Second team in Toronto? (along with Vegas, Seattle, Quebec City)

[Kin]

I think that's part of the reason #1 centers are not as dominant. The overall quality of hockey players throughout the league is getting better.

I disagree. I think the main reason #1 centres aren't as dominant(by which I'm guessing you mean leading the league in scoring by a comparable % to earlier years because I think there's less turnover at the top of the scoring charts these days than ever before) is because the talent is spread so thin that even the best teams only have a handful of good offensive players. A team couldn't game plan their defense solely around stopping Joe Sakic for the Avs because Peter Forbserg would kill them. Conversely a team can gameplan around going after John Tavares and live pretty safe knowing that they can probably handle Franz Nielson.

From a business perspective, we have:
$1.4 Billion in expansion fees
$2.0 Billion roughly to build four rinks
$5.5 Billion in increased league revenues over 5 years
$1.0 Billion increased investment in grassroots hockey around those teams (minimal guess over 5 years)
===============
$9.9 billion spent benefiting the NHL

That strikes me as a pretty optimistic number. Forbes pegged the Leafs as having the highest revenues in the league in 2012-2013 at 142 million. If all four teams generated as much revenue as the Leafs per year, which won't happen, that would amount to under three billion.

I think the cap system has much, much more to do with the competitive balance we see. I don't think the lack of a dynasty is a measure of the talent playing the game. The talent to play the game at a high level is still in the league and improving - it's just spread around more evenly. The cap system just makes it much harder to build and sustain a dynasty.

The fundamental result of which is that the product being sold at the highest levels, the playoffs, don't feature the same quality of play as they did 15 years ago. To combat that, and I absolutely admit I'm making an aesthetic argument and not an economic one, I think the league should try and let more talent get into the league.

When I watch the U20 WJCs or the Memorial Cup, the overall talent is not NHL caliber but some of those games are pretty darn good to watch - better than a big bunch of NHL games I've seen. It's a good game to watch and the talent level playing it isn't everything.

Well, yeah. That's my point.

 

[bustaheims]

I think there has to be some truth behind this despite the NHL's denial. The fact there are arenas being built in Quebec and Las Vegas as we speak would lead to this belief.

I think the league made it pretty clear they were looking to expand to 32 teams when they announced the new conference and divisional alignment - not 34, as the article states, though. As for the arenas . . . I don't think they're really indicative of anything. There have been other NHL calibre arenas built without teams being awarded to those cities - like the Sprint Center in Kansas City, for instance. They're more the result of poor municipal decision making than anything else.

 

[hap_leaf]

I think there has to be some truth behind this despite the NHL's denial. The fact there are arenas being built in Quebec and Las Vegas as we speak would lead to this belief.

I think the league made it pretty clear they were looking to expand to 32 teams when they announced the new conference and divisional alignment - not 34, as the article states, though. As for the arenas . . . I don't think they're really indicative of anything. There have been other NHL calibre arenas built without teams being awarded to those cities - like the Sprint Center in Kansas City, for instance. They're more the result of poor municipal decision making than anything else.

Maybe, but the fact is, if you don't have an arena, you don't even get a sniff of attention from the NHL.  You must have a "build it and they will come" optimism.  Just as MTS Centre was designed with the hope in mind that an NHL team would return some day.

 

[cw]

I think that's part of the reason #1 centers are not as dominant. The overall quality of hockey players throughout the league is getting better.

I disagree. I think the main reason #1 centres aren't as dominant(by which I'm guessing you mean leading the league in scoring by a comparable % to earlier years because I think there's less turnover at the top of the scoring charts these days than ever before) is because the talent is spread so thin that even the best teams only have a handful of good offensive players. A team couldn't game plan their defense solely around stopping Joe Sakic for the Avs because Peter Forbserg would kill them. Conversely a team can gameplan around going after John Tavares and live pretty safe knowing that they can probably handle Franz Nielson.

Forsberg and Sakic began together in a 26 team league and for roughly about half their years together, played in the 30 team league we're in now. So I don't get that as a big sign of a result prior to talent dilution. The Avs were typically a top 5 or top 6 scoring club - not absolutely dominant - during one of the lower scoring eras of the NHL.

They were two of the best centers in the game at the time on the same team. But we have Hart winners Crosby and Malkin on the Pens now for example.

For the John Tavares we have now as a lone top center, we had Mat Sundin during the Forsberg-Sakic years and many others of lesser ability:

For example, when Sakic-Forsberg were in the top 10 in scoring in '96 with 116-120 pts in a 26 team league, here's the top scoring centers for various teams:
Yashin led the Sens with 39 pts
Hawerchuk (almost done) led the Blues with 41 pts
Sykora led the Devils centers with 42 pts
Rob Niedermayer led the Panthers with 61 pts
Janney led the Sharks with 62 pts
Cassels led the Whalers with 63 pts
Titov led the Flames with 67 pts
Travis Green led the Isles with 70 pts
Brian Bradley led the Lightning with 79 pts
Pivonka led the Caps with 81 pts

So convince me that there were plenty of "top centers" available to other teams in the league during the Sakic-Forsberg era. Where's all this great league depth of centers you're talking about?

Now, at this point, you could be saying to yourself "ah ha, see? the league lacks depth!!" But it has lacked superstar depth for decades. If the benchmark for expansion is such that a league cannot expand until every team has a starting lineup of superstar Hall of Famers in their prime, you'd have a point. But no league has done that. The closest might have been the original six league. And if the NHL had done that, they would have grossly curtailed the growth of their league and the game.

I don't see 32 Hall of Famer / superstar quarterbacks in the NFL - or the equivalent caliber of Sakic-Forsberg. I don't see every MLB team with a Cy Young pitcher and champion home run hitter - the equivalent caliber of Sakic-Forsberg. Sakic-Forsberg is an unfair yardstick just like Crosby-Malkin is today, like Montana-Rice were for the 49ers or Mantle-Ford were for the Yankees. They were all special pairs of talent that not every team had.

I also think some of those 90s teams were able to collect talent and hang on to it because of their capless budgets. Avs were one. Wings another for example. Because of Stavros financial problems, the Leafs couldn't add Gretzky for example and neither could many of the bottom feeders prior to the 2005-6 CBA.

Kopitar, Carter (played some wing as Forsberg did some), Richards and Stoll are a darn good collection of four centers on one club. None of them are as good as Sakic-Forsberg but as a group of four, they'd certainly be right up there with a bunch of the best. Coach Sutter said as much and I'm inclined to agree with him. They have been very key to the success of the Kings because every forward line Sutter put out had a good quarterback and strength down the middle. Even Stoll might be a #2 on some clubs (not positive of that but he's good enough that I'd wonder).

I think you're cherry picking a bit to make your argument and overlooking the lack of superstar center talent further down in the league - like we see in all of pro sports and have for decades.

 

[cw]

From a business perspective, we have:
$1.4 Billion in expansion fees
$2.0 Billion roughly to build four rinks
$5.5 Billion in increased league revenues over 5 years
$1.0 Billion increased investment in grassroots hockey around those teams (minimal guess over 5 years)
===============
$9.9 billion spent benefiting the NHL

That strikes me as a pretty optimistic number. Forbes pegged the Leafs as having the highest revenues in the league in 2012-2013 at 142 million. If all four teams generated as much revenue as the Leafs per year, which won't happen, that would amount to under three billion.

Yes, I must have punched in a wrong number grossly there. That $5.5 should be $1.8 for a total of $6.2 billion - which is still a huge chunk of change for the league.

 

[Kin]

Forsberg and Sakic began together in a 26 team league and for roughly about half their years together, played in the 30 team league we're in now. So I don't get that as a big sign of a result prior to talent dilution. The Avs were typically a top 5 or top 6 scoring club - not absolutely dominant - during one of the lower scoring eras of the NHL.

They were two of the best centers in the game at the time on the same team. But we have Hart winners Crosby and Malkin on the Pens now for example.

You're sort of confusing the two distinct things we're talking about here though. You said that you thought that the reason that #1 centres don't "dominate" the way they used to is the overall increasing level of talent, I said that I thought it was because elite centres used to be part of dominant offenses that didn't just rely on their own talents. Whether it's Forsberg and Sakic or Messier and Gretzky or Lemieux and Francis or Yzerman and Fedorov, teams that had two truly great centres didn't have offenses that began and ended with their truly great centres in the way the modern Penguins sort of do. The Avs, at various times, had guys like Rob Blake and Hejduk and Ray Bourque and the Oilers had Coffey and Kurri and Anderson and the Red Wings had Lidstrom and Shanahan and the Penguins had Jagr and Murphy and...you see? Nowadays, teams either have two great centres, like the Pens, and virtually nothing else, or they maybe have an elite winger and an elite centre and very little on a second line.

But my pointing that out isn't making the argument that there was an equal amount of parity then as there is now. The larger part of my argument is that the parity has led to the absence of great teams and a weaker product at the highest levels. Because of that the league, again from an aesthetic point of view, should be trying to recapture some of that rather than add four teams all at once(although the extent to which that's a "done deal" seems less likely now).

edit: It's also worth mentioning, I think, that the effect that the cap has had on the league in terms of diluting the talent on the top teams in the league is really only just starting. Chicago is probably the closest thing we have right now to the successful pre-cap teams but that's really only because of their RFA contracts and backdiving contracts there's really nobody on that team outside of maybe Corey Crawford who's getting their market value. When Kane and Toews' new contracts kick in they're going to have to get thinner and eventually, when we no longer see contracts like the ones Hossa and Keith have, building a team like that probably won't be possible again.

 

[cw]

I think the cap system has much, much more to do with the competitive balance we see. I don't think the lack of a dynasty is a measure of the talent playing the game. The talent to play the game at a high level is still in the league and improving - it's just spread around more evenly. The cap system just makes it much harder to build and sustain a dynasty.

The fundamental result of which is that the product being sold at the highest levels, the playoffs, don't feature the same quality of play as they did 15 years ago. To combat that, and I absolutely admit I'm making an aesthetic argument and not an economic one, I think the league should try and let more talent get into the league.

Let's compare playoffs
15 years ago, 1995-1998, last yrs with 26 teams
vs
Today, 2011-2014, with 30 teams
                                1995-98    2011-14
Series shutouts              12              7
Finals series shutouts        4              0
Game 7s                        10            23
Tight Game 7s                  6            18
Finals Game 7                  0                1
OT Games                      55              95

1995-98 had nearly twice as many series shutouts including all four Cup finals

2011-14 had more than twice as many game 7s with three times the number of tight game 7s including 1 Cup final.

2011-14 had nearly twice as many OT games as 1995-98

1995-1998 wasn't nearly as exciting in the playoffs as 2011-2014 in my opinion.

The game in 2011-14 with the rules changes increases the reward for puck possession/good passing, speed, skill, less clutch and grab, more athletic goaltending, younger players, etc. It's a faster, better brand of hockey. And the cap has helped it achieve competitive balance, not only in the standings, but in the playoffs as well. To me, that's more exciting hockey.

 

[Kin]

Let's compare playoffs
15 years ago, 1995-1998, last yrs with 26 teams
vs
Today, 2011-2014, with 30 teams

I don't mean to burst your bubble or anything but 15 years ago is 1999. And between 1999 and, say, 2004 not only did you have a 6 or 7 game finals in every year but 2002(which featured a Red Wings team that may have been the best ever) but you had five different champions and nine different finalists compared to the four and 8 of the last six years.

Regardless, I reject the premise. March Madness every year features tons of close games and buzzer beaters and this year the NBA finals featured an incredible team handily winning the finals but nobody would think for a second that what March Madness had on the NBA was the quality of play. Great games can be close but so can rock fights. In the darkest days of the clutch and grab era there was a higher premium placed on the sort of elite skill that you saw the cup winners have because marginally skilled players and teams couldn't fight through that nonsense.

That, to me, was what was so refreshing about the Olympics. It was fun getting to watch an actually great team again. Yes, maybe they didn't win enough games in overtime to suit everybody but some people are drawn to sports to see excellence, even dominating excellence.

 

[Kin]

On a side note, does anyone really believe this report? Does anyone think that the NHL will have decided to go into cities that don't have arenas like Seattle and Toronto? Or that they'd expand without a public bidding process?

 

[CarltonTheBear]

On a side note, does anyone really believe this report? Does anyone think that the NHL will have decided to go into cities that don't have arenas like Seattle and Toronto? Or that they'd expand without a public bidding process?

I'm sure expansion talks are happening and that they will come to fruition within the next few years, but yeah this specific report as it was stated means nothing to me. Especially since nobody has really backed up the so-so source.

 

[cw]

Forsberg and Sakic began together in a 26 team league and for roughly about half their years together, played in the 30 team league we're in now. So I don't get that as a big sign of a result prior to talent dilution. The Avs were typically a top 5 or top 6 scoring club - not absolutely dominant - during one of the lower scoring eras of the NHL.

They were two of the best centers in the game at the time on the same team. But we have Hart winners Crosby and Malkin on the Pens now for example.

You're sort of confusing the two distinct things we're talking about here though. You said that you thought that the reason that #1 centres don't "dominate" the way they used to is the overall increasing level of talent, I said that I thought it was because elite centres used to be part of dominant offenses that didn't just rely on their own talents. Whether it's Forsberg and Sakic or Messier and Gretzky or Lemieux and Francis or Yzerman and Fedorov, teams that had two truly great centres didn't have offenses that began and ended with their truly great centres in the way the modern Penguins sort of do. The Avs, at various times, had guys like Rob Blake and Hejduk and Ray Bourque and the Oilers had Coffey and Kurri and Anderson and the Red Wings had Lidstrom and Shanahan and the Penguins had Jagr and Murphy and...you see? Nowadays, teams either have two great centres, like the Pens, and virtually nothing else, or they maybe have an elite winger and an elite centre and very little on a second line.

But my pointing that out isn't making the argument that there was an equal amount of parity then as there is now. The larger part of my argument is that the parity has led to the absence of great teams and a weaker product at the highest levels. Because of that the league, again from an aesthetic point of view, should be trying to recapture some of that rather than add four teams all at once(although the extent to which that's a "done deal" seems less likely now).

edit: It's also worth mentioning, I think, that the effect that the cap has had on the league in terms of diluting the talent on the top teams in the league is really only just starting. Chicago is probably the closest thing we have right now to the successful pre-cap teams but that's really only because of their RFA contracts and backdiving contracts there's really nobody on that team outside of maybe Corey Crawford who's getting their market value. When Kane and Toews' new contracts kick in they're going to have to get thinner and eventually, when we no longer see contracts like the ones Hossa and Keith have, building a team like that probably won't be possible again.

Well, I think I've been saying that. The cap is a very significant factor in this. And I'd also say that when Cup winning teams like Chicago have to strip their roster down to get under the cap, those players are not typically winding up in the KHL costing the league talent - they're going to other NHL teams - making those other teams better and more competitive.

Teams having trouble maintaining a dynasty is a direct result of the cap - not a result of a dilution of talent due to expansion of four more teams because they've already gathered the talent. They just can't keep it because guys like Boland want 5 yrs x 5 mil or Versteeg wants his piece of the money pie, etc.

So we're not likely to see a dynasty under this cap system that lasts long. But on the other hand, we're less likely to see a team suck for a long time out of the playoffs too (contrary to the Leafs foolishness, everyone else in the league enjoyed more playoff success). And I think that's good for the game - particularly in the smaller markets where patronage doesn't have to wait a decade to see some decent hockey played by the club they support.

 

[cw]

Let's compare playoffs
15 years ago, 1995-1998, last yrs with 26 teams
vs
Today, 2011-2014, with 30 teams

I don't mean to burst your bubble or anything but 15 years ago is 1999. And between 1999 and, say, 2004 not only did you have a 6 or 7 game finals in every year but 2002(which featured a Red Wings team that may have been the best ever) but you had five different champions and nine different finalists compared to the four and 8 of the last six years.

In 1998-99, the league expanded to a 27 team league. The following year to 28 and then 30 the next season. As we're talking about the impact of expansion on the league, that's why I ignored them and went 16 years back (15 seasons) to 1997-98 and before where they'd been 26 teams for a while.

From that, it looks like you're refuting your own point. That even with the league talent "diluted" with expansion to 30 teams, in the short window just after that expansion took place, when the dilution effect of expansion was likely at it's worst because the annual growth of U20 talent hadn't had as much effect yet, you saw some great playoff games.

I guess I can rest my case.

 

[Kin]

From that, it looks like you're refuting your own point. That even with the league talent "diluted" with expansion to 30 teams, in the short window just after that expansion took place, when the dilution effect of expansion was likely at it's worst because the annual growth of U20 talent hadn't had as much effect yet, you saw some great playoff games.

Well, no, in the first few years of expansion talent dilution is going to be as top down as possible as expansion teams struggle to build themselves into legitimate NHL franchises. You might have a couple extra teams floating around comprised largely of AHL sorts of players but they certainly didn't immediately affect the rosters in Colorado, Detroit and Dallas.

Like I'm trying to say, my problem with talent dilution isn't primarily focused on whether or not a game in February between Florida and Nashville is better now than it used to be, its about the game at it's highest levels.

 

[Kin]

Well, I think I've been saying that. The cap is a very significant factor in this. And I'd also say that when Cup winning teams like Chicago have to strip their roster down to get under the cap, those players are not typically winding up in the KHL costing the league talent - they're going to other NHL teams - making those other teams better and more competitive.

Teams having trouble maintaining a dynasty is a direct result of the cap - not a result of a dilution of talent due to expansion of four more teams because they've already gathered the talent. They just can't keep it because guys like Boland want 5 yrs x 5 mil or Versteeg wants his piece of the money pie, etc.

It's not an either/or proposition. Yes, one of the reasons the best teams in the league aren't as good as they were 15 years ago but it's a simple fact that if there were fewer teams then, cap or no, the remaining teams would be better.

That's what I think you're missing and why you keep trying to jump between the two points here. I agree that one of the reasons that you don't see teams as good as the Avs used to be is the cap. I'm not disputing that. What I'm saying is that I don't like that change and that adding teams would make that situation, which again I think is bad, worse. It wouldn't create it but it would add to it.

So we're not likely to see a dynasty under this cap system that lasts long. But on the other hand, we're less likely to see a team suck for a long time out of the playoffs too (contrary to the Leafs foolishness, everyone else in the league enjoyed more playoff success). And I think that's good for the game - particularly in the smaller markets where patronage doesn't have to wait a decade to see some decent hockey played by the club they support.

As always sir, your charity and care for the wellbeing of Carolina Hurricanes fans shames me and my selfish belief that I should get to watch a better product for my 120 dollar average ticket price.

 

[cw]

From that, it looks like you're refuting your own point. That even with the league talent "diluted" with expansion to 30 teams, in the short window just after that expansion took place, when the dilution effect of expansion was likely at it's worst because the annual growth of U20 talent hadn't had as much effect yet, you saw some great playoff games.

Well, no, in the first few years of expansion talent dilution is going to be as top down as possible as expansion teams struggle to build themselves into legitimate NHL franchises. You might have a couple extra teams floating around comprised largely of AHL sorts of players but they certainly didn't immediately affect the rosters in Colorado, Detroit and Dallas.

Like I'm trying to say, my problem with talent dilution isn't primarily focused on whether or not a game in February between Florida and Nashville is better now than it used to be, its about the game at it's highest levels.

If you sincerely want to sustain seeing the game at the highest levels, you have to keep growing it. If they remained an original six league, few would be watching - no national broadcasting deal, the money for the players would be a fraction of what it is now and the pool of talent and money for developing talent would be a fraction of what it is now.

The sport doesn't exist in a vacuum. It has to compete for the entertainment dollar or it will cease to exist as we know it. They could have gone the way of the CFL and floundered as a lower tier pro sport. But they chose a better path. It has grown just fine without a dynasty since the 2005 lockout.

These game sevens and OT games may not turn your crank but they interest a lot more folks than watching a dynasty sweep series four zip round after round, year after year, that only the wealthy markets can afford. Long term, that's not good for the game and the talent and money it attracts. The financials Levitt audited before the 2005 lockout proved that.

 

[bustaheims]

On a side note, does anyone really believe this report? Does anyone think that the NHL will have decided to go into cities that don't have arenas like Seattle and Toronto? Or that they'd expand without a public bidding process?

For what it's worth, Seattle does have an available arena that can seat 15K+ that could be used until a better facility is built.

 

[cw]

That, to me, was what was so refreshing about the Olympics. It was fun getting to watch an actually great team again. Yes, maybe they didn't win enough games in overtime to suit everybody but some people are drawn to sports to see excellence, even dominating excellence.

It wouldn't be nearly as much fun if Canada faced talent like Norway all the time. Or if the NHL didn't show up. I've seen Canada blow out teams many times in international play. But those are not the great games I remember.

Of the semi finalists in the tournament:
Team Sweden & Team USA & Canada - all NHLers
http://stats.iihf.com/Hydra/388/IHM400000_33_12_1_USA.pdf
http://stats.iihf.com/Hydra/388/IHM400000_33_11_3_SWE.pdf

Team Finland - at a glance roughly only 3 didn't play in the NHL at some point in their career
http://stats.iihf.com/Hydra/388/IHM400000_33_4_2_FIN.pdf

NHL expansion employing these players:
http://www.quanthockey.com/TS/TS_PlayerNationalities.php
has had a bunch to do with the quality of hockey we've seen in the Olympics

Sure, players can learn something in a short tournament. But when they're teammates for 82 games plus playoffs for a number of years, they thoroughly learn and develop confidence in playing with the best.

Canada could have easily continued to populate 98% of the original six rosters and even expanded doing that to a 15 team league because they make up more than half the NHL now.

I don't think the league would be nearly as interesting without the mix of the Euros adding their stamp on the NHL game. And if the money wasn't there, and that money has largely come by expansion, I don't think we'd see nearly as many of them make the move to North America.

NHL expansion had a considerable impact on the quality of hockey you witnessed at the Olympics in 2014 and recent prior Olympics.

 

[Kin]

These game sevens and OT games may not turn your crank but they interest a lot more folks than watching a dynasty sweep series four zip round after round, year after year, that only the wealthy markets can afford.

Sure, I'm assuming you mean the wealthy markets like Edmonton and Long Island that constructed the greatest dynasties the sport saw post-original 6?

Even still, the Oilers didn't sweep all of their titles in 4 game series. Neither did the Islanders. Even the years you mention where the final series were blowouts were the result of a handful of legitimately great teams all being lumped together in one conference(and, no, it wasn't because Detroit, Dallas and Colorado were in any way "richer" than Toronto, New York and Philadelphia). I would very much like to speak to any hockey fan who remembers the various series between the Red Wings and Avs or Avs and Stars from those years as being in any way an inferior product to the hockey we're watching now.

 

[Kin]

It wouldn't be nearly as much fun if Canada faced talent like Norway all the time.

But that's never been a reality of international hockey. It's not NHL expansion into Nashville and Atlanta that drive Russian and Czech interest in the sport and the influx of Europeans into the NHL is not the result of the NHL's expansion.

I confess, though, points for originality. I've seen a lot of people in recent years try to give Ronald Reagan the credit for fall of communism but you're the first person I've seen to try and do that with Gary Bettman.

 

[Kin]

For what it's worth, Seattle does have an available arena that can seat 15K+ that could be used until a better facility is built.

Sure and Toronto has the ACC. My point there about Toronto and Seattle was more about the lack of deals for building new arenas(or at least the sort of massive renovations that would be required in Seattle or Hamilton), and some might say the political will, that I think would be a precondition for any sort of expansion.