipe for economic success. Ice guys finish last.

Moreover, the NHL's contract with ABC and ESPN will be up after next season, and given its ratings, which trail even bowling now, there's no assurance that the league will even make that pittance in the future.

As the only major team sport without a salary cap or a luxury tax on high payrolls, the NHL is still living in a dotcom economy. Saddest yet, the place that really cares most about hockey is the place that can least afford it. That is Canada, where players must be paid U.S. value with a domestic income based on 65 cents to the U.S. dollar. Ottawa is one of the bankrupt teams. Calgary and Edmonton might have to move south of the border . . . well, if any U.S. buyers could be found.

People in hockey are already musing that high definition TV will make the difference. Oh, please, Mr. NHL, don't kid yourself. For hockey to thrive again it simply must learn to forget the siren call of television and operate like a theme park. All live and raw and noisy.

Sports Illustrated senior contributing writer Frank Deford is a regular contributor to SI.com and appears each Wednesday on National Public Radio's Morning Edition. He is a longtime correspondent for HBO's Real Sports and his new novel, An American Summer (Sourcebooks Trade), is available now at bookstores everywhere.

 

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