Here's one reason why the 275 people who watched along with me as the Sabres beat the Hurricanes last night feel that we got a better deal than the millions of you who watched the Suns beat the Mavericks.
I like basketball, but I think there's a flaw in the way the game's designed. The rules and strategies employed by teams often combine to turn a game played at lightening speed for 46 minutes into something that moves at glacial pace during the final two minutes. Many times, the more hotly contested a basketball game is, the more tedious it becomes down the stretch.
After the Sabres game, the entire TV audience decided to go out for a beer together, and we talked about how the opposite is true in hockey. For example, the Hurricanes' desperate efforts to score a tying goal turned the last two minutes of yesterday's game into a frenzy of non-stop action. That's the way it almost always is in the NHL, but especially in the playoffs.
Plus, they fight a lot more in hockey.
Thursday, May 25, 2006
Hockey Rules; Hoops Doesn't
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3 comments:
I can see your point but I disagree.
I've played both hockey and basketball (I've currently recovering from shoulder surgery due to a injury in intramural ice hockey - so right now I play neither) but I can't get into televised hockey.
I'm not sure why, I love playing it and I love watching it live, but on TV... meh.
Basketball I could watch anytime and anywhere (not the WNBA of course) and I love the final minutes. I love the chess matches, the coaches drawing up plays (like last nights inbounds play to Boris Diaw, what a call!). I also enjoy the dumbass plays that coaches call (Daniel Ewing? Huh?).
Anways, most of my frieds bitch about how long the last two minutes of a NBA game takes, but I don't care.
Ben,
Televised hockey definitely is an acquired taste, and I know a lot of guys like you who love to play hockey but can't sit through a game on TV.
In fact, while some of the guys I skate with are so hard-core that they buy the NHL Center Ice pay-per-view package, others don't watch a minute of hockey all year.
The NHL is pinning its hopes on high def. I don't have HD, but I've heard several people say that there's no sport that benefits as much from it as hockey.
I hope so, because right now, the game's pure poison from a ratings perspective.
Not a huge hockey fan, but it really is pretty amazing on HD.
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