I know — not a headline you might expect here. But Travis Hughes of the blog Broad and Pattison has proposed what, for my money, is the best NHL realignment proposal yet.
He, like we did earlier this week, posits that the only real way to reignite a two-way rivalry between the Flyers and Capitals is to put the two teams in the same division. But he does not suggest contraction or relocation of current teams — nor does he restrict his proposal to the current conference structure. Instead, his post A Flyers/Caps Rivalry Can Work, If… resurrects some classic division names and establishes four total divisions in two new conferences (as illustrated by a pretty cool graphic halfway down the page).
His proposal also addresses the playoff imbalance of a weak-division winner getting an automatic top seed, since there would only be 2 divisions in each conference. Plus he does away with the artificial East & West concept completely — something that forces goofy alignments contrary to the geographical concept. For instance, there’s nothing Western about Detroit, and I suspect sharing a division with teams like Toronto (while keeping Chicago) would make everyone happy. Well, except Toronto perhaps.
The only change I would suggest would be to include Minnesota in the new “Adams Division”, thus balancing the conferences with 15 teams each.
But the Wild move is a minor quibble; check out his article for an innovative solution to the NHL’s lingering alignment problem.
12 Comments
You need to move Minnesota to the Adams to make it slightly more geographically sensible, but that only exacerbates the “Real NHL Conference” and “Outlanders Conference” appearance of this alignment.
Sticking all 6 Original Six teams in one conference? How convenient for that half of the league, and how lousy for the Outlanders’ gate receipts.
He conveniently dismisses the uneven number in conference and division members. Sure, it’s easy to say “suck it up and deal,” but that’s not how it would work. Moving Minny to the “Northeast” conference would solve half of it, but you can’t have 4 teams from a each division make it when the divisions are uneven, either. That’s easily solved, too, by giving 2 automatic bids for each division then 4 “wild card” bids, with the division winners getting the top 2 seeds.
JoshC does bring up the most salient point, though, if there isn’t much more breadth to revenue sharing there is no chance teams would sign on to losing their big ticket draws.
-d
I really struggle to consider this suggestion with a rational mind.
I’ve never been able to embrace the Southeast division, and I’d break the sound barrier to get back some of that old Patrick division venom.
I see no problem with 7 teams in one division and 8 in the other — MLB seems to deal with it just fine, and far fewer teams make the playoffs in baseball than in hockey.
Josh’s point is a good one though, and one I hadn’t thought of: all Original Six in one conference would be pretty rough on the other conference, and offhand there’s no easy solution for that problem.
Biggest problem, florida gets screwed on travel, other than that, it is almost completely geographic still.
I like this plan simply because it brings back the historic names that made hockey so different and personal. Expansion wasn’t the trouble. Realignment wasn’t the trouble. Ignoring Messrs. Adams, Campbell, Norris, Patrick, and Smythe (and the prince of Wales) was the true disgrace.
With a little tweaking, you could even accommodate expansion and make for a 4×8 arrangement…
Move Buffalo to the Patrick (makes for a complete NY set of rivalries) and complete their eight-team division.
Move St. Louis and Minnesota to the Adams to complete that eight-team group.
Add Kansas City franchise to the Smythe; move Colorado to the Smythe.
Add Las Vegas to the Norris.
The result:
Prince of Wales Conference (14 teams)
Patrick Division (8 teams)
Philadelphia Flyers
New York Rangers
New York Islanders
New Jersey Devils
Pittsburgh Penguins
Washington Capitals
Boston Bruins
Buffalo Sabres
Adams Division (8 teams)
Montreal Canadiens
Ottawa Senators
Toronto Maple Leafs
Detroit Red Wings
Chicago Blackhawks
Columbus Blue Jackets
St. Louis Blues
Minnesota Wild
Clarence Campbell Conference (16 teams)
Norris Division (8 teams)
San Jose Sharks
Calgary Flames
Edmonton Oilers
Los Angeles Kings
Anaheim Ducks
Phoenix Coyotes
Vancouver Canucks
Las Vegas Ice Scorpions (humor me)
Smythe Division (8 teams)
Nashville Predators
Atlanta Thrashers
Tampa Bay Lightning
Florida Panthers
Dallas Stars
Carolina Hurricanes
Kansas City Scouts
Colorado Avalanche
Is it perfect?…no. But is the current distribution of teams and the antiseptic geographic nomenclature better?
While I certainly would love to see the return to the classic names, I think we’re all deluding ourselves that this would ever happen. Having a “Smythe Division” instead of a “Pacific Division” (another quibble, the two division names in the Campbell are backwards, IMHO.) repels new fans. Its makes hockey seem more mysterious to those who don’t already follow the game (and its not like its the most popular sport in the “Smythe Division” terrtitory anyway).
I like the return to the four-division system. I like the historical names to return (but in their proper places) and I like the playoff system to be tweaked.
With 30 teams divided unequally, no matter what, some team is going to get screwed with travel within its own division. That’s what happens when you open up geographic possibilities by reducing the number of groupings. Also, there will be a wickedly unbalanced schedule trying to shoehorn 30 teams in four divisions within 80, 82, or even 84 games a year.
Currently, I’d be in favor of either a 1-8, 2-7 playoff seeding within each conference based on record and not division standing. I’d even go for a 1-16 seeding regardless of conference to spice things up.
I like the return to the four-division system. I like the historical names to return (but in their proper places) and I like the playoff system to be tweaked.
With 30 teams divided unequally, no matter what, some team is going to get screwed with travel within its own division. That’s what happens when you open up geographic possibilities by reducing the number of groupings. Also, there will be a wickedly unbalanced schedule trying to shoehorn 30 teams in four divisions within 80, 82, or even 84 games a year.
Currently, I’d be in favor of a 1-8, 2-7 playoff seeding within each conference based on record and not division standing. I’d even go for a 1-16 seeding regardless of conference to spice things up.
I like the idea, but the East (I like Wales, but come on, they won’t go back to that for at least the conferences) is going to benefit a ton. The Smythe division looks atrocious on paper. Dallas and Colorado might get excited at the competitive prospects, but I think their fans would really hate it (not unlike the Caps’ for being stuck in the Southeast).
I like the idea, but if it comes from a flyers fan there must be something wrong.
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