Five Things That Would Make the NHL Better

If you can have three NHL clubs in the New York City area, certainly Southern Ontario could support a second club.  Winnipeg, despite some arena issues, should be given another chance. 

After all, what good is a 20,000-seat arena in a sunshine state if they can only get 5,000 paying customers?  Is it not better to sell out a 16,000-seat arena every game? This is not to mention other potential US cities that are chomping at the bit to be a part of the NHL. 

4. The clubs need to do more sharing

The salary cap was one thing, but until the owners share more revenues, the gaps between the haves and the have-nots will keep increasing, and the lower-revenue teams will have more financial pressure to get to the salary floor. 

The high-revenue teams are reaping the benefits of the salary cap and pocketing the profits, while the lower revenue teams are struggling to be able to meet the strains of an ever-increasing salary floor. 

The players get a percentage of all league revenues, not a percentage of a club's revenues.  There is some revenue sharing, but until the league and its member clubs divide all revenues more equally, there will always be an uneven playing field. 

5.  Change two rules that don't make sense

First of all, touch icing is a factor in at least one major injury every year.  From Pat Peake to Kurtis Foster, there are stories all over the league of players that have been injured in the mosty-ineffective race to beat out an icing. 

The rule could be tweaked in many ways to avoid this race.  Automatic icing, with the discretion of the linesman to waive it off in certain situations—i.e. an obvious pass that was missed by its intended target, or a puck that could have been played by a defender—could be implemented. 

The league has too many star players to risk having one of them injured in a play that only results in the icing being waved off once a game, at the most.

Second, restricting the areas where the goaltenders can play the puck was an ineffective rule, and only serves to make for confusion with extraneous markings on the ice and more subjective decisions for referees to have to make. 

It is time to go back to where a goalie can play the puck wherever they wish, because it adds excitement to the game.  The goalies who are good with the puck can start a quick breakout for a rush the other way, while the ones who struggle can create scoring chances against them with turnovers and bungles.

These are five ways that the NHL can be improved, both on and off the ice.  Not all of them are easy fixes by any means, but the more of them that can be implemented the better off the league as a whole will be.

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