Quote:
Originally Posted by dobbles
Really baffled by all the responses that blame the greedy players over this. It's not like the owners are any better. If anything it's short sighted by not participating. If the nil wants to grow it's fan base it has to look outside north America and the Olympics are a prime way to do that. Additionally, ratings for the nhl games those 2 weeks will suffer. Even though the Asian time difference makes viewing live unlikely, I am sure there will be lots of households watching replays of figure skating, curlinf, etc.
I guess I just see it as a bad business decision to not participate. I get the problems it causes, bit seems worth it to me. But the greedy owners can't be bothered to do anything that doesn't directly benefit them. (See how easy it is to play that card)
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How much did the previous Olympics benefit the NHL? No big US TV deal yet. I haven't heard of any big deals outside of NA either. I think the NHL knows how much they benefit from the Olympics and it's very little, it might even have a negative impact.