You know, even though I partially think Tiger Woods was kidding when he smirked, "...I don't think anyone watches hockey anymore...", I'm actually glad he said it.
The truth is, he's probably pointing out the painfully obvious (with a pinch of overstatement).
Hockey will forever be the bastard step-child of the five major sports, especially in the south.
But this is a realization that Gary Bettman and the "Let's-try-to-meddle-with-the-game-to-convert-the-hockey-haters" committee refuses to acknowledge. They hopelessly, and clumsily, continue to "trick-up" the rules and structure of the game to try to appeal to fans who will never embrace it.
Deluded marketing departments have finally gone off their meds and started to overestimate their power to affect the Zeitgeist. They see other sports' fans as a flock of dirty pigeons in a giant Skinner Box that they can force to like hockey, by flogging them with such compelling incentives as Ice-Girls, pimped-out Zambonis, the promise of higher scoring, and side-show, pseudo-soccer shootouts to shorten the games. (Shorter, so "fringe fans" can make a late movie after the game.) (Pathetic!)
It's all been about as effective as a rubber nail so far.
The only way to "grow" the popularity of hockey is through "grass-roots" initiatives. Get American kids playing, get their parents fighting in the stands, and teach the Southerners how to put skates on their sandy bare feet.
Granted, that approach may be tougher than probability math, but it's the only way a vision like this can succeed. And, it's going to take some time. Sorry, Gary; you won't have this problem licked by the time the Versus contract expires.
Selling hockey to Baseball, Football, Basketball, or even Jai Alai fans, is like trying to sell veal to vegetarians.
The critic's spurious snivels of "I can't see the puck" and "there's too much fighting," or "there's not enough scoring" is similar to a child making excuses as to why they won't eat their peas.
It's just another way of saying, "It's not Football/Baseball/Rodeo."
Admittedly, the NHL committed a ridiculous act of self-flagellation by suspending an entire season just to break the NHLPA, but any baseball or football fan that "claims" that's the reason they don't like hockey is so full of dookie that their eyes are quite likely to be brown.
Two years later, the NHL owners who cried poverty were back signing players to $10 million dollar contracts and driving up the market value for talent, again. We, the loyal fans, bought it, even though we were the only ones truly getting boned.
We also "drank the Kool-Aid" when they told us they had to change the game to appeal to fringe fans, by not letting the goalies play the puck in the corners, erasing the red-line, and making neutral ice a "No-Touchy" zone. Now they want to enlarge the net and make the goalies go naked.
After all this bull-butter, scoring is not up appreciably, and the NHL playoffs can barely beat Kimbo Slice in a ratings cage match.
Meanwhile, the Jumbotrons have to go back at least four years to show highlights of a decent hit, and I'm paying loads more for a sticky seat.
There's no point retaliating by pointing out that golf has about as much appeal to me as a skin abrasion, (Confidentially, I'm joking... a skin abrasion is decidedly more stimulating) or that if the game of baseball was any slower, it might actually cause a time vortex that sucks you into the Pre-Cambrian.
Unlike the other sportsters, I make no excuses. I don't ask the NFL to put goaltenders in the end zones or suggest that the MLB allow body-checks to the batters. I just watch my sport and sit in wonderment of how the game could have survived, mostly unchanged, from 1917 until 2004.
Now, evidently, it's got to be "re-thought" — "re-vamped" — "re-packaged" and… well, "re-tarded".
Thanks Tiger, you spoke the truth— one can only hope the league listens and starts to see the game for what it really is.
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4 months ago
First of all, let's just leave the rodeo out of it. ;)
Really funny article, and you make a good point.
from 4 months ago
Ha ha! By all means. No offense to rodeo!
4 months ago
Although I agree with your point, Tiger is still a douche.
For him to disparage fellow athletes who literally bleed and play through broken bones to win while he skips tournaments and jets around the world in his private jet just shows how out of touch he is.
If it weren't for Tiger the PGA Tour would be just as unpopular as the NHL.
from 4 months ago
I agree Spencer. I'm not exactly "Joe Hockey" but Tiger curses at photographers who click a photo in mid-stroke because it's too distracting.
I wonder how he'd do trying to stop a slapshot while an offensive player and his own teammate screen him off from seeing it.
4 months ago
dont give hockey crap, its because of a couple of sets of poor decisions why hockey isnt where it should be in its ratings but dont start trashing it because they are trying to rebuild, I mean the NHL got a full NFL football stadium filled with Buffalo Sabres fans for the winter Classic and now they have made a decision that The Winter Classic will be a once a season event, and one thing that I believe is that hockey fans once their team is out of the race they stop watching it, and I think if they went a little bigger in the stanley cup games like having live concert's in between periods and brought that kind of entertainment into the game like they do in the Superbowl they might have more fans from other teams watching the Stanley Cup games, and the ratings might go up. They just have to rise to the occasion and the lockout had no affect on my support for my team im a die hard fan and always will be.
from 4 months ago
Kyle, with all due respect, that outdoor game was a novelty event. They could never sustain those numbers, and most certainly not in the southern US.
I didn't stop watching when my team was out - nor did the other hockey fans I know.
The NHL's efforts to rebuild this way are misguided.
Live concerts!?!? Are you high?
4 months ago
I think that they should stop trying to fix it, and take some of the teams from the southern US and move them north. To Canada.
from 4 months ago
Simply the truth here, leave the southern (football aggressiveness?????) hockey effort out of the question. NHL is simply a game of the 1920s and before. Baseball is as well. Golf is an individual sport (Tiger is probably right... it must be a real nice discussion in Sweden heh?) Soooooo, basketball fans and soccer fans can rest assured that their sport is pure. Hockey remains a sport less violent than football yet not as visible to the urban culture due to financial constraints. yet, it is as viable of sport in the same vain as Lacrosse or the British Rugby. So tiger enjoy your green jacket, I will deal with reality. I will travel to Sweden this summer, I wonder what the Swedes (Tiger's wife) will say about his comments. In reality it does not matter.
4 months ago
Growing up with Canadian parents, I've watched hockey all my life and LOVE it. Despite the league tweaks the game is still substantially the same (thank heavens), fast, exciting, dangerous, captivating. Here in Minnesota, youth leagues are huge, the high school tournaments (boys and girls) are the best in the country and Minnesota Wild games are sold out well in advance.
I have nothing against Tiger Woods but I find golf painfully boring. And I never get all the stuff about defining a sport by it's popularity. To me it's like music. Most of the music that is popular is musically uninteresting.
4 months ago
Just to play my own advocate for a moment, some of the rules changes were, in my opinion, great for hockey. the neutral zone trap was so obnoxious that for the briefest second I considered watching soccer before I came to my senses. Loosening up the neutral zone has made for a much more entertaining game and, as you mentioned, has not caused the scoring to render records meaningless.
from 4 months ago
Your own advocate - ha! Anyway I agree with you on that one, Drew... but I disagree with some of the other "modifications" like 4 on 4 in overtime and the new goaltender boundaries. And don't even get me started on some of the other crazy ideas they are considering. It would be different if the scoring was up significantly, but it isn't. And besides, I'd bet higher scoring won't convert the fans either.
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