NHL fans what do think of this idea?

Question

What more can the sport of hockey do to increase the level of interest in the sport again. Is contraction of some of the southern state teams a good idea, maybe spread the wealth of good players to teams that actually get some attendance, or not contract teams but move em up north of the border. I am sure quebec and winninpeg would love a nhl franchise again. or do you have any good suggestions?

Answer 1

They need to contract some and move others.

Answer 2

Lmao I commend you man for recognizing the unpopularity of this sport, the fact is that it'll remain unpopular and never will surpass the other three major sports, mainly b/c kids can't go find an iced area to play a game of hockey unlike in football, baseball and basketball where facilities are more plentiful (moreso than an ice rink at least).  In addition, hockey requires too much equipment that its more of a hassle than recreational, sorry the NHL is a bust

Answer 3

ESPN!  More coverage on a MAJOR (Versus is not a major network) and bring back "National Hockey Night" with top Eastern and Western conferences games twice a week if not more, and the resulting hype/coverage on SportCenter would drastically increase interest in hockey as a whole.  I mean who realy watches Versus except people who are outdoorsy and like hunting and fishing shoes or have a hard on for Jimmy Houston (can't believe I even know his name!)  For all the Flyers fans, I will keep it simple so you get it too:  Increase Interest = NHL + ESPN  

Lets Go Caps!

Answer 4

De-evolving. No more of those stupid trapezoid rules that does nothing. Leave the game exactly the way it was.

Answer 5

First of all, to increase the level of interest in the sport, we cant expand back to canada. They already have interest in the sport and thats not our goal here. We need to get a better marketing campaign. You see the NBA on MySpace all the time advertising. You see This Week in Baseball every Saturday afternoon. The only places you see an NHL show or see NHL on the internet is on NHL.com and NHL.tv. We dont need more southern teams because they still arent going to have interest in the sport. It would be like the Minnesota Timberwolves. They would go to the games for the first couple years because it's something "new" and then lose interest. Besides, they are to busy clinging to their guns, religion, and Nascar. As much as it hurts me to say this, we need to get an ESPN contract. Im not saying get rid of versus, but we need ESPN. If you look at the NBA, they have TNT AND ESPN. MLB has TBS AND ESPN. Im not even going to go into the NFL. We can have two cable networks that carry hockey. If we have hockey on ESPN, think of the Bar outreach. How often do you walk into a bar and see Versus on one of the screens? NEVER unless your in Minnesota and we already have a strong hockey fan base, obviously. Think about it. Guy walks into a bar, who has no interest in hockey, for a beer, sees hockey on, thinks to himself "well theres nothing else on" and watches Sidney Crosby or Ovechkin make on of there signature goals and is instantly hooked. Maybe im imagining things here but really can hockey in bars hurt the NHL fan base. Sure espn may only cover 1 game every 3 weeks, which I am probably overexagerating(spell check) here but still I think more time on ESPN would definitly help us. Finally, bringing up my point earlier about not expanding to the south, we would need to do some other stuff BEFORE we expand down there. I would think outdoor hockey camps for kids in select cities would help the NHL a lot. They would go into select towns, find a big enough parking lot, lay some sythetic ice down and do some camps to teach kids how to skate, shoot, pass, and general rules of the game. It could be payed partly for by a sponser like Gatorade and maybe boost the rep of the NHL. Local media would be there and possibly national media if its sucsessful(spell check, again). We could do a bunch of somewhat funny commercials in southern towns explaing the rules of hockey and use them during the season to promote when the next game on versus or NBC is on to attract viewers there to. Im 13 and I thought of these ideas. what can adults in the NHL hq's think of. I guess well have to wait and find out.

Answer 6

Yes I'm like a broken record BUT move the Atlanta franchise to Quebec City.I would keep the other Southern teams where they are however.Dallas and TB are still very good draws and the Cats have good draws when they have a good team.

Answer 7

The only thing that will help increase interest is if people actually sit down and attempt to get into hockey.  The biggest problem is that most people in the U.S. don't grow up playing hockey because of the cost and accessibilty.  The only time I was exposed to hockey as a youngster was playing floor hockey once in a while in gym class and watching the Olympics.  I really liked playing and watching it, but never had much chance to do either so while I knew I loved hockey, I never had the chance to really get into it... until my parents got cable during the end of my senior year in high school back in 1996.  I've been seriously hooked ever since.  I've watched pretty much EVERY Wings game from the end of the 1995-1996 regular season on.  Most of the games I missed, I taped and watched anyway.   All it takes is for people to give it a chance, but most Americans don't want to even bother with something they don't understand.

Answer 8

Contraction and moving are not ways to boost the popularity. Stable franchises with growing fan bases are. And since you have presented nothing new and instead only the same tired drivel that has been posted here again and again, I"m not going to go into the gory details.  Just one quick note too: in order for the NHL to either fold or force a franchise to move, they have to buy it. And that's a lot of money, even for the teams that aren't making a lot, if any, money.

Winnipeg and Quebec would both love them I'm sure, but economically they cannot support one. THAT'S WHY THEIR TEAMS MOVED IN THE FIRST PLACE!

Answer 9

Canada doesn't need another hockey team, it is popular there already and a lot of teams can't fit the good players down south in their salary caps so it just wouldn't work. Bringing a hockey team to Canada if you are the owner because you will make money but if you are trying to make the sport more popular it won't do that much.

Answer 10

Make Tuesday nights free beer and lap dance nights,

Answer 11

ESPN is very influential, maybe have a few games on there? even though that'll never happen.

spark342 - what makes you hate hockey so much? i once heard  hockey is the 'rich mans sport.' are you mad that hockey costs more to play and you can't afford the equipment? sorry it's not as cheap as football, whereas you only need a football to play.

Answer 12

^ what is your problem sparky? Did a Hockey player steal your girlfriend or something?

OK, understandable, but why do you feel the need to come here and bash it. WE like it! I think Basketball is just about the stupidist sport out there, yet I don't go and bash it.

Answer 13

they should create more teams-espically in states that are hockey lovin-northern ones love it cuz of the weather

also, they should televise the games on more popular tv stations and add more canadian teams

Answer 14

It sounds to me like you are contradicting yourself. If you want the sport of hockey to increase its fan base and to become more popular you need to expand in areas if it is not yet popular. Most of the people in North Carolina or Tennessee probably never cared about hockey until they got an NHL team, now there are many people in those areas that are passionate fans. Adding more teams in Canada, where everyone is already a fan of hockey, will not increase the NHL's fan base.