Hockey Trade Rumors

The All-Star festivities have come and gone with most of the United States not having a clue the NHL played it’s All Star game Wednesday night.

Hey what channel is the game on?

The Versus network had terrible coverage of the skills competition and they didn’t fare any better the following night. Something about that station irks me. When i watched a game on ESPN it had the appeal of watching a national televised game. Versus into their 2nd season of hockey still hasn’t developed that certain appeal. No knock on NBC as they have done a fabulous job with their limited NHL coverage but NBC is what it is ( limited hockey coverage). It’s most likely not going to happen but the NHL and ESPN 2 need to work out a deal. ESPN 2 would be the best option for the NHL. ESPN 2 can be the main carrier while the ESPN carries the NFL and NBA and every once in a while ESPN gives the NHL the pleasure of televising a game on ESPN. The main point is the NHL would be back on a mainstream sports station that Americans actually tune in to. It’s not that i don’t like to tune into Versus to watch a game but because it’s not a regular station i tune into, i never get to catch a game on a Monday or Tuesday night. A move to ESPN will not spike T.V. ratings that much but exposure and overall health of the game will go up with a return to ESPN. In the end all i want is to be able to tune into ESPN around midnight and watch NHL 2 Night again.

Weekday All-Star Game or Weekend?
This is going to be up for debate for the coming months. I am never a big fan of hockey being show nationally on Sundays but the All-Star game would be better off played on a Sunday night around 6:00 est. With football on a off week the NHL needs to utilize the off weekend and bring the game back to the weekend with NBC carrying the telecast.

Young Stars Game needs to go
It was hard to even watch this game.
Boring , Boring , Boring!!!!
Tim Paccinno on hockeybuzz.com talked about the possibility of a youngstars – prospects game and that is a good thought but it would be the same old game. I would much rather see the old timers game come back and have the chance to watch Mario and Wayne lace them up. Solution: Old Timers/Young guns game. Combine the two together and make two squads and play each other.

The All Star game was okay. The scoring was up which is a good thing but the rail cam was making me change the channel. As fans of the game, we want to see the entire ice not a close up of how many zits a particular player has on his face. Barry Melrose said on Sportscenter that the NHL should do their All Star game like baseball. Winner gets home ice advantage in the finals. How great would that be to watch. Hard hitting, enthusiasm, power plays and so on. The only problem is unlike baseball, there would be tons of contact and the risk of injury. Despite the injury risk it would draw more attention to the game. No doubt about it

Posted by WD

For more indepth opinions on the NHL check out our blog at
www.thebuzzontheburgh.blogspot.com