Death of Hockey

Say it is not so!!!! Another F$%$ing lock out? DAMN IT!

For those unaware, I love hockey. Some of my earliest memories are sitting with my old man watching the Red Wings take on the Edmonton Oilers in the playoffs each year. The Wings invariably lost, but it was still a great bonding experience...

Seems the owners want a salary cap for the league, and the player have said, "over our dead bodies". Its hard to feel sorry for the players, given that the average salary is now just under $2 million a year, and 2/3 of the teams in the league are losing money. Still, I can understand the players' position. It is not their fault that the owners overpay them:)

But Hockey is quickly moving towards Baseball in terms of team balance. It NEEDS a salary cap. The great teams like the Red Wings, Philadelphia, and Colorado can afford $40 million+ payrolls. Most of the rest of the teams cannot. So we are quickly approaching a situation like baseball: teams will spend insane amounts of money for a year, make it to the playoffs, then dismantle the team the next year.

Also, unlike baseball, basketball, and football, hockey does not have a huge national TV contract to even out some of the individual teams' revenue. Hockey's TV contract is such a joke that I read that Arena football gets about as much money from their national TV contract as hockey:(