One of the greatest sports pictures of all time:
Posted on 02/18/2005 11:35:24 AM PST by Alberta's Child
A brief timeline of the modern National Hockey League. I posted some of these items on a long thread the other day, and I though I'd take the time to build on it some more . . .
1. In 1967, the NHL expands from the "Original Six" teams (which is really a misnomer because the league varied from 4 to 10 teams throughout the first 25 years of its existence from the 1917-18 to the 1942-43 seasons). The Original Six play in their own division, while the new expansion teams -- which include the California Seals, Los Angeles Kings, Minnesota North Stars, Philadelphia Flyers, Pittsburgh Penguins, and the St. Louis Blues -- are assigned to their own division. It will be several years before these expansion teams are truly competitive . . . the Stanley Cup is won by Original Six teams in 4-0 sweeps in the Finals every year from 1967-68 to 1969-70.
The 1967 expansion also marks the beginning of the National Hockey League Players' Association. Alan Eagleson is named the executive director of the NHLPA, a role he would fill for almost 25 years.
2. The Buffalo Sabres and Vancouver Canucks join the league for the 1970-71 season, and the divisions and playoff format are modified. The Original Six teams continue to dominate the league through the 1972-73 season.
3. The Atlanta Flames and the New York Islanders are added between 1972 and 1974. The Kansas City Scouts and Washington Capitals join in 1974-75, bringing the league to a total of 18 teams.
The World Hockey Association begins play in 1972, and becomes a credible competitor to the NHL when Chicago Blackhawks star Bobby Hull is signed to a $1 million WHA contract and NHL legend Gordie Howe comes out of retirement to join the league.
4. In 1973-74 the Philadelphia Flyers become the first team from the post-1967 expansion era to win the Stanley Cup. They win a second consecutive Cup in 1974-75 over the Buffalo Sabres -- the first time two post-1967 expansion teams meet in the Finals.
5. The first obvious signs of economic strain in the NHL appear in 1976-77, when the California Seals move to Cleveland and become the Barons and the Kansas City Scouts move to Colorado and become the Rockies. The Barons only last two years in Cleveland before they merge with the Minnesota North Stars.
1977 also marks the year John Ziegler is named commissioner of the National Hockey league, replacing NHL icon Clarence Campbell -- who had served in that position since 1946.
6. The World Hockey Association folds in 1979 under a mutual agreement with the National Hockey League, in which four WHA teams (Quebec Nordiques, Hartford Whalers, Winnipeg Jets, and Edmonton Oilers) are permitted to join the NHL.
The Edmonton Oilers become one of the top teams in the NHL almost immediately. Their best player is the legendary Wayne Gretzky, whose relationship with the team is based on a contract with Oilers owner Peter Pocklington that dated back to Pocklington's ownership of the Indianapolis Racers of the WHA (more on this later). The WHA was able to get first crack at the 17 year-old superstar from Brantford, Ontario because NHL rules prohibited teams from drafting junior players until they turned 18.
7. In 1980-81 the Flames move from Atlanta to Calgary, becoming the fourth team in western Canada. The Colorado Rockies move to the new arena in the New Jersey Meadowlands in 1982-83 and become the New Jersey Devils. The 21-team configuration is the most stable in recent decades, lasting from this point until the addition of the San Jose Sharks in 1991-92.
During this period, the league's conferences and divisions are named after legendary figures from the game's storied history in North America. The Prince of Wales Conference (the eastern teams) includes the Patrick and Adams Divisions, while the Clarence Campbell Conference (the western teams) includes the Norris and Smythe Divisions.
8. The 1983-84 season ends in some controversy, as the Pittsburgh Penguins are accused of of deliberately losing games late in the season to secure the #1 selection in the 1984 draft. A young phenom named Mario Lemieux was in the process of tallying 133 goals and 282 points while playing for Laval of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League that year. Lemieux is drafted by the Penguins in 1984 and immediately makes his mark as "the next Wayne Gretzky."
9. The 1987-88 Stanley Cup playoffs descend into chaos when New Jersey Devils coach Jim Schoenfeld is suspended by the NHL for an incident in which he (allegedly) tells a referee Don Koharski to "go have another donut, you fat pig!" after Koharski ejected him from a playoff game between the Devils and the Boston Bruins. The Devils get an injuction against the suspension in Federal court, and Schoenfeld coaches the next game. The NHL referees walk out in protest, and the game is officiated by college and high school officials called in at the last minute. Through it all, John Ziegler -- the commissioner of the NHL -- cannot be reached while he is on vacation in Europe . . . DURING THE STANLEY CUP PLAYOFFS.
10. In the late 1980s, Pocklington decides to sell off part of the Edmonton Oilers through a sale that would make them a publicly-traded company (similar to a move the Boston Celtics had attempted around that time). His biggest problem is Wayne Gretzky . . . even though Gretzky is playing under a unheard-of 21-year contract, this contract is not with the Edmonton Oilers -- it's a personal-services contract with Peter Pocklington. To get Gretzky on the Oilers' balance sheet, Pocklington must tear up his old contract and sign Gretzky to a new one with the Oilers. But Gretzky indicates that he may only play another 2-3 years, so Pocklilngton is effectively forced to trade him to the Los Angeles Kings for an enormous pile of cash just to prop up the team's balance sheet in advance of the IPO.
11. Bruce McNall, the owner of the Kings, immediately becomes a celebrity among NHL owners and one of the most famous team owners in all of sports as a result of this trade. He is appointed the head of the NHL Board of Governors, and is later instrumental in hiring Gary Bettman as commissioner in 1993.
The hiring of Bettman is questioned by many long-time hockey fans, since he is a New York lawyer who spent the previous 12 years as a senior executive of the NBA. Well-founded stories persist to this day that Bettman had never even watched a hockey game until he was hired by the NHL. He is tasked by the NHL with growing the league into a "big-time" sport in North America, and one of his first orders of business as commissioner is to discard the traditional conference and division names and replace them with bland geographic names similar to every other major sport.
12. The establishment of the San Jose franchise is another key milestone of economic instability in the post-1967 era, for this marks the first time the league "re-expands" into a market that it had abandoned fairly recently (when the Seals left for Cleveland).
13. The "Wayne Gretzky era" reaches its peak in 1992-93 when the Kings advance to the Stanley Cup Finals with a stirring victory over the Toronto Maple Leafs in the Campbell Conference finals. But a relatively obscure Montreal Canadiens team ends the Kings' playoff run in the Finals and wins the legendary franchise's 24th Stanley Cup. As of 2005, the 1992-93 Canadiens are the last team from Canada to win the Cup.
14. Alan Eagleson, the head of the NHL Players' Association from 1967-1991, is indicted for fraud and embezzlement in 1994 for his dealings with the NHLPA and is later convicted and sentenced to 18 months in prision.
15. In what will probably be remembered as the start of the NHL’s current misfortune, the New York Rangers win the Stanley Cup in 1994 -- their first Cup victory in 54 years. The popularity of the NHL seems to be at its height, due to the extensive media exposure and great story lines in the playoffs. The Rangers win the Finals in seven games against Vancouver, after beating their cross-river rivals in New Jersey in a seven-game Eastern Conference Finals that is still remembered by many as the greatest NHL playoff series of all time.
With the Stanley Cup in New York and former NBA executive Gary Bettman at the helm as commissioner, the NHL seems poised to take its place among the other major North American professional sports leagues. Nobody would have known it at the time, but big-time NBA-like status would come with a serious downside for many hockey fans -- it will be ten years before another team from Canada appears in the Stanley Cup Finals.
16. The 1993-94 season also marks the first of many franchise moves that seem to be completely at odds with the notion of hockey as a winter sport. Only a few years after they made the Stanley Cup Finals, the Minnesota North Stars are sold to an owner who promptly moves the team to Dallas. Over the next few years the Hartford Whalers will move to North Carolina, the Winnipeg Jets move to Phoenix, and the Quebec Nordiques move to Denver. By this time, Edmonton is the only WHA franchise left in its original city.
All of these moves are based on the misguided notion that hockey is a big-time television sport, and these teams are worth more money in southern U.S. cities with large potential television audiences than in northern U.S. and Canadian cities with great fan support but small television markets. In a twist of irony, the NHL effectively determines that a city with 500 hockey fans among 3 million people is a stronger market than a city with 200,000 hockey fans among 500,000 people.
17. The 1994-95 season is delayed by a lockout when the NHL’s collective bargaining agreement expires, and is shortened to 48 games. The Stanley Cup stays in the New York City area as the New Jersey Devils win their first championship after an improbable run through the playoffs as the #5 team in the Eastern Conference.
In a bizarre turn of events, the playoffs are marked by a series of media stories about an ongoing dispute between the Devils and the owner of the Continental Airlines Arena, the New Jersey Sports & Exposition Authority. In the midst of the playoffs, rumors whirl about a potential lawsuit against the NJSEA for breach of contract, under which the team -- which would go on to win the Stanley Cup, mind you -- would immediately vacate the arena and move to Nashville. During the course of the dispute Gary Bettman makes a number of public comments in support of the team’s potential move. He is interviewed on the Fox network at the Continental Airlines Arena between periods in the last game of the Finals, and must shout his responses to the Fox announcers to be heard over the cries of "Bettman sucks!" emanating from the crowd in the arena behind him.
18. The Devils settle their dispute with the arena landlord and go on to become one of the most successful franchises in the NHL over the next decade, winning the Stanley Cup in 1999-2000 and 2002-03 and losing in the Finals in 2000-01. But their on-ice success is tarnished by an abysmal off-ice performance that is symbolic of the "big-time" NHL. Despite winning three Stanley Cups in nine years, the team can’t even sell out many of its playoff games in that period.
19. Los Angeles Kings owner and former conquering hero Bruce McNall is indicted and convicted on multiple counts of bank fraud in 1996, and is forced to sell off many of the Kings' assets. It turns out that his financial empire was all smoke and mirrors, and he effectively had a net worth of ZERO while he owned the team.
Over the next few years in the 1990s, the NHL goes through a series of embarrassing episodes with the New York Islanders in which successive prospective owners come forward to buy the team, only to have their financial plans fall apart under close inspection by the league (a close inspection that the NHL implemented only in the aftermath of the McNall debacle). In at least one of the cases, the buyer's plan is predicated on utterly fraudulent financial arrangements.
20. Mario Lemieux retires in 1997 after a career marred by injuries and a battle with Hodgkins Disease. The Hockey Hall of Fame grants a special waiver of its normal three-year requirement for retired players before they are eligible for induction, and Lemieux is immediately elected to the Hall.
21. The Pittsburgh Penguins teeter on the brink of financial collapse on a number of occasions in the late 1990s. Mario Lemieux is forced to take a partial ownership of the team in lieu of his deferred payments on his original contract with the team. He really has no choice in the matter -- if the team were to go bankrupt, his "guaranteed" contract would be worthless.
In 2000, Lemieux -- who is already a fixture in the Hockey Hall of Fame -- returns to the ice in a desperate attempt to boost sagging attendance for the Penguins and restore some value to the franchise. When the NHL players are locked out by the owners in 2004-05, Lemieux finds himself in the peculiar position of being on both sides of the labor dispute.
22. The addition of the Minnesota Wild and Columbus Bluejackets franchises for the 2000-01 season bring the league to its current total of 30 teams.
As you can see, the NHL has never really been a very stable professional sports league -- and has quite a colorful history as well. And yet hockey is an incredible sport to watch and play . . . it has a serious "cult following" among its fans that runs deeper than any other sport in North America. Very few people who take the time to see a game in person will come away unimpressed, and it's my hope that the game will emerge from the current NHL mess in better shape than it's been in recent years.
I look forward to any comments!
Can you send this to your hockey ping list? Thanks!
Bump to read later.
I figured it was going to be a blank page... ;)
Hockey began to suck when they tried to make it friendly to TV. They need more Jeff Brubakers and less Peggy Flemings.
1. Everything you said about the mistakes the league made is correct..However, once the expansion plan was begun, it had to be completed, otherwise the legal problems would have been monumetal. That's why the NHL twice extended a bad, money losing, CBA..they had no choice..
2. The current math is obvious..the owners lose LESS by NOT playing, than if they played...so it's a no-brainer..
3. And despite what Bettman says, the ONLY way the league can regain popularity AND a solid financial footing is through a restructuring..a contraction of maybe 4-7 teams...If they tried to do this while operating under a CBA, it would require huge negotiations with the union, because you'd be eliminating 100-200 players' jobs, and also the terms of any disperal draft..it would be a nightmare..The best, nay the only way to do this is AFTER an impasse had been declared, and new rules imposed by the league..
Bettman is out to break the union..Remember the counter-offer to the players' 25% roll-back? The league proposed a deal that would exempt ANY player making less than $800k..
4.So now, when the league next comes back with say a $32 million cap..they'll again exempt two-thirds of the players from any cut..and put the onus entirely on the high-paid players to give back their excessive salaries..Classic divide and conquer..
The union is dominated by the agents, and they are only concerned about the high paid superstars..Unlike the UAW, where everyone is paid about the same..in sports you have a HUGE disparity between league journeymen, and the superstars..the league is exploiting this disparity..The majority of players earning less than a million, having lost one year's pay, will NOT do so again..
5. The first rule of war, and politics..is KNOW they enemy. Bettman came from the NBA..he was Stern's right-hand -man for many years..and look what Stern did to the players. He broke the union with the lockout...imposed the salary cap...The NHLPA never read Lord Acton..
The events that transpired during the tenures of Ziegler and Eagleson offer a lot of insight into what the league is dealing with right now. Bettman was hired because the NHL needed a (relatively) competent commissioner who wouldn't be on vacation in Europe during the Stanley Cup finals. Goodenow was hired because the NHLPA needed an executive director who wouldn't end up in jail.
Excellent timeline!
There are some strange stories still to be told about the erratic fortunes of some teams--the St. Louis Blues' aborted move to Saskatoon, Harold Ballard's trashing of the Maple Leafs, the ownership woes of the Senators, Penguins and Islanders--but this is a great synopsis nonetheless!
One of the greatest sports pictures of all time:
Which are:
Bruins
Blackhawks
Canadiens
Redwings
MapleLeafs
?????
I started losing interest in the late 80's - too many teams in cities that did not warrant pro-hockey - (Phoenix, Atlanta, Los Angeles - come on !!!)
My bad--you've got the Penguins and Islanders covered.
Your analysis might be correct, but I think the biggest obstacle to the contraction of the league is not the players -- it's the owners. Not just the owners of those teams that would go out of business, but every owner who purchased his team or paid a hefty expansion fee under the inflated values of the 1990s.
. . . and the New York Rangers.
Which are:
Bruins
Blackhawks
Canadiens
Redwings
MapleLeafs
?????
Don't forget the Rangers.
Thanks for pointing that out. I should have included not just the Blues' aborted move to Saskatoon, but that city's subsequent attempt to get an expansion team. As unbelievable as this may seem -- the city of Saskatoon (pop. 180,000 or so) was a strong candidate for an NHL franchise as recently as the late 1980s!
Thanks, AC! Ping to Miss Garden (Dan's already been here).
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