Rearranging the NHL

While all of Canada celebrates the return of the NHL to Winnipeg, where it will surely be a proud and successful franchise, at least until the Canadian dollar weakens and the clubs moves to the exciting, burgeoning hockey market of Jacksonville (y’know, 2018), I decided to write something about it. Why? Because I’m bored and am putting off working on my dissertation, plus I haven’t updated my blog in two years (WHAT?) and figured it was about time I wrote anything non-academic. But I’m not writing about the Thrashers or Winnipeg or Gary Bettman’s staggering incompetence. No, I’m writing about what really matters in all of this: will the Red Wings move to the Eastern Conference?

The Red Wings themselves are all for this; they are one of two (Columbus) Western teams in the Eastern time zone, and their travel load would be greatly decreased if they played Toronto and Pittsburgh four times a year, rather than LA and Vancouver. How much would it make a difference? Outside of the Central Division and Minnesota (and Winnipeg), every Western Conference city is farther away from Detroit than Miami, the farthest city in the East. (Dallas and Denver are about the same distance as Miami). The distance adds up, especially in the playoffs. A seven-game series at Philadelphia would involve 2,658 total miles of travel; seven games against Phoenix would top 10,000 miles, not to mention cover three time zones.

Another bonus for the Red Wings is that the East is kinda shitty. And that’s not just my opinion. Ask Pierre LeBrun, the only guy on the Hotstove with half a brain. I’m not saying the Red Wings would dominate or make the Cup Finals every year, but their playoff path would be easier. They would certainly have won many more President’s Trophies if they’d been playing in the East. (I do realize these things are cyclical, and I’m not silly enough to think the East will forever be inferior. As I often say to my AL East friends, collective quality is always in flux. But the West has been better since the lockout, and that doesn’t really appear to be changing. But this a matter for another blog post.)

So the Red Wings’ brain trust wants to move to the East, and I’ll believe that it’s a good hockey move, as they’re much smarter than me (except about Marian Hossa). But how would such a move work? Where would the Red Wings play?

It has been noted by some that putting Detroit in the East would rekindle old Original Six rivalries against Toronto, Montreal, Boston and New York. This argument does nothing for me. While the Original Six as an idea still has some meaning, it’s been almost 50 years since that era. And yes, important Red Wings-Canadiens games could be hyped as a continuation of the battles of Howe and Richard. But it’s not like the Red Wings had illustrious rivalries with the Bruins or the Rangers (and Toronto doesn’t play in important games), and they haven’t been in the same conference as Montreal since 1981. Further to the point, hockey breeds rivalries. History matters, of course, but you force any two good teams to play eight games a year and perhaps seven more in the playoffs and they’ll start to hate each other. The Red Wings never had any history with the Avalanche or the Ducks, and all their history with the Blackhawks couldn’t make games against them from 1998 to 2008 interesting.

But some rivalries are important and are worth preserving. The Blackhawks, except for a brief gap from 1970 to 1974, have always played in the same conference as the Red Wings, and Wings-Hawks games, even at their absolute nadir, feel more important than games against the Wild or the Flames.(1) So if the Red Wings do move to the East, they would lose that, to say nothing of the Blues, who, as I was informed when living in St Louis, also have a huge rivalry with the Red Wings. (I was unaware.)

So where to put them? Simply switching them with the Thrashers is the simplest solution, but there is absolutely no other reason to put the Red Wings in the Southeast. So that leaves the Northeast or the Atlantic. Travel-wise, the Atlantic makes the most sense. Even though Toronto seems like clearly the closest Eastern city, it is 206 miles away from Detroit, and Pittsburgh is 205 miles away. And New York, home to three of the divisions’ five teams (way to spread them out, Gary!) is only 500 miles, or half the distance of a Proclaimers song. But if the Red Wings join the division, who leaves for the Southeast? Pittsburgh can’t go, because without it there’s no geographic link for the Red Wings. And if Pittsburgh stays Philadelphia has to, because that is another rivalry worth keeping. And it makes no sense to have two New York teams in one division and the other playing somewhere else (even if lack of sense never stopped the NHL), but moving a New York team to the Southeast helps no one.

The Northeast provides a better fit for the Red Wings, who would get to play three other Original Six teams, and only Boston is outside the Great Lakes/St Lawrence region. Except by that criteria, it makes sense for Boston to be the team to leave, which breaks up the Habs-Bruins rivalry and lessens the Original Six element. That leaves Buffalo, which would allow Detroit, Toronto, Montreal and Boston to get the ol’-time hockey band back together, and keeps Ottawa in its rightful place as the red-headed stepchild. As to the Toronto-Buffalo rivalry: really, who cares?

(Just kidding. Rivalries by proximity have more going for them than rivalries based simply on teams hating each other. The White Sox and the Cubs had a plenty healthy rivalry, even when they hadn’t played each other for 90 years. Toronto and Buffalo are too close to not be rivals, plus they’d still be in the same conference, so they’d play four times a year instead of eight. Big loss.)

So Buffalo it is? Well, no. Buffalo and Miami in the same division doesn’t make a lot of sense,(2) and someone still has to join the Southeast, which brings us back to the same problem with moving Detroit to the Atlantic. None of these options is particularly good, and I like Detroit in the Central.

Enter Nashville. As I’m sure many of you have already noticed, a team in Nashville playing in the Southeast division is far too logical for the NHL. So Nashville moves to the Southeast and the Northeast and Atlantic stay the same. Good.

But who joins the Central? Minnesota and Winnipeg make sense as rivals, and as a newly arrived team, it would help the pseudo-Thrashers to have them play more games against each other. Plus keeping Minnesota, Winnipeg, Calgary and Edmonton together just feels right. So that leaves Dallas for the Central? That kinda ruins the close-knit, Great-Lakes-plus-Nashville thing the Central had going. Colorado? In and of itself I guess that makes sense, except keeping Dallas in the Pacific (1400 miles to San Jose) is pretty stupid.

The whole thing is pretty much a logistical nightmare. You want divisions that make sense geographically, if not culturally, while preserving—strengthening, if possible—important, meaningful rivalries. It’s tricky. That’s why it calls for some seriously radical thinking. And I think that with a little rearranging, we can figure this out while solving some of the NHL’s other problems.

First, why stop with Atlanta? There is absolutely, positively, no reason why there should be more professional hockey teams in the New York area than any other sport. Yes, people love hockey in New York, and by sheer numbers there are just as many hockey fans there as in all the Prairies combined.(3) But three hockey teams (it was four before Hartford moved) that close together is just too many. Two is a good number, so one needs to move somewhere else. The Rangers are too established, with too much history to move, while people in Jersey really love the Devils. So I present to you, by process of elimination, your four-time Stanley Cup champion Kansas City Islanders. As much as it hurts moving a team with such considerable past glories, all New York teams have multiple Cups, and New Yorkers really love the Rangers. (It’s kind of surprising.)

Why Kansas City? Although I think Quebec should have a team, Kansas City is bigger with a better corporate base for supporting a team. (The Assemblée nationale is not a corporate base, though it comes close.) Also, unlike Phoenix or Atlanta, Kansas City is not exactly Sunbelt. Hockey is already pretty big in the region, and is well-established in St Louis, Dallas and Denver, which surround Kansas City. Plus they already have an NHL-ready building.

But moving the Islanders doesn’t take care of everything, and it still leads to more realignment issues. So, with that in mind, I give you the Houston Panthers. Look, the Florida Panthers have been going downhill since the 96 Finals, and they just need a new start. They suck, no one comes to their games, and at any rate sports fans in Miami are shit. You know it, I know it, it is what it is. And while Houston is very much the Sunbelt, it’s a huge city with cadres of rich, crazy oilmen. And we all know what they’re like:


You’re telling me you wouldn’t want luxury boxes full of these guys?

That leaves us with some pretty sensible divisions:

Eastern Conference
Northeast: Montreal, Boston, Ottawa, New York, New Jersey

Central: Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, Washington, Buffalo, Columbus

Red State: Tampa, Carolina, Nashville, Dallas, Houston

Western Conference:
Middle: Detroit, Kansas City, St Louis, Chicago, Toronto

Seasonal Affective Disorder: Calgary, Edmonton, Winnipeg, Minnesota, Colorado

Pacific: Vancouver, San Jose, LA, Anaheim, Phoenix


These divisions make sense regionally, while keeping basically all the important rivalries together (and putting Pittsburgh and Washington together, which needed to happen already).(4) And while it still has two Eastern-time teams in the West (switching Toronto and Columbus), it adds three Central-time teams to the East, so at least the travel will be a little more balanced.(5) And while that’s pretty good, it could be even better (especially if we add just a couple more teams):

Eastern Conference:
Original Four: Montreal, Detroit, Toronto, Chicago

East Coast Assholes: New York, New Jersey, Philadelphia, Boston

Shit Kickers: Carolina, Nashville, Dallas, Houston

I’ve Been Through There: Pittsburgh, Columbus, Kansas City, Buffalo

Western conference:
I Like to Get High and Go Snowboarding: Vancouver, Colorado, San Jose, Seattle

Tanned Assholes: LA, Anaheim, Phoenix, Tampa

Seasonal Affective Disorder: Edmonton, Calgary, Minnesota, Winnipeg

Capital Cities and St Louis: Ottawa, Washington, Quebec, St Louis


I like it. I like it a lot. You know where to find me, Gary. My consulting fee is very reasonable.


(1) We should also bear in mind that these kind of historical rivalries mean much more to us fans than to the players, who—rightfully—care more about who they’re playing now. Some 24-year-old from Burnaby doesn’t really give a shit about Gordie Howe vs. Bobby Hull, but he hates that asshole on the Kings who speared him the last time they played.

(2) Well, unless you’re the NFL, but then you’d have chronic low-level brain damage. (And I’m just talking about the executives.)

(3) Don’t scoff, Canadians. The entire population of Alberta, Saskatchewan (spelled correctly on the first try, without looking it up) and Manitoba is about 5.7 million, while the New York area is 20 million. Even if only one in four people in New York like hockey (a reasonable estimation) and 90% of the Prairies do, that’s about 5 million each.

(4) Possible exceptions are Vancouver-Calgary and Montreal-Toronto-Ottawa. For the former, they’re still in the same conference, and putting Calgary with the other mountain/prairie teams just makes sense (ditto for Vancouver and the West Coast teams). As for the latter, it was tough keeping Toronto-Ottawa-Montreal together while still retaining Boston-Montreal, and, though I’ve conflicting reports from Habs fans, Boston seems like a more important rivalry than Toronto. And though Toronto and Ottawa have a nice mediocrity thing going on, keeping that together really wasn’t a priority.

(5) The biggest distance in the West with this plan, Toronto-LA, is 2100 miles, while it’s 1600 miles between Houston and Montreal. That’s better than the current distance ratio, which is still 2100 miles for the West (Columbus-Vancouver) but only 1400 miles for the East (Montreal-Miami).