Olympic Hockey A Success!

BY: Bobby

So far the NHL players have participated in 4 Olympics since 1998 and there has been only one big injury which was Dominik Hasek in 2006 who was a thousand years old already and injured his groin which was a recurring injury. So there hasn't been a whole bunch of injuries. The NHL is complaining about the compacted schedule because of the 14 day break. If anything the NHL should stop playing a few of the regular season openers in other countries while some teams are still playing pre season games. The flying and time difference really has an effect on the players but yet they send them over every year and now more teams than ever are starting their season over seas. I say lets send our players again in 2014 to Russia. Here is the reasons why?

So far since 1998 the Canadians met the USA in the Gold medal game twice out of four times. That will draw more American fans into hockey by them seeing how strong of a team their country has been. The game was the most watched hockey game since 1980's USA GOLD WIN. That gold-medal game drew 32.8 million. According to NBC, the game drew an average viewership of 27.6 million and a rating of 15.2, a jump of 45.5 percent from the same matchup at the 2002 Salt Lake City Games. Both gold-medal games were aired midafternoon live. From 5:30 p.m. ET to 6 p.m. ET, the audience reached its peak, with 34.8 million glued to the TV.

Yes it might not have been the Crosby vs Ovechkin finals people thought. But we got to see that matchup a round before. You got to see Ryan Miller prove that this is his year for Vezina. He took his game right into the olympics and won the tournament MVP. We all got to see for maybe the last time: Peter Forsberg, Zigmund Palffy, Sergei Federov. We now all know that Switzerland is no joke and with Hiller only being 27, they might have two more shots to win a medal if they can get a few more NHL caliber players. We saw Drew Doughty step into the spotlight and take over. We saw Roman Wick of Switzerland and now can wonder why he is not in the NHL. We got to see Jonathan Toews show he is an elite all around forward. We saw Russia choke once again, to many selfish players that want to be in the spotlight. We even got to see the great Martin Brodeur get pulled from the tournament for Roberto Luongo who then went on and won gold. Not to mention the greatly played final game. With parise tying it with 25 seconds left to get the game into overtime. Only to see lucky Sidney Crosby put home the game winner on a beautiful falling sweeping pass by Jarome Iginla. How Ironic? None the less it was a historic bout between two North American teams that will be talked about for ages.

Gary Bettman please you ruined enough things for us hockey fans including a whole season. Plaese do not screw this up. This is world class talent at a high fast level pace with hardly any commercials. I seen some of the best hockey I have seen in years. Do not take this away from us too. I would love to see the new players that would be there representing their countries like: Steven Stamkos, Victor Hedman, Keith Yandle, Kyle Okposo, John Tavares, Mike Green, Zach Bogosian, James VanRiemsdyk, MPS, Jakob Markstrom, Tyler Hall, Erik Karlsson, Jonathan Quick, MArc-Andre Fleury, Kiril KAbonov, Nikita Filatov etc.. It will be even better cause alot of the older guys will not be there anymore like: Selanne, Kiprusoff, Brodeur, Iginla, Alfredsson, Pronger, Niedermayer, Langenbrunner, Drury, Rafalski, Gonchar, Kozlov, Koivu, Timonen, Salo, Jagr. It will be like a changing of the guard. I can only hope that olympics will be as good as this past one in 2010.