NHL Playoffs 2011: NHL Shouldn't Oppress Vancouver Canucks Green Men

NHL Playoffs 2011 and Why the NHL Shouldn’t Oppress Vancouver Canucks Green Men

As the NHL Playoffs approach their pinnacle with the Stanley Cup Finals, there is a side storm brewing that could make the NHL look very silly.

With the Conference Finals and Stanley Cup Finals expected to draw huge viewership numbers this year, the Vancouver Canucks will be a huge part of the televised action.

While the Western Conference Finals will be fought in Vancouver, another battle will take place just feet away from center ice.

Two men, Sully and Force as they are known, are the Vancouver Canucks Green Men.

These two gentlemen have caused an international sensation with their antics at Vancouver Canucks home games.

The premise to what they do is simple.

Both men have season tickets for the two seats adjacent to the opposition’s penalty box and are committed fans. That much is certain.

What isn’t exactly understood is what they do once they’re at the game. Sully and Force wear full body suits of spandex-tight green material that hug their bodies, to say the least.

They then use their dress and wild dance antics to confuse and even intimidate the opposition sitting in the penalty box.

Most athletes act professional, but some think what they do is very funny. Some of the best footage of the Green Men has come from the cameras stationed in the penalty box.

As in all of life, big brother can’t let the people have any fun. The NHL has asked the Green Men to tone down their actions and not to contact the glass during their dance sessions.

While the backwards handstand has become a stable in the Green Men’s arsenal, it is being frowned upon by the league.

Green Man Sully told Yahoo.com:

"

It's a liability thing. Even though I've been doing them for a year and a half, and I'm sort of an expert on them. The Canucks have our backs. The NHL didn't want to call us personally, so they had the Canucks do it for them.

"

The NHL is dodging the Green Men like it dodges most hard issues that face the league, but the Green Men are getting heat from all directions.

Former NHL goalie Glenn Healy said on CBC’s Hockey Night in Canada:

"

No one's owning up to the fact that the league has looked into getting rid of these guys. We've simply had enough of looking at their rear ends and their crotches when players have to go to the box. And as a result … eh, day, their daddy owns the seats so they're allowed to be down there, but they've been more than a pain in the neck to almost every team that's played here.

So, from that standpoint, the league is looking into 'you can't touch the glass, you can't stand up'. It's probably not appropriate to do a handstand on the seat and to make faces at the players that are in the bench. We've had enough. It's about the game, it's about the players, it's not about guys doin' handstands. And the league's looked into it and they're going to make amends.

"

I think the NHL needs to collectively lighten up and realize that this is the kind of cult classic stuff that makes the NHL loved by the people that do watch it. The league doesn’t want to alienate its fan bases because they aren’t the biggest sport in the United States and more and more people are opened to new sports every day.

At times it seems like the people at the very top of the NHL are too close to the old way of thinking and that slows the growth of the sport.

An American market has proved to be the most monetarily successful venture for the NHL and it’s time for the NHL to consider what the younger people in both Canada and the United States want.

The kids who buy the jerseys and buy the cheap seats don’t want the league officials stopping something that makes the game experience unique. It makes people feel like their being restricted and people don’t like that in America or Canada or anywhere.

The NHL needs to leave the Green Men alone and if I were involved in the Canucks PR department, I would use these gentlemen as a way to get international fans and fans from across all sports to watch the Canucks.

My honest hopes are that the Vancouver Canucks make the Stanley Cup Finals and the Green Men are on a National Display. If the league acts out of order on that big of a stage, the Green Men could become the staple that other fans are judged upon.

Let’s all stand together and tell the NHL that we want our Green Men free from persecution. During the game tonight and during the whole San Jose-Vancouver series, keep an eye out, you never know when and what the Green Men have in store for the players banished to the sin bin.

Check back for more updates on the NHL Playoffs as they come and check out Bleacher Report’s Hockey Page to get your fill of the NHL.