Western Standard - Sports columnist Roger Millions on the upcoming NHL season

00:00:00.000 Thank you.

00:00:30.000 Thank you.

00:01:00.000 hey everybody welcome to a western standard special i've got roger millions our new sports

00:01:17.540 columnist on with us today quite a treat and uh we'll talk a little bit about something

00:01:23.180 everybody's been starved for for some time we've all been suffering from everything from lack of

00:01:28.340 hairstylists to restaurants and a lack of professional hockey. So it looks like a COVID

00:01:36.320 NHL season is underway or going to be right away here, Roger. What do you read into? What do people

00:01:43.540 look forward to in this? What's going to be hopefully a one season unique sort of hockey

00:01:47.920 season? It's going to be unique, Corey. Even today, two teams are shut down their practices,

00:01:54.800 that being Columbus and Dallas, just because of the COVID threat.

00:01:58.780 Apparently, they've had some testing in their organization.

00:02:01.820 So that's just an indication that some of the upheaval we're going to see over and over again.

00:02:06.180 I would think with the schedule like it is, particularly in Canada,

00:02:09.960 you're going to have teams that are home for a week.

00:02:12.280 You're going to have teams that are on the road for the week.

00:02:14.820 How do they adjust with COVID?

00:02:16.900 How do they change their roster?

00:02:18.720 They have a taxi squad now, which is a good idea by the NHL,

00:02:21.980 that will allow five, six, seven players that will be available for them to call up

00:02:26.240 in the event that COVID decimates the team.

00:02:29.480 And I think we can expect a lot of that.

00:02:31.920 Let's face facts.

00:02:32.960 What's hockey played in? 0.91

00:02:33.920 It played in rinks.

00:02:34.860 Where is it being played here in Canada?

00:02:36.520 It's played in the cold.

00:02:37.840 You're going to see some cases of COVID without doubt.

00:02:42.240 To be honest with you, Corey, I'm not 100% sure what COVID is.

00:02:45.540 All I know is it's there and it's threatening our country

00:02:48.980 and every other country in the world at this point.

00:02:50.800 But the NHL will have some ups and downs throughout the course of this.

00:02:54.520 There's no doubt about it.

00:02:57.300 Yeah, well, and we saw that with the state side.

00:03:00.400 You know, the NFL pulled it off.

00:03:01.920 But there were some games that were terribly lopsided because teams were missing a whole pile of their starters due to COVID issues.

00:03:07.860 And I'm certain we'll see that going to the hockey season on and off again this year.

00:03:12.180 But, I mean, it's still great to have some hockey to look forward to and watch.

00:03:16.360 So we're going to see a higher concentration of Canadian division games just due to the fact of lack of travel, I guess.

00:03:22.720 And you've been doing rundowns and breakdowns on what you see ahead for Winnipeg and Vancouver this season.

00:03:30.020 Do you have any thoughts on the Flames?

00:03:32.440 Well, yeah, I do.

00:03:33.440 And that'll be coming out shortly on Western Standard in terms of our online thoughts on what Calgary might look forward.

00:03:40.020 I think they'll be an interesting team.

00:03:41.680 There's no question about that.

00:03:42.980 they are basically i think a heavy emphasis on defense and goaltending they of course signed

00:03:49.440 jacob markstrom from vancouver as a free agent that's six million dollars a year for the next

00:03:54.140 six years so they have committed to him they think he's the goaltender that they haven't had

00:03:59.680 since the likes of mika kiprasov they have also added a very solid defender in chris tanev who's

00:04:05.400 31 years old he is a very good player he was in vancouver as well but he can give all sorts of

00:04:12.340 different ways of handling the defensive structure so I think the Flames themselves kind of felt that

00:04:17.160 they gave up too many goals last year and although they did lose to Dallas in the first real round of

00:04:23.020 the bubble playoffs that we had in the fall I think that they want to shore up their goaltending

00:04:28.100 and their defensive play and they think they have enough offense to win if they do that and they

00:04:32.600 just could be right well good we're really looking forward to seeing them out in the ice so with

00:04:39.520 challenges for the whole league too. And you talked a bit about that in a prior column with

00:04:43.240 they won't be able to get fans into seats. I mean, we don't know if that's going to happen at all

00:04:48.060 this season or if they might get a few later, but that puts an extremely heavy burden on these teams

00:04:54.940 going forward. Do you think, I mean, if a year from now this is still going on, they're going to

00:05:01.860 have to reevaluate things like player budgets and such? Well, they've already done some of that,

00:05:06.520 cory what they've done is they've reduced the schedule to 56 games from 81 so they've cut it

00:05:11.400 down by almost 25 percent they've also the players have taken a hit uh per uh i don't know what you

00:05:17.640 would say but they've kind of graduated their their salaries down that 25 as well plus the

00:05:23.720 nhl has reduced cost let's take the canadian north division so to speak a lot of times for instance

00:05:30.440 let's use the flames as an example since i'm very familiar with them they'll be in ontario for 10

00:05:35.320 days coming up at the end of january early february so very limited travel that's where the

00:05:40.680 big cost is in a lot of nhl teams is how they travel from point a to point b and now they won't

00:05:47.720 have to charter planes nearly as much so that cost goes down so they've graduated it down where they

00:05:54.280 remove some of their costs they've reduced salary just to try to try to keep that profit line in a

00:06:00.920 sustainable position but i'm with you i think if this last another year or so then i think we're

00:06:06.760 going to see uh some more problems with teams and low budget teams teams like the winnipeg jets i

00:06:11.960 hate to say they're they're very limited they're in a very small market of 700 000 people the

00:06:18.200 province itself can't drive in to see their games they don't have that much marketing in terms of

00:06:22.760 advertising so winnipeg is a team that would really really worry me they don't have that big

00:06:28.360 a building in the first place it doesn't matter it's going to be empty but their ability to raise

00:06:34.280 money from advertising whether it's going to be on helmets on sweaters which i think is going to

00:06:39.080 happen big time in the nhl maybe a little bit to start this year but they're going to have to look

00:06:43.720 at additional revenue sources over and above television television will be there winnipeg's

00:06:49.080 under contract with tsn the other teams in alberta will be under contract with with sports that

00:06:54.600 edmonton and calgary so they have that revenue but how are they going to increase revenue

00:06:59.880 and it's all about money and at this point in time the nhl will have to kind of

00:07:04.120 take a look at how this year goes and then go from there next year's a whole new matter

00:07:11.080 right on well i seem to have lost my beautiful green screen background oh well the crowd comes

00:07:17.000 down well that it's good to hear though i mean it's a lot to look forward to uh i know it's

00:07:21.880 going to be hard for them without that parking revenue and selling beer and having seats in the

00:07:25.800 stands but looks like they're doing everything they can to make a season of it so i'm really

00:07:30.520 looking forward to your coverage and analysis of it and uh seeing more you've got more coming out

00:07:35.240 in the western standard right away here i believe do you yeah we do we'll have both edmonton and

00:07:39.640 calgary coming out before the start of the regular season on wednesday and take a look at them i

00:07:44.280 think the oilers are quite exciting i know that they've you know that probably seems strange

00:07:48.360 coming from a guy who spent 17 years covering the flames but i did spend seven years in edmonton so

00:07:52.360 i know a little bit about them but i think the oilers have improved i i really like their their

00:07:58.200 head office uh frontage with uh the people they have there and in terms of dave tippet i think

00:08:03.720 he's a great guy and kenny holland as general manager i think the oilers are going to be better

00:08:08.520 the flames will have to cut down on goals against to be better i think vancouver is going to be

00:08:13.000 fantastic winnipeg i think is going to be a team that'll be challenged just a little bit but the

00:08:17.880 the west is going to be fun it's going to be a lot of different angles and as we go through this

00:08:22.040 covet hockey season it will be interesting to see how it proceeds all right on well i look forward

00:08:27.440 to talking to you as the season progresses and seeing how things develop so thank you very much

00:08:32.080 for coming on roger and we'll talk to you again soon all right cory all the best thank you

Western Standard - January 08, 2021

Sports columnist Roger Millions on the upcoming NHL season

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