Quote:
Originally Posted by browna
This isn't international hockey, it doesn't follow IIHF rules for player eligibility or much else.
It's a NHLPA/NHL Hockey Related Revenue generating exhibition series under the marketing guise of patriotism.
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It seems closer to what the North America vs World all star games sounded like than the Olympics, personally.
Like, “What if we had four all star teams instead of two!” … very cool.
Until they open this up to non-NHL players, expand the list of countries participating (and have a better selection criteria than “countries that have enough NHL players”) and at least have consistent rules around Russian participation (not sure why they can play in the NHL, play in the all star game, but can’t play in an NHL-sanctioned tournament) then it’s never going to reach the status of the Olympics or World Juniors. As it is, it’s barely got the status of the World Championships, and that’s only because the quality of players are better in this all star games game/tournament.