Today's NHL, Job Market: Iced and Inept

“It sucks I have to get a job in this economy. At least you have another four years for it to get better.”

—Various friends, upon graduating college, Spring 2001

“This Bush economy is terrible. Good thing you have three years ’til you need a real job.”

—Spring 2002

“The job market has to be better in two years, right? Right?”

—Spring 2003

“The Bush economy is skull-fucking me. Pray to God things change in 12 months.”

—Spring 2004

“Dear Sir/Madam: We are unable to offer you a position at this time. [Scrawled in pen: ‘Why did you think it was acceptable to include a clip about Drinking Scrabble?’]”

—Rejection letter No. 1,049, Spring 2005

Some of my friends already know what they’re doing after graduation. I hate these friends. They know who they’re working for, in what city, and at what ungodly salary. They’re in safe, reliable majors like economics, got premier Wall Street internships last summer, and accepted job offers in October.

Now they while away their carefree days spending their signing bonuses, pricing apartments in San Francisco or Bonn or wherever their I-banking firms whim, and having sex with other Masters of the Universe underneath a warm blanket of $100 bills and the security of guaranteed employment.

I, on the other hand, am in the field of journalism, where you compete like a law clerk and get paid like a stable hand. Nothing has panned out for me yet. At this point I’m even jealous of my friend Anssi, who’s looking at a year of mandatory service in the Finnish military.

But yesterday, I took a look at some of the guys behind me in the unemployment line, and I felt a lot better: there was Brett Hull, and Scott Stevens, and about 500 other guys who should be playing pro hockey right now.

They’re being locked out of the NHL by their owners, who are tired of losing a quarter of a billion dollars each season. In case you haven’t noticed—and you probably haven’t—the Columbia club team gets more ice time than these guys right now. I earned more money on the $0.25-$0.50 tables at pokerroom.com last night than they have all season.

The two camps, players and owners, can’t agree on a new collective bargaining agreement. The NHL will, in all likelihood, soon become the first major sport in America to cancel an entire season.

As much as it pains me, a diehard fan, to say, here it is: the season should be canceled. Next season, too. And the one after that. Whatever it takes to pound into these morons’ heads that pro hockey is failing for a reason.

Guys, I have a solution. Give me a job—as NHL commissioner—and I promise to give you your jobs back in turn.

I certainly couldn’t do worse than the existing NHL execs. They’ve made every decision of the last decade wrong. They said it was imperative to end fighting, because otherwise suburban moms and dads would never take their kids to games. But they ended up neutering a crucial part of the sport’s personality. They let defenses get too good and didn’t compensate with simple rule changes that would encourage explosive goal-scoring. (No records have been set lately—hockey has nothing to rival Peyton or McGuire-Sosa.) They’ve utterly failed to answer the challenge of marketing visor-wearing European guys with names like Teemu Selanne to skeptical American consumers.

What’s really appealing about this job is the inefficiency of the league right now—there’s such a chasm between what the NHL is and what the NHL ought to be that it’s just begging to be torn down and rebuilt again. That happens to be what I enjoy doing (anybody remember the old Spec, on black and white tabloid?); the fact that I know how to pronounce “Miroslav Satan” and the eight reasons icing can be waved off is just gravy.

The good news is that hockey is--—really is—fundamentally a great sport. It just needs some fresh eyes. Invest in cameras that swoop above the ice, in the same way that the NFL imitates video game angles. There’s a reason that everyone loves hockey on SEGA and hates hockey on television.

In the long term, increase the game’s reach and the depth of talent. Want to start a team in a city where ponds don’t freeze in the winter? That’s fine, but you’re now required to build one community rink a year for five years before you’re allowed to play.

Make the players not quite so goddamned Canadian. They’re too polite and team-oriented. When a hockey player scores a goal, then pulls a cell phone out of the net and calls his boo, I’ll be satisfied. (And while we’re replacing personalities, axe greasy ESPN commentator Barry Melrose, who looks like he owns the patent on roofies.)

Hockey is a great sport at its core. But it’s packaged all wrong. Until you douse the place in gasoline and toss a match, guys, we’ll be keeping each other company in the bread line.