HEY GARY, WAKE UP!
Wow, it's already March! I can't believe the playoffs are a little over a month away. I hope everyone is (getting) over their Olympic hockey hangover because we're currently in the midst of the NHL trade deadline. The deadline is coming up on us on Wednesday, March 3 and some teams are expected to start announcing trades as soon as today. 
Unfortunately, watching Olympic hockey has made me realize just how faulty the NHL actually is. It pains me that I haven't felt as connected to an NHL game (exluding Game 6 of the Bruins/Canadiens game in 2008) than I did watching either the USA or Germany. Maybe I'm still reeling from the games themselves, but you can tell there is definitely something missing in Gary Bettman's NHL.
The sad thing is, you can tell Bettman doesn't even care about the product in front of him because it doesn't present any green backs. During the US/Finland game, Bettman was interviewed by NBC and basically stated (paraphrasing) "We're a little bummed that it cuts into our schedule." That's about it. Maybe I'm wrong, but that's what I took away from his stupid interview.
The biggest thing I hope Gary takes away from these Olympic games is the commercial-less periods. The NHL has way to many commercials, interjecting ads during game play or missing out on some spots because they're running a commercial. Is Gary, the NHL and it's television partners aware of how irritating and frustrating it is as a fan to watch that? The reason the Olympics worked so well is because there was a visible ebb and flow of the game that was not interrupted by multiple car or Subway ads.
Unlike the Olympics, if a puck is iced or heads into the stands (especially on Versus) the television station will rattle off 2-3 commercials and interrupt the viewing experience. Why can't the NHL state "This period is brought to you with limited commercials by Subway" much like they did on NBC? Hell, you want some advertising, throw the Subway logo into the score ticker.
I also enjoyed the no-touch icing, but that isn't as important as the commercial-less periods.
There are many things that the NHL could do to improve its product (commercial-less periods, eliminating four teams, removing the trapezoid, etc) but all of this will once again fall on deaf ears. The NHL's problem begins at the top and slowly trickles its poison down the tree.
Hopefully Gary was paying attention to the 17.6 overnight Neilsen rating it received on NBC, because his league hasn't come close to that number in God knows how long.
"But it's in the middle of our schedule..."
