NHL Takes a Pass on 2018 Winter Olympics
Prince George, B.C. – The suspense is over regarding whether the NHL plans to participate in the 2018 Winter Olympics in PyeongChang, South Korea.
In a statement today, the NHL said the answer is no:
“We have previously made clear that while the overwhelming majority of our clubs are adamantly opposed to disrupting the 2017-18 NHL season for purposes of accommodating Olympic participation by some NHL plyers, we were open to hearing from any of the other parties who might have an interest in the issue (e.g. the IOC, the IIHF, the NHLPA, etc.) as to reasons the Board of Governors might be interested in re-evaluating their strongly held views on the subject,” the NHL said in a statement.
“A number of months have now passed and no meaningful dialogue has materialized. Instead, the IOC has now expressed the position that the NHL’s participation in Beijing in 2022 is conditioned on our participation in South Korea in 2018. And the NHLPA has now publicly confirmed that it has no interest or intention of engaging in any discussion that might make Olympic participation more attractive to the clubs.
“As a result, and in an effort to create clarity among conflicting reports and erroneous speculation, this will confirm our intention to proceed with finalizing our 2017-18 regular season schedule without any break to accommodate the Olympic Winter Games. We now consider the matter officially closed.”
Dan Rosen, NHL.com senior writer, says the NHL conducted polls in both Canada and the United States to determine if fans were in favour of the League taking a break in February and the answer was also no.
In the U.S., he says 73 per cent were against and in Canada 53 per cent.
The NHL has participated in every Winter Olympics dating back to Nagano Japan in 1998.
Comments
at least the russians can win one again finally…lol
I think this is a great idea. I like to at least pretend that the Olympics are all about amateur athletics.
Pretend all you want. The KHL will shut down for the Olympics, giving the Russians all the pros they need to win. As for other amateur olympians, many of the successful ones are paid quite a bit of money for their success.
The good thing is that I wont have to stay up in the middle of the night to watch the Russians beat a Canadian team full of semi pros, wanna be pros and players who are so anonymous only their parents and family know who they are. The hockey will be wretched.
Way to grow the game, Mr Bettman. I will not be surprised if this is the first step to another lockout.
Every skier, snowboarder, figure skater and 99% of all other sports, are all professional athletes. Why should the hockey be any different?
99%? Not likely, maybe 30% at most. The vast majority of Olympic athletes are publicly funded.
I really don’t know if it is good or bad. I know the Olympic committee could not get it together, so Bettman made it easier for them. so the Olympic committee thinking they are gods, tell Bettman, that they are out for 2022 as well than, Bettman replys, OK.
I know a lot of people don’t like Bettman, but, here was at least one person that was not going to get bullied. So, I guess nobody in North America is going to watch the hockey that much, or care too much about it. Just means less advertising money will be collected, I think a lot of the money comes from the Hockey portions, and we spend a lot of money on advertising. So is Tim Hortons going to take an ad for $100k during a Olympic hockey game with lesser quality players, likely not, maybe $10k.
So is CBC, TSN and other networks going to offer the big bucks to the host country, likely not, because the viewers won’t be there. I think the Olympic Committee dropped the ball, its just that they don’t realize it yet.
Hate to say in print, but, Bettman did the right thing.
True dat, would love to see some timbits players skating against the ruskies all swarming the puck like moths to a flame. Would be awesome
Don’t think TV networks will pay the big dollars to get the rights to the games without a big return in viewers. Big revenue loss for the IOC
Bettman is the worlds biggest >>>>>>>>>>> will rune hockey if not replaced
if the NHL won’t allow the Russian & European players participate there is no Olympic hockey worth watching maybe even china could win gold if they put a team in.
Before 1998 when the NHL first went to the olympics there was no hockey teams from Canada and the US? We have a ton of players in the AHL, WHL and university leagues that would be pleased to make the journey to the olympics in 2018. The AHL players may be tied to the NHLPA but there are some great players in the university system that would give their left nut to play in the olympics.
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