It's crusade time in the National Hockey League. This time, the crusade is against diving, the swoon of a dying swan as it folds itself on the ice in hopes of coaxing a tripping penalty out of an inattentive referee.
The last time the NHL went on a crusade it was against obstruction, the interference with legitimate hockey stars in order to whittle them down to the size of the less-than-mediocre players who clog NHL rosters.
The obstruction crusade was as successful as our traffic law against people who talk on their cell phones while cutting you off on the Thruway.
Diving and obstruction are just symptoms of the NHL's biggest problem. The product is boring. It has become soccer on ice, with massive amounts of time spent doodling between the blue lines with an occasional goal to wake up the customers.
Don't accuse me of watching the Sabres too often. It goes far beyond the Sabres in their mother of all bad seasons. People are complaining about the same thing in Philadelphia, Chicago, Phoenix - all across North America.
It seems an eon ago that Phil Esposito scored 76 goals during the 1970-71 season, when Wayne Gretzky almost reached triple figures in goals, when no one snoozed at NHL games. The Sabres were never more fun than 1974-75, when they had six scorers with 30 or more goals - Gil Perreault, Richard Martin, Rene Robert, Danny Gare, Rick Dudley and Don Luce.
Thirty goals? Martin had five 40-goal seasons and 21 hat tricks. For that matter it was only 10 seasons ago that Alexander Mogilny scored 76 goals as a Sabre and Pat LaFontaine had 95 assists.
What has happened? Well, for one thing the neutral zone trap has happened, causing about half the game to be played at mid-ice. Creative changes in equipment, such as the goaltenders' armor, plus the increasing size of the players and the accompanying increase of their strength has given the game a dark shade of "no one shall pass this line" to the defense. American sports fans have never taken to soccer as a spectator sport and they don't like hockey as soccer on ice.
What to do? Make changes. Radical changes.
The NBA changed its game radically with the three-point shot and before then with the 24-second clock. When the late Pete Rozelle was commissioner of the NFL he became alarmed at the descending trend in scoring and issued a white paper soliciting views from the fans. The result was a radical change in rules which liberated the wide receivers, protected the passers and virtually made holding legal. Business thrived.
Baseball has built stadiums more conducive to home runs, but the big change there comes in the form of juiced players as well as juiced baseballs. Now there are battalions of hitters who pound the ball like Hank Aaron and Babe Ruth. Sammy Sosa used to be a slick 160-pounder who was basically a line-drive hitter. Now he's Godzilla, reaching 60 homers a season.
The All-Star Game now gets overshadowed by the home-run hitting contest, once a mere sideshow.
What's so sacred about hockey that it can't change its rules for the sake of entertaining its slumbering fans? How about starting with the elimination of the red line, the inclusion of which dates back just to World War II. The college game contains no red stripe and its game is far more wide-open than that of the pros.
But the NHL needs something more radical than junking the red line. Increasing the size of the ice surface would be an economic impossibility. What it needs to do is put its lineups on a diet. It needs to dump its fifth skater and play four-on-four hockey. That's right: two defensemen, two forwards, plus the goalie.
Neutral-zone that!
With four-on-four hockey the emphasis would be on skill, guys who can actually play the game and skate all over the ice. The shoemakers who take up too much space on NHL benches would have to find another line of work. We would see more games like the Toronto-Buffalo battle Thursday night. No more soccer.
The big battle would be with the players' association since jobs would be eliminated. But the owners are getting ready to do battle with the union over a salary cap in another year. Why not include rule changes and four-on-four hockey along with it?
!
The last time the NHL went on a crusade it was against obstruction, the interference with legitimate hockey stars in order to whittle them down to the size of the less-than-mediocre players who clog NHL rosters.
The obstruction crusade was as successful as our traffic law against people who talk on their cell phones while cutting you off on the Thruway.
Diving and obstruction are just symptoms of the NHL's biggest problem. The product is boring. It has become soccer on ice, with massive amounts of time spent doodling between the blue lines with an occasional goal to wake up the customers.
Don't accuse me of watching the Sabres too often. It goes far beyond the Sabres in their mother of all bad seasons. People are complaining about the same thing in Philadelphia, Chicago, Phoenix - all across North America.
It seems an eon ago that Phil Esposito scored 76 goals during the 1970-71 season, when Wayne Gretzky almost reached triple figures in goals, when no one snoozed at NHL games. The Sabres were never more fun than 1974-75, when they had six scorers with 30 or more goals - Gil Perreault, Richard Martin, Rene Robert, Danny Gare, Rick Dudley and Don Luce.
Thirty goals? Martin had five 40-goal seasons and 21 hat tricks. For that matter it was only 10 seasons ago that Alexander Mogilny scored 76 goals as a Sabre and Pat LaFontaine had 95 assists.
What has happened? Well, for one thing the neutral zone trap has happened, causing about half the game to be played at mid-ice. Creative changes in equipment, such as the goaltenders' armor, plus the increasing size of the players and the accompanying increase of their strength has given the game a dark shade of "no one shall pass this line" to the defense. American sports fans have never taken to soccer as a spectator sport and they don't like hockey as soccer on ice.
What to do? Make changes. Radical changes.
The NBA changed its game radically with the three-point shot and before then with the 24-second clock. When the late Pete Rozelle was commissioner of the NFL he became alarmed at the descending trend in scoring and issued a white paper soliciting views from the fans. The result was a radical change in rules which liberated the wide receivers, protected the passers and virtually made holding legal. Business thrived.
Baseball has built stadiums more conducive to home runs, but the big change there comes in the form of juiced players as well as juiced baseballs. Now there are battalions of hitters who pound the ball like Hank Aaron and Babe Ruth. Sammy Sosa used to be a slick 160-pounder who was basically a line-drive hitter. Now he's Godzilla, reaching 60 homers a season.
The All-Star Game now gets overshadowed by the home-run hitting contest, once a mere sideshow.
What's so sacred about hockey that it can't change its rules for the sake of entertaining its slumbering fans? How about starting with the elimination of the red line, the inclusion of which dates back just to World War II. The college game contains no red stripe and its game is far more wide-open than that of the pros.
But the NHL needs something more radical than junking the red line. Increasing the size of the ice surface would be an economic impossibility. What it needs to do is put its lineups on a diet. It needs to dump its fifth skater and play four-on-four hockey. That's right: two defensemen, two forwards, plus the goalie.
Neutral-zone that!
With four-on-four hockey the emphasis would be on skill, guys who can actually play the game and skate all over the ice. The shoemakers who take up too much space on NHL benches would have to find another line of work. We would see more games like the Toronto-Buffalo battle Thursday night. No more soccer.
The big battle would be with the players' association since jobs would be eliminated. But the owners are getting ready to do battle with the union over a salary cap in another year. Why not include rule changes and four-on-four hockey along with it?
!
