Quote:
Originally Posted by dobbles
I appear to be in the minority, but I still love the game of hockey even without the physical play. I would certainly love more physicality and even more authentic fighting, but I still love the game because of the athleticism and strategy.
I will never get sick of watching these big bulky dudes move around on ice using tiny blades all while having amazing speed and agility. I will never get sick of watching multiple players coordinate an attack in the zone where they all have to execute a plan that has a hundred moving pieces to it.
What I love about hockey is the speed of the game. For all the love football gets here in the states, I find it amazingly boring. I still watch, but find myself less and less interested every year. The pace of the game is terrible. With hockey, even though there are boring times (Dman waiting behind his own net for line change to finish) they pass much more quickly than other sports.
All those reasons are why I still turn on center ice at night to watch anything that is on including some random Panthers/Senators tilt that most people would find mind numbing.
Taking this a bit back on topic for a second in terms of fair weather fandom, I find that for me that actually ties in a lot with what people have been talking about in terms of getting older and having less time. When I was younger I had much more time to learn players from all the teams, to learn prospects, etc. While I still watch as many games as I can, I am much less informed and much less vested in the outcome due to those factors.
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Football has one exciting event last 5 seconds and then a whole 10 minutes of advertisements, commercials and replay. Football really, REALLY needs to quicken the time before plays, turn-overs, punts and field goals.
Soccer is very much similar to hockey in that there's always action, except hockey has more offensive chances and "potential scoring events" than soccer. Sure, its possible a guy boots it from centrefield and beats the goalie, but all the 1-0 games suggest that you need 10 people to consecutively set-up the perfect passing play that only by sheer luck did someone actually score. So is it exciting that a player brings the ball up into the offensive zone? No, because usually its nothing.
Baseball is too slow. Pitch, miss, pitch, miss, pitch miss,...., fake steal, pitch, miss...., hit, catch, and repeat. The odd big catch and run is fun to watch, but there's like a 10:1 ratio of butt scratching events to potential scoring events.
And now on to my second favorite sport: basketball. Lots of scoring events. A lot of dangles with the ball, trick dunks, and sweet shots that manage to make it despite them being contested. But my God is basketball soft!! You so much as sneeze on an opponent, they stop all the action events and make you watch the lame free throw. Too many whistles and not enough contact. For a game that usually allows 150 to 200 baskets (both teams combined) from the biggest men on the planet, dear lord is it sissy and lame. I would absolutely love some PPE for the players and let them body check in the paint and allow pre-shot hand-slaps elsewhere, even if resulted in only 25-50 baskets each. Hockey physicality + basketball-sized men == A pretty sweet sport.
Hockey is by far the most entertaining sport due to handicap (special teams), speed, physicality, and number of action scoring chances without disruptions. But then the physicality is being diminished, and coaching has tightened up to reduce the exciting events. How many times has your heart stopped during a 5-on-3 against your team when the other team is hammering away, and your so relieved that they survived it. That's excitement!
How many times has your team hit the post to get you standing on your feet, and then they keep the pressure on with quality chances and you're standing the whole time waiting for that sweet goal? Even f they don't score, that 30 seconds of standing on your feet in anticipation is an exciting even. Goal scoring doesn't need to go up necessarily, but things like shot blocking and collapsing in front of the net needs to go down, because its those things that ruin exciting events.
Plus hockey has reduced its spontaneity. I remember Iginla flying down the wing and letting a slapper go from 20ft out and it somehow whizzed by the tender. You think its a nothing event, and then SURPRISE!! That's excitement. But so many goalies are such big butterfliers with .910+ percentages that only the most quality shots beat them. So you know every single shot from Gaudreau or Monahan from anywhere but the slot or perfect set-up is going to result in nothing. You become apathetic to what is defined as a "scoring chance event". It then becomes closer to soccer.
That's one thing I like about basketball is the spontaneity. Sometimes Steph Curry just drains it from 40ft away with a hand in his face. Or Westbrook drives to the crowded net with hands everywhere and somehow he does some backwards twisting somersault to get the ball in the basket. That's excitement.