Flying out to a relative's wedding last week, I happened to wind up reading American Way Magazine. That's right, an airline magazine - the boring stuff they pack into the little seat pouch in front of you in case you (like me) happen to forget to bring a book, and happen to forget that you can't turn on your gameboy/psp/ipod/laptop/whatever until the plane's well off the ground.

So I read up on an article regarding the NHL's television woes this year.

Well, yeah. Because the NHL's actually having a season this year, that's good, but after their cancelled 2004/2005 season, they switched TV networks. And ratings have, well, pretty much sucked, not that they were very good before either.

The article's got a priceless quote:

Bradley says the speed of the game entices a live audience but that on television, the game is actually less appealing than the other three sports. With pucks traveling at speeds of up to 100 mph and bouncing all over the rink, the game is difficult to follow within the confines of a living room.

“What can you do about that?” Bradley asks. “You’re talking about something that’s good for attendance and not so good for television. It’s not something that can be changed.”

The followup to this is that the NHL, unlike most major sports groups otherwise (even professional futbol/soccer), has a revenue plan that doesn't rely on TV revenues.

However, here's one that baffled me:

“One thing hockey deals with is that a lot of its fans have never played the game, so many of them aren’t as knowledgeable [about] the game as, say, a basketball fan,” he explains.

Now, there is an interesting challenge. In the deeper South, sure, hockey isn't played much. But growing up in the more northern regions, hockey was something to do for fun. In summer months or not much snow? Grab your rollerskates/rollerblades, play street hockey. I didn't know many people from my hometown who didn't have some level of understanding of the game, even if only on that basic level - and that's still about the same level that you have for people playing football, because not everyone can be on their high school team, and "fun leagues" for that don't exist in the way that basketball and baseball do. Yet football is popular, even when many fans are admittedly just watching for the next injury to happen.

And Hockey? Might not be as popular as football, but even during the NHL strike, it seemed like the sport was doing well, and going to Aeros games was still fun.