24's on Ice: A Guide to Watching the NHL in 2009

I don't get Versus and I know Americans try hard to hate hockey, so my efforts to help out with this piece are likely in vain.

Nevertheless, Versus has released their TV Schedule for the 08-09 NHL Season and I wanted to offer a viewing guide for those interested in setting their TVO's months in advance. To further my assistance in the matter the games will be judged on a scale we are all familiar with: intoxication.

I'd Watch it Sober:
Oct. 14* 7:30 pm Philadelphia at Pittsburgh
-- Division rivals that battled all season last year. This won't be the only Pens game worth seeing with your wits about you.

Jan. 12* 8:00 pm Detroit at Dallas
-- A very probable preview to the Western Conference Final, this one will turn your crank all on its own.

Mar. 17 7:30 pm Philadelphia at Detroit
-- While we're on potential previews, here is a late-season bout between the two clubs who could very well battle for the right to Lord Stanley's mug (Philly offering the best value for '09).

Might Need a Sixer:
Oct. 5 2:30 pm Ottawa at Pittsburgh
-- Two of last years' favorites clash nice and early in '08-'09. The playoff history between these two teams means we might get a rare regular-season game with intensity.

Nov. 10 7:00 pm Tampa Bay at Washington
-- give me AO and a vastly improved Lightning squad any day. This one will be good enough to enjoy sober as a judge, which is exactly why I'll take it up a notch with the suds.

Mar. 31 7:30 pm Chicago at Montreal
-- One of these teams could over-achieve and make a lengthy playoffs run so the idea of them facing off late in the season stokes me up. Have one for each Toews, Kane and Sharp while they battle the Brothers Kostitsyn and Carey Price (maybe a few for the latter as well).

You bring a case, I'll bring a bag:
Nov. 11* 7:00 pm Pittsburgh at Detroit
-- Stanley Cup re-match. Pittsburgh got worse and Detroit got better, but revenge is well nigh.

Jan. 5* 7:00 pm Pittsburgh at NY Rangers
-- I can't frigging believe I'm all over the Penguins again, but this scheduale is deficient in match up's worth getting excited about.


Take 4 Deux Deux Deux's for a little pop:
Nov. 25* 7:00 pm St. Louis at Nashville
-- Chris Berman has been dreading this one. Have you ever heard of Canadian Asprin?

Jan. 24/25 All-Star Weekend
-- I don't want to be another guy crushing the All Star festivities, but they are more disappointing than the Canadian Summer Olympic team. It might look good on paper, but rarely delivers...


[Hat Tip to Greg from Puck Daddy who inspired this article and broke it down nicely here.]

Thanks for reading, and by all means subscribe and come back real soon. Cheers, Derek.

Oprah tells NHL: Hire good people, be successful like me.

Oprah is a ludicrously successful person, but she didn't say that about hockey. /shock/ I think she might know it exists though. Regardless, this is how your NHL team can find success just like O.

This is an interesting time of the year for the NHL in which something incalculably vital to organizational success is going on under the guise of the Stanley Cup Playoffs. This determinant of success is in reference to the host of managerial and coaching contracts being discussed and subsequently signed over the last few weeks.

The invaluable role that coaches and managers play in team success can too easily be overlooked. These types of decisions which influence your on-ice product so tangibly are becoming of increasing importance in an NHL rich with parity. Your teams' path is laid for the future through the executive restructuring ongoing throughout the Spring months currently upon us. How important are the decisions your team is making right now? Very.

In any walk of like, often people of superior talent and intelligence rise to the top – this is why the smartest guys on Wall St. are hedge fund managers, why infomercials feature the same people repeatedly, and of course, why Crosby, Zetterberg, Malkin and Datsuk are so much better than their peers (but, thats another topic altogether). This excruciating analogy speak to the collective desperation in which teams – from all sports leagues -- explore the Saharan pool of available world-class management.

Naturally, the off-season is a happy place where teams dream of a bright future often overlooking the 50% chance they have of finishing in bottom half of the standings. The rampant delusions around this time of year lends itself to the symbiotic shuffling of management and coaching. So you pull the plug on the old hack(s) and bring in the new miracle worker. Funny thing about that though....

There aren't many miracle makers in the business of orchestrating winning sports franchises. All the guys old enough to recall a legacy worth remembering are dating themselves back to the Battle of Queenston Heights (alright, maybe just back to hippies). My point remains: the value of good management is priceless.

Take a quick look over the dog-and-pony show that is the Maple Leafs GM search and you'll have to look no further. The media has obsessed endlessly because it so important to them! Just picture Trader Cliff on the blood pressure monitor 24/7 as he endlessly searches for an adequate solution. Other teams has since resolved their vacancies however, with Dallas, Colorado and Vancouver all putting the pieces in place recently in preparation for the draft.

The Stars locked up the incumbent Brett Hull and Les Jackson by ceremoniously removing their Interm tag, Colorado decided to go back to Tony Granato (who was the bench general from 2002-04), and Vancouver told coach Alain Vigneault that he can wait another year to be a lame duck. (I guess Van City GM Mike Gillis is the old ball breaker hes made out to be.)

Lest we forget the lengths that people and organizations go to in an effort to retain good talent. Several have gone so far as to deny the right to negotiate with an individual under contract (even if, contrary to the customary practice, that job was a promotion).

This is a ruthless business where cash-cow markets can take advantage of their dough simply because there are no salary limitations within the managerial ranks. It encourages the thought: Why are managers and coaches making Darren McCarty-type money, when sane rationality dictates they should be living like Crosby? Eventually, it will come to this, or market principles tell us it should. There will be a great deal of resistance from some owners, but over the course of time their dollar will get stretched by fielding poor teams manifest through poor decision-making executives. In time, it will force these owners to make it rain on someone capable of winning.

How can one deem a GM capable of delivering victories? I'm a strong believer in established team identity as a predictive measure of success (in all sports). Managing means developing this identity and exemplifying it on the ice with the players of the ilk required. It's like seasoning the perfect bone-in Rib Eye streak, or playing jenga – its all about balance and timing. Its about managing the right ingredients to fit the mold you deem most likely to produce championships. But, its not easy...

This is evident around this time of year when we see and hear all of the organizational restructuring (as the GM-types might say it) around the league. It reminds you how exposed and vulnerable they are in a position that always demands success – not merely from the fraternity of their peers, but the ravaging fanatics who pay their salary with ever ticket. Being a GM or a coach is all about risk-reward: thankfully for them, those who succeed are being increasingly compensated for their work. This is a trend, unlike the men themselves, with a termination date far out of sight.

8 Radical Rule Changes to Revolutionize the NHL.

Hockey purest continue to deny changes are necessary, but reality dictates otherwise. The NHL needs needs to stop looking in the wrong places to improve (see: enlarged nets) and listen to these recommendations.

1. Bigger Ice Surface. It doesn't require much analysis to decipher why this would make the NHL game better. As the sun has shrank over the last few decades so has the relative size of the NHL ice surface with the increasingly larger men playing the game. Opening up the rink even fractionally will increase the defensive players' ability to move the puck up to the forwards (the most critical transition pass in hockey), in addition to providing skill players more room to negotiate down low, in the offensive corners. Expanding the rink hurts only the owners who must forfeit the revenue currently generated from the first few rows of pricey seating -- fortunately, most can afford it when adjusted for the greater good.

2. Balance the Schedule. Yet another shortsighted rule that has limited fan interest in the post-lockout era. The unbalanced schedule designed to create inter-divisional rivalries, in spite of those inter-conference, has depriving NHL fans of formerly more passionate and historical match-ups. At a time when the whole planet is expanding and embracing globalism, the NHL is foolishly isolating and disconnecting from it's fan base. To rectify, evenly distribute inter-conference contests amongst all 16 clubs and ensure each team in the NHL meets one another at least once per season.

3. Determine playoff seedings by raw point total within your conference. No more of this horrendous divisional non-sense. Once the schedule is balanced as per above, this initiative should be promptly inked into the rule book since teams are (now) playing inter-conference games in equal abundance, thus eliminating the any rationale in allowing divisional winners to steal the top three conference seeds. This will avoid mis-matches throughout the playoffs which often spoils some of the more competitive series prematurely.

4. Stop awarding points for LOSING. Why does the NHL insist on being the only professional sports league to award the loser points – it's like a participation ribbon: lame and ineffective? It skews the standings by inflating the points awarded to average teams who are good in specialized situations, like OT and the shootout. This was an unfortunate consequence of the New NHL which can instantly be repaired by rewarding three points for wins (while keeping all other things equal). Increasing the incentive to win will award aggressiveness at the games' conclusion rather than the passivity the league endorses presently. In turn, the fans are treated with clearly enhanced entertainment value.

5. Make like International Hockey. Replace the Conference Finals with League-wide semifinals by mandating a crossover when only four teams remain. The Top Western team plays the low-seed Eastern team and vice versa. Doing so will ensure the utmost competition in the final stages of the Stanley Cup Finals – utopia given the talent disparity between conferences (a phenomena that spoiled the NBA championships this year past). The League-wide Semi Finals could see season-long rivals, or traditional match-ups (like original 6 teams) that cannot manifest under the current playoffs structure.

6. Allow GM's to compensate trades with CASH. The salary cap has created an era with restrictive and often unfeasible constraints when negotiating moves in player personnel. In other words, trades are now very difficult to execute, which has decreased the ability for fringe teams to acquire star power or depth for a playoff push Were teams allowed to share a portion of Player X's contract following a transaction, the GM's would have more than enough freedom to be active and improve their respective team. Creating this degree of freedom will also help reduce the frequency of these well-extended, often front-loaded contracts that have become emerged as a byproduct of this CBA.

7. Drop the Instigator Rule. With powerplay proficiency a make or break characteristic in the New NHL, we mustn't penalize enforcers who protect the (often entertaining) skill players. Removing the Instigator Rule will likely reduce the cheap-shots and poor conduct observed in recent memory, while ultimately creating fewer serious injuries. Not only are these changes in the interest of players and their safety, but they also benefit the fans. Say what you will about violence in sport, and I'll say this so you don't forget it: fighting is good for hockey. This rule is much like the stringent regulation on celebration in the NFL -- they penalize players for performing an act in which 90%+ of the fans actually WANT to see! Why diminish the entertainment value of sport in need of exactly that?

8. Contraction. The excess of teams in the NHL has diluted the talent pool initiating a decline in the quality. By contracting the league and reducing the number of teams in the NHL to 26, the NHL can effectively concentrate talent and improve the overall quality of the game. Think of the impact that 12 top-liners would have on leagues remaining clubs by imagining what it would be like to add Eric Stall up front. (Yes, hint: Carolina, Tampa, Atlanta, Florida should get axed.)