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Tomorrow I will make my predictions and we will discuss the playoffs on a podcast starting at 2 PM Eastern time!
So the playoffs are set. I couldn’t be more excited. How about you?
Even if your team isn’t in it, is there anything better in all of sports than the first round of the NHL Stanley Cup playoffs? (if your answer isn’t immediately “YES,” then you, my friend are at the wrong website.
We also have the best trophy, hands-down. Even NFL players will tell you so.
Why is it so amazing?
I was talking to some friends I play pickleball with, many of whomare not hockey fans in the least, but still most will admit that there’s nothing better in sports than the NHL playoffs. They all point to the great overtime games where hockey players become gladiators and will do anything they can to survive. In America, I feel like the NHL “score until someone wins” is just considered the coolest thing about hockey. People even admit that they respect hockey players more than any other because they will allow this OT method is never complained about.
Hockey’s popularity in the States..
I’ve always believed and found it to be true that in America, if you ask sports fans what their favorite sport to watch is, you will get one of two responses:
Hockey is either last on American sports fans’ list of favorites by a mile, or first on their list by 1.61 kilometers.
It is incredibly rare for hockey to put hockey second or third or fifth. Etc.
However, if you ask Americans their favorite “playoff type games” to watch, they will of course say “football, football, football….” After football, many will say March Madness. But quite often many Americans will surprise you with sayingthe Stanley Cup playoffs.
And the reason for that tends to be tied to the way they decided. The fact that there’s going to be a winner no matter how many periods it takes is great theater and will keep even the casual fan up till one in the morning to see the end. They will watch players continue to skate hard under the highest of pressure no matter how late it goes.. Football players won’t even do that. The overtime system in the Super Bowl in football is still a bastardized version of the first 60 minutes.
Baseball players will play until there’s a winner, but even that has the issue of only the home team being able to actually end the game on a score. Besides that, the physical impact on one’s body between hockey and baseball is not even comparable. Baseball players after 15 innings aren’t spent.
Hockey players, after two overtimes, our forced to play an incredibly high-pressure battle for survival. We all make mistakes when we get tired. In the hockey playoffs… one mistake and its over. Talking to NHL players, they wouldn’t have it any other way. Many will tell you how there is nothing worse than the feeling of losing a multiple overtime game, and no better feeling than winning one.
So to answer the question in my headline:
“No. The NHL should never ever ever ever ever change. The way playoff games are decided.”
Even in the Olympics, the shootout can decide a gold medal game. But the rules of the 4Nations exhibition game in the final were clear and direct: “ The countries will play until someone loses.
The players’ association in hockey is supposed to protect players. It is for this reason that we won’t even see a 10-minute three-on-three overtime in the regular season. But even the NHLPA knows the importance of the EPIC NHL playoff games. No player I’ve ever talked to is said doing anything to do with changing that. They know it’s a very special part of our league.
No 4-on-4 until someone scores, and God’s sake, no shootouts!
What are your thoughts?
TRAPPED IN ESPN PLUS TORTUROUS COMMERCIAL BREAK HELL…
Was anyone else watching Montreal and Carolina last night and had this happen?
During the commercials my television entered some kind of weird parallel universe and was showing me ten seconds of pieces of ads at random and also repeating them over and over again????
I made this YouTube video last night because I literally found myself going nuts from it all.
Hope you enjoy!
I’ll be back with my playoff predictions and playoff prediction podcast tomorrow!
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