NHL Predictions: 9 Bandwagons You Can Jump off of Now

Part of being a sports fan is dealing with the highs and lows of your favorite team.  A glorious playoff win is unappreciated if the fan knows nothing of a devastating defeat. 

Hockey is a sport that sees fair-weather fans running wild, and unfortunately, many of these fans are the ones who get the most attention in the media.  While the undying loyalty of fans in Toronto, Montreal and Philadelphia goes unrewarded, teams like the Penguins and Lightning have found playoff success, front-office promotion and the spotlight.

Unfortunately, glory is only temporary, and some teams are going to find that their expansive fan base dwindles quickly when the team does not perform.  Here are nine franchises that bandwagon fans should abandon this year, for their own good and the good of real fans.

Washington Capitals

The Capitals have a great team.  Tomas Vokoun is a difference-maker in net, Bruce Boudreau has finally learned that he needs to invest in defense, and Alex Ovechkin will not be kept down for long. 

But after you don your No. 8 jersey and fetch your front-row tickets, you realize you have to Google “Washington Capitals + Stadium” to know what it’s called.  After all, despite all the red you’re rockin’, you’ve never been there before.

So even if the Caps finally make a great playoff run, be sure to update your wardrobe.  You’ll be surprised to find that the jerseys don’t feature a flying Eagle like they did last time you went to a game, in the ’98 Final.

You can stay on the bandwagon if…you can name the team’s captain before Ovechkin.  You can’t?  Then go away.  If this squad does win, you don’t deserve to celebrate.

No matter though.  They won’t win.  Washington is the new San Jose.

Tampa Bay Lightning

Tickets are cheap and that Stamkos guy keeps popping up in the paper, so you go to a Lightning game or two.  Suddenly, the team has beaten the Pens and Caps (the only other two hockey teams you’ve heard of) and they look set to win their second Stanley Cup in seven years.

You can’t believe how well that Khabibulin guy is playing in net.  That’s him, right?

And that Martin St-Louis is still on the team, and Steve Stamkos was probably a high pick in one of those drafts, right?

Ah, who cares, does Hulk Hogan still sing the national anthem?

You can stay on the bandwagon if…you might hurt yourself getting off.  You don’t care about hockey.  Go to a Rays game; they need some help.

New Jersey Devils

Oh boy.  You were raised in the most difficult of environments, weren’t you?

Mom comes from a long line of Rangers fans, and Dad married her despite his undying love for the Flyers, and yet you came out and developed an affection for the third most popular team in Jersey, despite being the only team in Jersey.

You’ve had a great run, of course, winning a few Cups and continuously making the playoffs until recently.  Between Brodeur and Kovalchuk, you have two of the most talked-about players in the league on your squad. 

But Kovy is overpaid and Marty is showing his age.  And that tough Atlantic Division has only gotten tougher.  And the darlings of the Eastern Conference have finally found themselves struggling to succeed.  Hockey’s longest honeymoon is now over, and the stands at the Rock are going to be vacant for quite some time.

You can stay on the bandwagon if…you enjoy a little masochism.  Even if the team manages to be good, which is unlikely, the Devils will hardly garner the attention that the Rangers, Flyers and Penguins do. Jersey will find itself struggling to sell tickets for quite some time.  The good news is, if you do stay on the bandwagon, you can get your seats pretty damn cheap.

San Jose Sharks

San Jose has become one of those teams that hockey fans who have never been to California will root for.  Maybe it’s the energy in the Shark Tank, maybe it’s the years of choking in the playoffs, maybe it’s the dignified players who deserve a Cup…whatever the reason, something about this yet-to-win Sharks team is very endearing.

Rooting for the Sharks in the playoffs is like rooting for the Detroit Lions on Thanksgiving.  Sure, you’ll watch, but you already feel like you know how it’s going to end. 

This year is the year that you stop rooting for the Sharks.  At some point, pity turns to pathetic, and the Sharks have had too many consecutive chances to play for the Cup, and they’ve never made it.  The team looks stacked this year, but if Thornton and Marleau couldn’t do it with Nabokov, how can they do it with Niemi and Niittymaki? 

You can stay on the bandwagon if…you live in San Jose.  That tank is loud for a reason, and the true local fans deserve some recognition.  But the casual “They’re-my-favorite-Western-Conference-team” fans need to find a new suitor.  Take a hard look at the Kings.

Chicago Blackhawks

Less than two decades ago, the Hawks weren’t being televised in their own city.  Suddenly, being a Hawks fan makes you sound like a badass hockey expert who ignores the mainstream media attention on Crosby and Ovechkin to focus on the game’s true superstars, Jonathan Toews and Patrick Kane.

Granted, you still aren’t sure how Toews’ name is pronounced and it’s news to you that Niemi is now playing in San Jose, but your guys got a Cup and they’re ready to make another run, right?!

Wrong.  Corey Crawford may be coming along and the young core of the team has potential, but immaturity is still an issue for the Blackhawks and the West has too many good teams to allow Chicago another path to the Cup.  But hey, if a Cup could be won by only the four players on the team that you can name, they would be an odds-on favorite!

You can stay on the bandwagon if…you wrote angry letters every time a Blackhawks game was blacked out.  True fans do not accept missing their team’s games, and those limited Chicago fans who still supported the team when even the owners did not should look down upon their fair-weather counterparts.

Edmonton Oilers

Sometimes, it’s just cool to hate the team that sucks.  The most attention the Oilers get each year is at the draft, when their top pick is already decided for them by scouts.

If you like the Oilers and a) you don’t live in Alberta and b) you didn’t watch Gretzky and Messier win their Cups, then you only root for the team to get attention.  Really, you’re an NHL hipster.  “Oh, you have a Crosby jersey?  Check out my Jordan Eberle threads.”

No one wants to hear you analyze the bright future of the team as they twiddle their thumbs in the basement of the NHL all year.  One year they will burst onto the scene in dramatic fashion, but 2011-12 is not that year.

Besides, let’s be honest.  Once they get good, you’ll scoff at them and start your eBay search for a Panthers jersey.

You can stay on the bandwagon if…you can retell the history of the team beginning with the WHA, without consulting Wikipedia.  You may also stay if you have a well-formed opinion of the top prospects in the NHL Entry Draft months before it takes place.  That probably means that the highlight of your year was figuring out who your team was going to take.

New York Rangers

New Yorkers are difficult to rival in their passion for sports, and they are given plenty of teams to choose from.  Unfortunately, since 1994, the New York Rangers have been more comparable to the Mets than the Yankees: spend big, fail big.

Certainly, many a casual hockey fan who joined the NHL conversation this summer is aware that Brad Richards was the coveted prize of free agency, and the Rangers were fortunate enough to acquire him.  What these wanna-be fans may not recall is New York’s history of signing big names to big deals with no results.  Marian Gaborik, Wade Redden and Scott Gomez have all been the Next Big Thing in the Big Apple, only to fall by the wayside.

If you think a hefty, long-term deal makes this Rangers team a playoff favorite, you may need to consult your history books.

You can stay on the bandwagon if…you resent the type of fan listed above.  True Rangers fans have no time for fresh faces at the Garden.  If you only plan to show up for the Cup celebration, the city has no use for you.

Boston Bruins

No city with four professional teams in four different fields can fully support all of the teams to the best of their abilities, and the Bruins have taken a backseat to the Red Sox, Celtics and Patriots over the years. 

Now that the team is the defending Cup champion, it might be best not to behave like you knew Timmy Thomas had it all along and Nathan Horton was Mr. Clutch.  Let’s face it, few Bruins fans gave the team much of a chance at the beginning of the season, and no one saw Thomas’s record-breaking season coming.

Even in the playoffs, three of the four series were a game away from an uneventful conclusion to Boston’s season.  So before you even bother to climb on the bandwagon, keep in mind that Thomas is getting older and the East has gotten better.

Perhaps it’s time to save your energy and focus on hoping the Sox can make the playoffs instead.

You can stay on the bandwagon if…you don’t care how the Sox, Pats, and Celtics do.  The most die-hard hockey fans will never throw the success of teams in other sports in the faces of opponents.  If you’re interested in bragging about the trophies in the other three sports, don’t bother talking about the fourth.

Pittsburgh Penguins

You’ve got the superstar of the NHL.  You’ve got the brand new arena.  You’ve got the Stanley Cup ring.  Life is good in Pittsburgh.

Two Winter Classics, two of the best players in hockey and too much focus from ESPN have made the Penguins the most known team in hockey, at least to the fair-weather fan.

But that whiteout wasn’t happening right before Lemieux saved the franchise from relocation, was it?  The Igloo wasn’t bursting at the seams before Malkin and Crosby took the hockey world by storm.  The city would have been fine without the Penguins, as long as they had the Steelers.

Fair-weather fandom is not unique to Pittsburgh.  But if you’re going to house the team that is the inexplicable poster franchise of the new NHL, then expect to be scrutinized as an undeserving city that sucked its way into two superstars.

You can stay on the bandwagon if…you don’t act like the Pens are the greatest franchise in hockey.  If you can admit that the team would have left town (and you wouldn't have cared) without the involvement of Mario Lemieux, then the hockey gods will consider forgiveness.  If you insist on acting like Pittsburgh is where hockey starts and ends, the fine folks in Montreal and Toronto would probably like to have a few words with you.