The Athletic’s Sean Shapiro blasts Original Six teams for having the luxury of “tanking” today, and while he focuses on the Chicago Blackhawks, who are clearing their decks of talent in an obvious tank job, he does not have kind words for the Detroit Red Wings, either.
He offers this take on the hiring of Derek Lalonde and the heralded Yzerplan…
When Derek Lalonde was introduced as the Red Wings’ new coach he and general manager Steve Yzerman practically tempered any playoff hopes to an icy chill. Winning in Detroit isn’t part of the plan this year. The “Yzerplan” has long-term visions, and frankly, the Yzerplan is just slow-roll tanking with a catchier name.
And he offers this take on the Wings and Hawks’ respective situations…
Original Six teams can be bad and still matter, especially in a sport that puts tradition on an extreme pedestal. These legacy brands, even when terrible, are still the financial behemoths of the NHL. They sell more merch, they get better placements on national television, and they drive more revenue through sponsorship and television rights than any of the 26 NHL teams that entered the NHL after them.
It might have been embarrassing when the Blackhawks’ sellout streak came to an end. It was bad when the Red Wings literally changed the color of the seats at Little Caesars Arena because of the unsightly appearance of a less-than-full building, but lagging attendance for the Original Six teams isn’t tanking their bottom line as it would in, say, Nashville or even Colorado.
“The Blackhawks will still be one of the richest teams in the NHL this season,” one NHL team president said. “They’ll still make a ton of money. The Red Wings make double on their TV deal than I ever will. That’s just the reality of it. My GM has to put people in seats for my owner to be happy. It’s not fair, but sports aren’t fair.”
And he notes the following:
In places like Chicago, Detroit, and Montreal there are more of you [fans are] held by the mental captivity of hockey fandom and you can’t escape so you’ll still care, and that extends to your local area’s sports talk radio stations, columnists, and local television broadcasts.
Media coverage of a team is a reflection of the market, and how packed or empty a press box is when a team is playing poorly is a pretty good indicator of whether that team’s owner has the ability to actually tank without serious consequence.
The moral of the story is Chicago and Detroit will be fine. Their respective GMs will keep their jobs because the tank is understood and accepted as a part of the process where relevance doesn’t hinge on winning or losing. Other teams don’t have this luxury. Winning is required to drive relevance, and being in that soft middle and being close to the playoffs every year in a loser point system is more of a certainty than hoping a tank will pay off with a championship a decade from now.
Continued (paywall);