Last night, the National Football League announced they will be going ahead with their Draft scheduled for late-April.
And while the NFL has generally taken a more “aggressive” approach to continuing activities during this period of global uncertainty, it does provide an interesting case study for the NHL.
Earlier this week, the NHL announced that the NHL Combine (June 1-6), the NHL Awards (June 18th) and the Entry Draft (June 26-27) were all being postponed.
Although interestingly enough, no official word was given on the Draft Lottery scheduled for April 9th. The news release from the league did say this though.
“The location, timing and format of the 2020 NHL Draft (and Draft Lottery) will be announced when details are finalized.”
Unfortunately for Sens fans eager to find out the details of the Draft Lottery, it seems like this may end up being one of the last things to get figured out. And that’s because it’s tough to make a decision on the lottery without some sort of direction on the remainder of the regular season.
There have been some truly awful ideas thrown around on a Draft Lottery format and while the lottery tournament would never work and the team that suggested it should feel truly terrible for proposing such a ridiculous concept, it does hint that the league is at least considering creative solutions.
Should the entire season get cancelled, including playoffs, it’s not out of the question that all teams will be looking for some sort of compensation for a lost year. The idea of two draft lotteries, one for teams currently in the playoffs and one for those on the outside looking in, seems to make some sense.
It’s worth noting that the New York Islanders were sitting outside of a playoff spot when the league paused earlier this month. Although if you go by points percentage, they were in the second Wild Card spot.
All those words to say nobody really knows how this is going to play out.
The example set by the NFL proceeding with a scaled back version of their draft relying on technology does present an interesting model for the NHL to consider though.
While they’ll likely wait as long as possible, it’s safe to assume that internally the NHL is confronting the idea of a cancelled season. Should that be the case, decisions on the lottery and the draft wouldn’t be far behind.
And now, for no particular reason, a video from the TSN vault.
-Sens news or hockey news of any kind has been part hard to come by the last little while but it does sound like there may be a player signing to look forward to in the not too distant future. The Senators have had their eye on Russian defenceman Artyom Zub for some time now and according to Darren Dreger, they are one of two finalists for his services. A decision may still be a couple weeks away but Dreger says the Senators remain the favourite.
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Every year around this time, I usually make a sports trip of some kind. When there’s no playoff hockey to look forward to in Ottawa, I try to catch a game somewhere else and then visit a couple stadiums when I go. Not this year, I guess.
See I have this completely unrealistic goal of visiting every major sports stadium but it’s becoming increasingly clear I’d need to live three lifetimes or completely abandon my family to make it happen. Here’s my list so far. Can anyone beat it?
NFL
-New Era Field (Buffalo Bills)
-M&T Bank Stadium (Baltimore Ravens)
NHL
-Canadian Tire Centre (Ottawa Senators)
-Bell Centre (Montreal Canadiens)
-Scotiabank Arena (Toronto Maple Leafs)
-Wells Fargo Center (Philadelphia Flyers)
-Madison Square Garden (New York Rangers)
-Rogers Arena (Vancouver Canucks)
-Keybank Center (Buffalo Sabres)
-Amalie Arena (Tampa Bay Lightning)
NBA
-Scotiabank Arena (Toronto Raptors)
MLB
-Fenway Park (Boston Red Sox)
-Citizens Bank Park (Philadelphia Phillies)
-Comerica Park (Detroit Tigers)
-Rogers Centre (Toronto Blue Jays)
-Olympic Stadium (Montreal Expos)
