Winter Classic

Happy New Year!

The NHL's Winter Classic is today.  It is very difficult for sports leagues to add something into their regular season that gives them great media exposure.  The NHL has done that in this case.  The success of this game can be attributed to two factors.

1) An appealing gimmick that will bring in fans that otherwise would not be interested.  This factor is pretty obvious.

2) An opening on the calender to take advantage of the gimmick.  The NHL benefited in this case from the BCS.  25 years ago having this game on New Year's Day would not have worked because the bowls would have sucked up all of the oxygen.  But with the extension of bowl season a week into January, the 1st has room for a big hockey game.  If the NHL could not put the game on New Year's, I am not sure there would have been another optimal time given the competition of the NFL playoffs and that an outdoor hockey game would not work in October.

There are NOT too Many Hockey Teams in New York

Peter King in his Monday Morning Quarterback column mad the following column about the NHL and New York:

"b. I worry about the NHL. Last week, on the same night, all starting at 7 p.m., three teams within 35 miles -- the Islanders, Rangers and Devils -- all dropped the puck. And 97 miles south of the Devils' rink in Newark, the Flyers played. Also at 7.

c. And Quebec City can't get a team?"

I'm not sure what his complaint here is, but if it is the idea that there are too many hockey teams in New York or New York and Philadelphia then he is completely off base. There are 22.2 million people in the New York metropolitan area (CSA) and 6.5 million in Philadelphia. There are 715,000 in Quebec City and only 8 million in all of Quebec. There are more people in the combination of the metropolitan areas of New York, Philadelphia, Hartford, Albany, Allentown, Harrisburg, Scranton, York (PA), Lancaster, Atlantic City and Norwich, than there are in all of Canada.

This is not a region that has no interest in hockey. The Rangers and Flyers are two of the league's flagship franchises. Also, last I checked New York is the media capital of the continent, so having an excessive presence there would probably not have much of a downside.

There are not too many professional sports teams in New York!

NHL Realignment

The NHL is considering changing its playoff structure (see here and here). The second article lays out two big advantages for TV. First a little background. Here is a listing of teams by time zone:

Eastern: 16

Central: 6

Mountain: 4*

Pacific: 4

* I'm assuming that Phoenix is in Mountain, even though it actually would be the equivalent of Pacific Time for the beginning and end of the season. Arizona doesn't go on Daylight savings.

So an Eastern Time team has to play in the Western Conference because more than half the teams are in the Eastern Time zone. That team is not decided in the current plan; it will either be Columbus or Detroit.

The new plan has goes from 6 divisions of 5 to 4 divisions of 7 or 8. Also the schedule would change from 24 intra-division games, 40 inter-division, intra-conference games and 18 inter-conference games to 36 intra-division games and then two games against each other team regardless of conference. Whichever Eastern-Time team gets stuck in the Western Conference would definitely have an improved schedule.

Old schedule:

Eastern: 9

Central: 16

Mountain: 8

Pacific: 8

New schedule:

Eastern: 15

Central: 18

Mountain: 4

Pacific: 4

The Red Wings would trade 8 Mountain or Pacific games for 6 additional Eastern games and 2 additional Central games.

However, the second supposed advantage is to help the Pacific teams have fewer Eastern trips. I don't see that helping under the proposed schedule:

Old schedule:

Eastern: 11

Central: 12

Mountain: 9

Pacific: 9

New schedule:

Eastern: 16

Central: 6

Mountain: ~11 (would range from 10-12)

Pacific: ~8 (would range from 7-9, the total across Mountain and Pacific would by 19)

So the Pacific teams end up having one fewer trip to the Eastern and Central, but five more of them will be further east.

{Offline H/T to my brother}.

Instant Replay

I was not watching the "Perfect Game" last night by Armando Galarraga, because I was too busy watching the Flyers' 4-3 overtime win over the Blackhawks. What I am struck by is the discrepancy in instant replay rules between hockey and baseball. Baseball supposedly cannot have instant replay because it will break up the flow of the game. However, hockey which has a lot more natural flow to the game has instant replay. In last night's game there were two key calls that went to instant replay, one giving the Flyers a goal and one not giving them a goal in overtime. The first one went to replay after the game continued for a minute and a half. If hockey can have instant replay despite problems with the flow of the game, then I cannot see how baseball cannot. Admittedly hockey needs instant replay more in that both of the calls would have been impossible to necessarily get right without replay, whereas the ump in the baseball game should have gotten the play at first base right anyway.

P.S. After writing this but before posting, I found another argument along the same lines.

Number of Playoff Teams: NBA vs. NHL Comparison

The NBA and NHL have fairly similar structures to them. Each league plays the same number of games, 82, plays the same length playoff series, 7 games, and lets the same number of teams in to the playoffs, two 8 team conference playoffs. Both have a problem with their playoff structure from my point of view. However, it is not the same problem for each. In the NBA you have a number of teams that have little or no chance of winning even after making the playoffs. The talk-show hosts in Chicago discussed whether it would be better for the Bulls to make the playoffs or miss and improve their draft position. Getting the 8^th seed has very little value in actually winning a championship. In the NHL since every team can win the regular season matters very little if you are in playoff qualifying position.

This year the semi-final matchups in the NBA will feature the 1 and 3 seeds facing off in one conference and the 2 and 4 seeds in the other conference. The NHL will also not have any duplicate seeds between the conferences as the 1 and 2 and either the 6 and 8 seeds or the 7 and 8 seeds.

This outcome in the NHL vs. the NBA is not new. Since going to approximately the current playoff system the NBA has seen three 8-seeds beat 1-seeds in the first round in 54 matchups. These results may overstate the likelihood of an upset as two of the 8-seeds won 5-game playoff series, rather than the current 7-game series, which should give the weaker team a better chance. Also one of those two seasons was strike-shortened, so the regular-season performance should be less tied to post-season performance than in a normal-length season. In the NHL, 8-seeds have beaten 1-seeds nine times in 32 matchups. Only one of those came in a strike-shortened season and all of them were in 7-game series.

Here's the thing. Neither situation is optimal. The NBA situation simply adds in teams with no chance of actually winning, while the NHL situation leads to a de-valuing of the regular season as any team that makes the playoffs has about as good a chance of winning. The difference in outcome is probably attributable to differences in the nature of the sports (less competitive balance in general in the NBA, hot goalies in the NHL). Regardless of the cause the problem is too many teams in the playoffs and it does not depend on the underlying nature of the sport.