I'm fresh off of watching my beloved Avalanche win a 5-4 OT thriller on a penalty shot and another 6-5 rally against Florida. For a game that has been sapped of its aesthetic appeal these were the kind of games I feel lucky as an Avs fan to have and would love to put Gary Bettman in a Clockwork Orange eye vice and force that basketball exec to see how the game can be played.

So with the lockout looming, the game being dragged down into the sewers, and the TV contract expiring I'm sure alot of hockey fans are trying to enjoy the NHL while it lasts.

And please Canada do something about Don Cherry! I expect to download the next Coach's Corner and see him with an armband with a maple leaf on it.

Sadly, hockey is in deep hurting. Just this very morning I was lamenting the fact that although it's freaking January, baseball gets more coverage on Sportscenter than hockey. This is a station that has every reason to promote the sport (seeing as they, you know, televise it), and yet appears ready to simply eliminate it from it's flagship recap show. Hockey can't receive more than 4 minutes of coverage per average show, and rarely even cracks the first half hour anymore. I've hated Sportscenter's neglect of the sport for years, but now it's reached truly appalling levels.

Six, seven years ago I really thought the NHL was onto something, and was doing a good job promoting itself as an up and coming game. Now it appears destined to head back to regional obscurity, which is just too bad.

That Avalanche/Tampa Bay game was great -- too bad sportscenter is more interested in covering fights in hockey than decent games. They barely talked about the Avs-Lightning game, but they were all over the Eric Lindros/Joe Thornton fight that evening.

Part of hockey's problem is that basketball has gotten its act together in the last 5 years (the NBA was at a low point when hockey was doing well). But more of the problem lies with the league itself. It's disappointing to see fewer and fewer games on ESPN.

Did I say something about ESPN sucking ass when it comes to hockey coverage earlier? They must have taken that personally, seeing as they are right now showing freaking Baseball Tonight immediately following the hockey game they showed. In January.

I hate that fucking network.

Oh yeah, ESPN is the worst about hockey. Forget promoting it as much as baseball how about as much as soccer or the WNBA (at least in purpotion to the fanbase.) I know ESPN can't show alot of game featuring Canadian teams because of CBC, but I had to go to a bar to watch the Heritage Classic. I like most of the announcers, who seem to enjoy the sport like anyone who has taken the time to get into it, but Gary Thorngassm is a detrement to the game. He calls the wrong name decides on a storyline for a game and sticks with it to the bitter end, intones "This is not a power play," when ever a team gets penned in its own zone for 2 seconds.

Yeah the NHL really screwed the pooch during its renaissance during the Rangers run to the Cup and the early Avs-Red Wings wars. They would have been better off to realize that the NHL is a niche market, but a viable one. Instead we get players, agents, a union and the New York Rangers who think $10 million a year garaunteed isn't enough, Bettman letting the quality of play deteriorate while remaining in denial of the problem (the joke I use "All is well, remain calm, all is well!") The refs go on double-secret probabtion every year on obstrution only to swallow their whistles about a quarter in the season and generate another wave of bad press. The league overreached into lousy markets (Some worked, but when Peter Karmanos moved the Whalers he chose Carolina over Minnesota.) And just bad ownership Bill Wirtz, and Jermemy Jacobs are putting a drag on the league by driving their fans away and remeber when the Yakuza owned the Lightning.

Now I don't think Hockey is any worse run than baseball (the other two...) but baseball can always recover because of it's built in propaganda machine of nostalgists and apologists (how to this day the argument over baseball vs football is even an issue is beyond me.)

ESPN still shows hockey? I've had Center Ice so long that it's do not pass go, just go to channel 740 and start looking for Wings games there. The only ESPN hockey commentator I can handle is Dave Strader, and I'm not sure if he's even there anymore.

And I'm still trying to figure out the All Star rosters. Big Keith Primeau gets in? No Matthieu Schneider? No Milan Hejduk? Could they just go ahead and scrap the all teams must be represented nonsense, and give us a West team of Detroit, Colorado, St. Louis, and Vancouver, and an Eastern team of New Jersey, Ottawa, and Philly, and you'd end up with a much better situation.

They haven't had the rule that all teams have to be represented for a while now, but they still try to spread it around as much as possible. I don't get some of the selections this year, though (Keith Primeau? Filip Kuba?).

I've heard rumors that the NHL will end up on SpikeTV if they can't get a good contract for ESPN. This might just be certain people's wishful thinking, but I hope that doesn't happen... I can't imagine that network doing a good job of covering hockey.

SpikeTV is owned by Viacom, which also owns CBS and UPN, so I guess there would be the possibility that they might shift some hockey to the broadcast networks if the ratings are high enough...or at least borrow some competent technical people from CBS Sports.

Until the problems with the CBA are resolved, why would any network want any part of the NHL. Does anyone know when when the contract runs out?

The CBA expires September 15. I'm not entirely certain when the NHL's contract with the Disney family of networks expires.

I found a pretty good article about the current situation regarding the television contract. One of the most interesting points is that any new agreement will probably cut network revenue in half.

While it's true that NHL teams don't rely as much on national TV revenue as the other leagues, losing a couple million dollars per team is going to hurt (especially in light of the rumor that the owners want a cap in the 30-35 million dollar range.)

On a related note, I can't help but notice the huge difference between the way the NFL is marketing its new channel and the NHL's ad for their NHL Center Ice. The ads with Roenick and Carter look amateurish compared to the NFL's ads.

Now that I think about it, they also look pretty sad compared to the ads ESPN ran when they picked up the NBA despite the fact that they use a similar premise (stars living together under the same roof).

The Spike TV deal sounds like on of the awful deals of the Zeigler era that weren't even nationwide. I remeber buying some playoff games on pay per view (during Denver's taint period with the NHL.) The thing is the NHL needs ESPN much more than ESPN needs it. I think even second class citizenry on ESPN2 would be preferable to getting shunted to another cable channel. Everyone gets ESPN2 these days anyway and ESPN and the Deuce are inseperrable in most minds. The league also needs to avoid losing prestige of a non sportsnet.

Got to agree the ads aren't any good even in comparison to older hockey campaigns. The Black & White ads featuring players that ran during 90's were alot funnier. My favorite was the "Now you understand playoff hockey." the only two I remeber was the kid hearing about the school closure and the guy jumping the fence and hearing the guard dog.

Speaking of ads, the Hockey, Made in America is awful by any standard. It's a factualy dubious claim to begin with, the ads a deadly dull and they seem to be in responce to the xenophobia going around. It's as if they're saying "Relax it's not that kind of Frenchmen! We don't have many Germans!"

So Jagr to the Rangers, they deserve eachother.

I hated the Hockey Made in America campaign as well. I couldn't understand what they were aiming for. Were we supposed to believe the claim or laugh at the guys for believing that hockey was made in America. Their choice of a tv factory was also weird because while it worked visually, but there are no televisions made in America. Was that part of the joke?

My favorite hockey ads were for the Caps in the late nineties. They were very funny and managed to feature individual players off the ice as well as in action.

xaxat, IIRC, the Hockey Made In America campaign is based on ESPN showing US-based teams, whereas CBC(?) shows the Canadian-based teams. I'm sure some of our North of the Border friends can clarify this issue.

Huge hockey fan right here! It's not just national coverage of hockey that is suffering, it's local coverage as well.

Look, my Pittsburgh Penguins are having some really really tough times right now, but the play so hard, I mean they battle with teams, they battled Ottawa 6-5, and played the Avs pretty evenly. They've even beat teams like Detroit, New Jersey and Philadelphia.

The hockey game coverage is fine. Mike Lange is amazing, Bob Errey is no Edzo, but he'll do, and there are great shows like "The Edzo Show" and stuff.

It's just the local media never gives any attention to the Penguins unless they lose. They beat New Jersey 4-2, nothing is said. They lose to Tampa Bay 3-1 and it's all over the news.

I'm just tiring of Pittsburgh obsession with the shoddy Steelers and the Pirates...well let's not even mention them.

Me too, except the Leafs are my team of choice. I'm not surprised that ESPN is being half-assed in their NHL coverage, I saw it coming the moment they landed the NBA broadcast rights. As far as local coverage I'm in Flyers country so they're getting a lot of attention, probably because the Eagles are done and the Sixers are circling the drain. Too bad I hate the Flyers, and if I had to see that asshat Jeremy Roenick one more time during the Center Ice preview last week I was gonna do an Elvis on my TV.

How many NHL games is ABC contracted to air, regular-season and playoffs? I think I've only seen one weekend's worth of games, and if they're not going to be consistent about it, a la the MLB Game of the Week lo this many Saturday afternoons ago, why are you forced it show it once?

I actually like ABC's coverage; I like Gary Thorne very much, Bill Clement is solid, and I wish Mike Emrick and John Davidson would've transposed their duties from Fox. (I miss the team of Steve Levy and Darren Pang as well, because, well, I don't have cable.) One of the big explanations as to why hockey doesn't pull in big ratings is because it "doesn't translate well to TV" and I don't get it. I saw a Wild game tonight (led 2-0 in the second and lost to the Habs 3-2 in OT; the Wild just suck shit right now, goddammit...), and while I was so glad to see it live (though having second-row seats may have helped greatly) I'm sure I'd be into this game if it were on my local station.

Which leads me to my conclusion: I don't think hockey pulls in big ratings because ... many people just don't like hockey. I love hockey, but I think that's because I live in a hockey state. With sports, you have to be inculcated in it, know your team, the players, the nuances, the rules, the reasons why the team's winning or losing, etc. It may take a generation of teams in hot-weather climes to truly make the NHL a national sport, but my guess is people in the South won't feel hockey the way people in Minnesota or Massachusetts do, as we will never know how Canadians truly feel about hockey. Sad, but ... possible.

Want more evidence? Since I'm out of work I don't have to go to sleep until 6 in the morning, and at 5 a.m. I listen to "Mike and Mike" on ESPN. I also frequent the sports boards at TWoP a lot. There is so much coverage about football, baseball and basketball on both vessels, and it gets very microscopic, and we get so passionate that we frequently go off-topic and talk about the games themselves. Not only are there many, many less mentions of hockey on that show and many, many less posts about the NHL here, but the only times I've heard or read anything about it, it isn't about David Aebischer completely filling Patrick Roy's shoes, or the stylish play of the upstart Atlanta Thrashers. We talk about the health of the sport. And when the only thing most people know about the NHL is the current labor shortage (my quick take: salaries should be at least half of what they are, 75% ideally), you're kind of fucked.

Well Hockey is a success in Colorado after being a niche sport for years, but we're an unusual case to say the least. We got a great team instead of a plodding bunch of trappers, the Avs brought the city it's first championship (it was like VJ-Day,) and we have such a massive amount of imigrants we had ready made rivalries (tons of asshole Red Wings fans.)

I agree hockey is an aquired taste, but in 1996 I went from seeing pucks having a cult following to something everyone was into. Amoungst my friends the same was true.

I say it's an aquired taste. It takes about a year to get a good understanding of the sport. I know that sounds insurmontable, but I've tried explaining our football to europeans and that is our most popular sport.

Anyway All-Star weekend the NHL gets a ratings boost from football fans who are having break-up sex with the NFL and get too drunk to turn of the TV! It makes me pine for the real all-star game to be played this summer. Perhaps I'll go see Miracle.

Has anyone seen hockey on an HDTV? I remember reading an article in which a league official (maybe Bettman, I'm not sure) placed hope in the fact that HDTV would provide a boost in the ratings because it could cover the sport better than regular TV.

I've seen football in high def and it is awsome (the fact that it was a 48 inch screen probably had something to do with that), but I'm skeptical that HDTV would provide hockey viewers with a more of a positive experience than any other sport. If so, hockey would be at them same place fighting for coverage, only this time on HDTV.

I just watched a bit of the all-star game in HD(on CBC) at the electronics store and I must say that it was very good. I could actually see the puck. It wasn't as good as the college basketball game I saw in HD a while ago.

[ot]We'll see what happens in the playoffs. Boy, oh, boy.[/ot] (Yeah, another Colorado fan here, in Colorado. Hi, Hasbro!)

I'm very interested in seeing the sport in HD, too, especially with ESPN pushing it by showing that red-outlined box of what you get vs. what you could have on each game. Is it that much sharper? Brighter? I never watch for the puck, so I dunno if that would sell me, but anything that improves the occasional muddy, blurry presentation is bonus in my book.

Count me as another fan of the Thorne-Clement team: I just like their chemistry, the sense of fun and humor they bring to games. I know the sport; I don't need someone explaining and analyzing it for me. Make me smile, that's good enough most games. I like most of the broadcasting teams ESPN/ABC fields, in fact. Maybe I'm not picky enough? (Sorry.)

Heck, I even like it when they mike up a player, such as J.R. in the All-Star Game yesterday. I'm a sucker for the personal touches, even if they are preaching the choir, with me.

I notice ESPN is starting to run those 'Relax, it's just a game' ads that pissed Cherry off when they ran on the CBC last season. Of course anything is better than those Hockey Lake assholes.

I love those commercials, especially the one where the father makes his son go down in a manhole during hide and seek.

I love those commercials, too. My girls softball coach could have used a viewing of those when I was a kid.

So now that the season is almost over, ESPN 1&2 are showing a lot more hockey. I'm looking forward to the Tampa Bay games this coming week or so. I've picked them as my team of the moment (since my hometown team, the Penguins, are so painfully awful there's not much to root for with them). ESPN seems to be talking Tampa up a bit too much right now -- I enjoy them, because they don't trap much, but I'm not sure they're going to win the East.

Any other good games coming up?

deimos speaking as another Penguins fan, I assure you that you will come to regret your flirtation with another team. All we need is financing for a new stadium, for the ping pong balls to give us the first pick in the draft, in the abscence of a CBA some type of transger process that will allow us to sign Ovechkin, a work stoppage short enough so that it doesn't destroy the team or the league, and the creation of a CBA that provides effective cost controls.

That's all we need to get back into business!

Edited to ad that I alos noticed that the aptly named penguinette is also a Pens fan, how about that three of us on this board!

deimos, look for Philly/Detroit on Sunday afternoon. No.1 in the East vs. No.1 in the West.

Where does Barry Melrose get his suits from? The Michael Irvin collection at Pimp Daddy Slim's mens outlet?

Considering that it's hockey, maybe he is using Don Cherry's haberdasher.

Usually people think about Deion or Irving when it comes to suits, but Cherry has never been reluctant to dispay a certain sartorial splendor.

Well Hockey is a success in Colorado after being a niche sport for years, but we're an unusual case to say the least. We got a great team instead of a plodding bunch of trappers, the Avs brought the city it's first championship (it was like VJ-Day,) and we have such a massive amount of imigrants we had ready made rivalries (tons of asshole Red Wings fans.)

You can't really tell if hockey is a success in Colorado yet, Hasbro. The team was built in Quebec and the Avs have never been supported through bad years yet, because they've never had any. If the fans support the franchise through tough times, you may be right. Most American fans won't, though, because they have too many other options. Vide Dallas. Same situation, but the franchise is now slipping, and isn't drawing.

I like to watch the Avs, though, at least they don't trap. Ditto the Wings. The Wild and the Devils should be outlawed.

The trap is a function of over-expansion, and over-expansion is a feature of Gary Bettman, a basketball man who knows dick all about hockey and proved it by running the league into the ground.

Not that I disagree with your reasoning, but there isn't a single major US sport that hasn't over-expanded. Football, baseball, basketball and hockey could all do with some contraction (not that it'll happen unless teams go bankrupt).

To get back closer to topic, anyone think there'll actually be a season next year?

Yes, but. Those other sports are a lot more popular than hockey. There are a lot more potential players for those sports, too.

The NHL was demanding $50 Million per franchise. Worth it in Canada. Not in the States.

Football actually isn't overexpanded at all. The only team that has no hope is the Arizona Cardinals, and that's mainly because of their awful ownership. Otherwise the Revenue Sharing with the TV Networks and the Salary Cap give hope to every team in the league each year.

Hockey and Baseball are however, extremely overpopulated. When the strike is over, you will easily see 8-10 teams out of the NHL.

We are very much off topic here.

Tommorow is the second greatest event of the Hockey Season, the Trade Deadline. again I must express my envy at Canada for having a network that drops eveything to cover the flury while I'm stuck rechecking the net and listening to sports radio updates (ugh!) I get repetative stress disorder after about three passes through ESPN news. However with the thing I don't know how this swap meet is going to stack up to others and it also seems like teams aren't waiting for the last minute to get things done. Case in point the Rangers and Caps have already dismantled their rosters with only a few pieces of bait left. Being an Avs fan it's alway a pregnant pause around here considering Lacroix surprises us with some deal about this time.



Well in our deffence our youth hockey programs have tripled, our college programs are getting a boost the Univesity of Denver moved into a new arena restablished itself as a national power and has a TV deal now too and there is a new minor league team in Ft Collins. The Denver market also had the highest ratings for the 2002 Olympic hockey in the US, so I get a bit incredulous at all of the "three times before the cock crows" talk. I think the team would have to deliver a massive insult upon the city for there to be a massive exodous, like the Nuggets did when they decided to rebuild a second time and only got going this year.

ESPN News channel did have a nice hour long show for the last hour before the deadline. They also carried a press conference from Pierre Lacroix- mostly talk about l'affaire Bertuzzi and Moore's medical condition, but a couple questions on the trades as well.

It's now 4:12 est, and I'm really a bit surprised that no one has announced a Kolzig trade yet. (at least it hasn't shown up on tsn.ca yet)

Iwas watching the Avs Van game last night and it was one of the more vicous things I have seen in my hockey life. The local announcers were broken up about what happened to Moore and were having a hard time finishing the game.

I'm a real draft pick/ prospect head when it comes to hockey and always liked Moore so seeing him get three vertibre broken in real time was absolutely heart stopping. I knew Bertuzzi was a jerk, but this. On top all of this Moore was apologetic about the hit on Naslund, Naslund forgave him, Vanco didn't take up this issue during the last game in Denver, Moore fought in the first period and the thing about that Naslund game not getting any press about the game that started this mess is Peter Forsberg got injured in that game in because of being mugged by Jarko Ruttu.

Coach Mark Crawford and Mike Keane are utter hypocrites in my eyes. The were members of the Avs during the infamous brawl with the Red Wing over retribution of Claude Lemeuix's hit on Kris Draper (ironicaly czar of discipline at the time was Vancouver GM Brian Burke.) Detroit like Vancouver sought retribution at a home game after forgoing the opportunity to do so in Denver. Keane called the Wings "A bunch of gutless homers" that night.

Well the NHL is left to salvage it's reputation as a it's been branded as a thug league again. A bunch of pundits who never watch the sport are sure to come out of the woodwork to scold the climate of violence. Yet NASCAR, boxing, and wrestling are popular in this country.

Not to mention football. Which relishes showing hard hits, unless someone get paralyzed.

As a huge hockey fan (more specifically, the Islanders) I was disgusted by Bertuzzi's cheap shot. The guy was a gutless puke when he was with the Isles and I'm glad the real Bertuzzi showed through. ESPN showed a great piece which showed, even in the context of "Hockey Justice", how uncalled for Bertuzzi's hit was.

Did anyone else see Cherry on HNIC? Jesus. He looked like a plaid Rubik's cube.

So hockey makes the NBC nightly broadcast. Oh, look how violent and creepy hockey is, and just in case you missed all the details, let's repeat the tape 7 times! Excuse me? A NBA player is being tried for murder, another for rape, and numerous others for assault, dealing, etc., and hockey's terrible. Ever seen a soccer riot? A Nascar crash? The NFL is so punishing that many of the veterans are permanently crippled, but everybody is shaking their heads over hockey. What a bunch of idiots.

That said, Bertuzzi was dumb and got what he deserved. But there are very few people in hockey who haven't done something not exactly kosher. That includes Granato (a notorious stick man when he played) and Moore himself (he was used by the Avs as a hitman for other team's stars. He mugged Martin St. Louis of Tampa not too long ago, as well as Naslund.)

I think that's overstating it a bit. Moore was a checking forward without great skills or speed who had to get out there and finish his checks and played the obstruction game like everyone else unfortunately. We certainly have dirtier players on the Avs, Foote, Forsberg, Hinote, Worrel (depending on your feelings about the Hip check) Rob Blake and the recently acquired Matthew Barnaby. Alumni include Bryan Marcment, Darius Kasparitus and possibly the worst ever Claude Lemeiux. Martin StLouis is 5'9" and a speedster ao unfortunately he's prone to that sort of thing (I've seen it alot this season with Kariya.) The Naslund hit is debatable and I have heard alot of people outsode of Denver say it was clean, so six on one hand. My contention is that if Steve Moore had been Scott Stevens everyone would have been talking about how lucky Naslund would have been to escape with his life.

the blovating before hand by Marc Crawford, Brian Burke, the Vancouver media, et al about Moore being a marginal player was tragicaly out of line here. He got two degrees from Harvard and even for a "student" athlete that's nothing to scoff at. He spent two years in the minors and took three call ups from Hershey this year to earn a full time spot on the roster. He was genuinely apologetic towards Naslund and Naslund forgave him. I would also like to see some mention in the Vancouver press about our star Swede being out from injury from the Naslund-Moore game due to being mugged by Jarko Ruutu and Matt Cooke.

I'm a real prospect/draftnick and I always liked Moore. The Ned braden and Harvard jokes abounded. So it was odd to see how he got transformed from a slug targeting stars to an assualt victim. Bertuzzi really couldn't have picked worse target, a 25 year rookie who worked his way from the minors and a easily identifyable as a Harvard Graduate. Whereas all of Bert's past sins on the ice come home to roost.

Considering the other scandal going on in sports. Since apeculationis enough to attach a baseball player's name with steroids, I'm surprised (not accusing or speculating just surprised) no one started saying the same about Bertuzzi being a power player who is prone to irrational penalties. Which would have made things even worse. I guess since it was two Canadians in Canada the US government had little juristriction.

Speaking of making things worse, Canuck GM Brian Burke holding a press conference and complaining about the suspension and fine was just awful. It's not like it's a surprise the guy is a major league whiner, particularly in regards to the Avalanche and he used to have Colin Campbells job and did a piss poor job at that and has since started whining about officiating since he took over in Vanco.

There is this Burke quote "despite a few seconds on the ice during which you might think he acted inappropriately." Yeah that's just my ethics about not punching guys in the back of the head and riding them into the ice. He also tried to meely mouth the punch talking about the pile up that unsued causing the damage. I've watched the punch about a hundred times and once Moore hits the ice you can see Bertuzzi flex his arm out like he's going to keep hitting him and that's when Nikolishin comes in, so I don't think we can blame him for trying to pull Bert off Moore under the assumption he's going to keep pummeling him. And the key thing is that Moore would not have been in a pile up if BERTUZZI HADN'T HAVE SUCKER PUNCHED HIM.

as for Bertuzzi's apology, yeah ok, you had to. My pet peave is false acts of contrition used as get out of jail free cards that don't ever result in a change of offending behavior. The thing that steamed me was Bertuzzi saying "I had no intention of hurting you." What were you trying to swat a bee off of him? I'll write it off as poor articulation.

There are a few people who think he hould be available for the playoffs. A small minority of canuck fans held a Bertuzzi rally. With all of the bad press the NHL has gotten can you imagine what would happen if Bertuzzi had to face the Avs in he playoffs after the refs had gulped down their whistles?

Surely Bertuzzi should be worrying about jail time rather than being allowed to play in the playoffs? Do the same thing in a bar and he'd already have been charged. Hell, he could have broken Moore's neck and then it could have been a manslaughter charge.

A soccer player over here called Duncan Ferguson was charged and convicted for a vicious headbutt that occurred on the field of play, and for something as vicious and unconscionable as what Bertuzzi did I see no reason for him not to be charged with assault.

Actually, Richyy, he did break Moore's neck, it's just that the spinal cord wasn't severred.

People have been charged, and convicted, of assault in cases like this, Marty McSorley being a prime example. In Canada, the law on this tends to be that you do consent to some degree of force, as long as it is within the normal scope of the game. This clearly wasn't within the rules, and Moore certainly didn't consent, but I still don't know if I like the idea of Bertuzzi being charged for this assault. I'm torn between worrying about the dangerous precedent it may set, and thinking that a person really should be accountable for his actions in cases that are this extreme.

McSorley's "conviction" was a joke at best - 18 months probabtion and the conviction doesn't appear on his record.

This



made me spit milk out my nose.

I don't know how much Uncle Marty's conviction will play into this case as a precident. If I recall his charge was weapon based since he used his stick to go upside Donald Brashear's head, whereas Bertuzzi used his hand. However Bert dropped his stick in order to grab Moore's jersey and drag him into his punch so that could play into it.

Plus the Canucks bounty on Moore, the fights previous in the game, and Bertuzzi's admition of trying to get a fight started with Adam Foote earlier in the game prove some premediatation unlike McSorely just snapping.

Media perception of the assalants and Victims in the incidents will probably play into this. I think alot of leniancy was extended to McSorely based on the fact that he was Wayne Greztky's body guard, a servicable deffence man despite being slower than mollases and a good guy off the ice. Brashear is an ass anyway you cut it. Whereas Bertuzzi has a poissonous reputation with the Vancouver media, a reputation for taking dumb penalties, a lengthy rap sheet in terms of suspensions, became the face of hockey thuggery. And we all know the angle "All-Star assualts Ivy-Leaguer who worked his way up from the minors."

I'm a little apprehensive about a legal case, but I think this is an "if there were ever..." type scenario. Plus I doubt anyone would face a manslaughter charge for an errant puck hitting a fan.

Nice of Commisioner Gary "the Douchebag" bettman to come out and garner the NHL some extra bad press by telling the law to stay out of the matter, rather than let the case run it's course. It would have been nice if he used this as a mandate to clean up the game of obstruction, stickwork,fighting, anything really... okay we can all stop laughing.

Very well put, Hasbro.

I know it's a different sport and happened a loong time ago but was Kermit Washington charged with or convicted of anything when broke just about every bone in Rudy Tomjanovich's face?

Look at the Philly/Ottawa incident. Bobby Clark tries to break into the Ottawa dressing room? Ken Hitchcock vows revenge at their next game? The NHL did precisely nothing about that. Mainly because they think it creates media interest and in fact have encouraged it. So when they fine the Canucks they are being disingenious.

I think, though, that the Avs exploited the situation thoroughly once it happened. That has Lacroix's fingerprints all over it. Not that it will do them much good. The East should win this year, and if they don't, it'll be a mid-pack Western team: Dallas, San Jose or Calgary.

That's another proof of this story not getting the background it deserves. Most people think this is just "Moore hits Naslund, Canucks vow revenge, Bertuzzi goes crazy." There is a pretty acrominous history here. I'm sure you know most of this zenner if you even know Lacroix's name.

Canucks coach Marc Crawford was the Avs first coach when the team moved here and was behind the bench for the first cup. After getting tossed in the playoffs in the first round by Edmonton, Lacroix eased off on extending Crow's contract saying he wanted to "wait for the dust to settle." Crawford more or less walked and got replaced by Bob Hartley who was sneered at by some wags as a Lacroix puppet. Crawford and Pierre were growing apart in opinions. So Crow was working as an analyst when Mike Keenan got shitcanned in Vancouver and they hired Crawford. Lacroix said since Crawford walked and still under contract he was entitled to compensation from Vanco, which was a second rounder. Since then crow as an emotional guy has gotten pretty bitter and Lacroix? He never says shit. A couple of the local guy who are trustworthy said Crow has forgot he had any friends left in this town, and as of two weeks ago he doesn't anymore. He has also stated publicaly that he'd like to end the Avs Division streak (last year tying the record, this year the breaker.)

Brian Burke I think loves to promote Lacroix as a free spending boogeyman to vent at sometimes (which is not accurate.) After his press conference last week I think he cemented his reputation as a whiner. He's a capable GM and and has gotten reconition as such from Denver scribes, before war were declared. and another angle that's been missing from this is that he was head of Discipline. And furthermore during L'affair Lemeiux Burke made some bizzare rulings that didn't endear himself to the fans here and I'm sure Avs management. In the 1996 he gave Claude Lemeiux the infamous 2 game suspension, and made him sit another game in the Wings-Avs series, but he didn't enforce any suplemental discpline on Slava Kozlov for throwing Adam Foote face first into the glass. (A ref just watched that as a huge gash was opened up on his face and the on-ice mic picked up Foote saying "you saw that?!") And here is the parallel we draw in Denver Lemeiux came back from an injury with two games left between the Avs and Wings the first, in Denver, passed without settlement and the second in Detroit resulted in a line brawl in which (the hometown opinion) Darren McCarty jumped Claude and pummeled him, and then scored the game winner in OT. After the game Mike Keane, now a Canuck labeled the Wings "gutless homers." And another paralel the Detroit papers were printing wanted posters of Lemeiux and several players made their intentions known beforehand.

Burke reviewed the game, having had the ref in charge say he screwed up not tossing McCarty after the fight, and didn't suspend him. Even being a perepheral player in the Wings rivalry is enough to get your name mud here. Since he left the disipline job, Burke started whining about the officiating in a series against Detroit.

On the ice since Vanco got going again, the Avs have had a few bloody classes with them on the ice. In 2000-01 Adam Deadmarsh got a concussion in a fight with Ed Jovanowski and Cris Drury was injured in a knee-on-knee hit in a game vs Van. Brashear also had a goon rivalry with Scott Parker, complicated by his get-the other-guy-to-drop-the-gloves-and-back-out move, his prefference to fight Greg DeVries and his hand dusting gesture after even a draw. When Vancouver came back to Denver, another fight marred game ensued Deadmarsh took on Jovo, Brashear vs Parker and the Avs won, which was analogous to the last game until Moore/Bertuzzi. There has been a pretty big rivalry since.

Keep in mind Lacroix's rep amoung Avs fans is the greates a front office or coach has had in this town.

He is a good GM, please don't misunderstand. However, I don't think the choice of Tony Granato as coach is a good one. I thought Hartley (who was an excellent coach and is proving it with Atlanta) was much better. I am a Canucks fan, but I have never liked Crawford, and I suspect the Canucks have zoned him out. Might as well fire him now. The Canucks under his regime have shown no ability to weather adversity and so they are toast this year. Neither Colorado nor Detroit will go very far in the play-offs, the Avs because they seem to be having chemistry problems (which I noticed prior to l'affaire Bertuzzi) and possibly goaltending and Detroit because of their age and goaltending. In the West, the clubs with the good goaltending are the mid-pack ones: Dallas (depends on whether Turco wilts in the PO this year); San Jose or Calgary (bet on the latter for an Anaheim-like run; very well coached, hard-working, good goaltending.)

In the East:

New Jersey: Excellent goaltending; injury problems; aging
Philadelphia: Ken Hitchcock is a good coach if you can get over the fact that all his players hate him. Bobby Clark is not a good GM and all his players hate him (always wondered what he had on Ed Snyder, because he screws up incessantly). Goaltending is the problem.
Ottawa: Great offence; lots of talent; no heart; no grit; questionable goaltending. I don't think Jacques Martin is the right coach. The Canucks East--though Ottawa has much more talent.
Tampa: Great goaltending and momentum could take them a long way.
Boston: Haven't seen much of this team recently. Inexperienced goaltending.
Toronto: A big question mark. Lots of injuries, and some players aging. Goaltending very good but not great. The Toronto press make the coverage of l'affaire Bertuzzi look civilized.
Montreal: They've improved, but the hockey culture of Montreal is fierce and often consumes the players and/or coaches.

CBC shows all rounds of the play-offs (all 7 games) right to the final. Dunno about the American coverage. I understand that ESPN doesn't want to renew their hockey coverage---is that true?

I don't know that ESPN wants to abandon the NHL completely, they just want the next TV deal at a Yuooge Discount. For whatever reason, Hockey just doesn't bring in the TV ratings. SI has an article in this weeks issue about Violence in hockey and one of the sidebar stories is that ABC/ESPN doesn't want to shell out for a product that just doesnt sell to the American viewer. Their example is that the NHL All-star Game was out watched by an Arena Football game.

Of course I think that ESPN/ABC is waiting to see what happens with the upcoming labor problems. They aren't going to sign a contract with gauranteed money, if there's even a possibility that next season will be a washout.

The League has to do a few things to improve the game, before any network will give them a big TV deal again.

1.Eliminate the goon mentality and frontier justice that is rampant in the NHL. These are professional atheletes, not a beer league. They should act like it. I mean there are fights, and then there are "fights" like the crap that Bertuzzi pulled. The League can't stand by and watch as players cripple each other.

2. Contract at least 2 teams. 15 years ago there were 23 teams, now its what? 30? 32? 64? Contract the teams, put the players in a draft pool and the remaining teams fill their rosters with real NHL's and not glorified AHL'ers. They need to do it sooner rather than later, cause if they wait too long, it'll be 10 teams folding and not 2 or 4.

3. Figure out a way to increase scoring. It's cliche, but most American viewers love scoring. Make the ice surface bigger, elimnate the redline, increase the goalsize, elimnate the chuck and chase offense that 90% of the teams use. Any or a combination of these would probably do the trick.

And as a personal peeve- Home team wears WHITE, Road team wears Dark. Not the otherway around, f'n Betteman. And the Third Jerseys have to Go. Now. And there should be a rule that if you change your team logo/colors, you have to stick with it for at least 5 years.

Since the NHL is pulling only about $4 mill per team off of the national contract, the loss of revenue would not be devistating. The NHL gets most of its cash off of the gate anyway. Paradoxicaly widely publicized problems getting a decent tv contract will probably help in CBA negotiations as the League will be able to point out to the union and everyone that there is somewhere where less cash is coming in.

In any event they aren't going to get a great deal anywhere and they need ESPn so they might as well take what they can get and work on rebuilding hockey's profile after the lockout. The time to make the tv contract better has long since past.

Of course if you believe Bettman's recent pronouncement (and believe he believes it,) the union will want to negotiate well before a lockout.


American coverage of the playoffs is local for the first two rounds and national for every game of the conference and cup finals. ESPN picks up some of the out of market games in the semis and first round, but they get blacked out regionaly. And of course the Blackhawks home games aren't televised in Chicago.