Word: bettman
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...friend-of-the-court essay written to advance my cause, director Kevin Smith argued that hockey has "Heroes! Villains! Costumes! Masks! Fights! It's a comic book come to life ... at any moment, someone might try to punch someone else in the face!" Oddly, NHL commissioner Gary Bettman was less effusive. When I asked him to sell his sport, he pointed out, "The players all grow playoff beards. It's their commitment to the cause, the bond of the team." But Bettman did add that anyone who watches "Washington play Pittsburgh and sees Ovechkin play Crosby" will catch hockey fever...
...This is what NHL commissioner Gary Bettman doesn't understand. You can't put hockey into every major city in America, because hockey isn't woven into the fabric of the American quilt the way it is woven into the Canadian toque. Canadian billionaire and hockey nut Jim Balsillie knows this - which is why he's making his third attempt to purchase a NHL team ... seemingly against the NHL's wishes. (Read "Why No One Is Seeing the NHL's Great Game...
...hockey skate into this mess? Coming out of the 2004-05 lockout, Versus outbid ESPN for rights to hockey games. NHL commissioner Gary Bettman chose cash over the increased exposure any sport gets from ESPN, which is currently in 98 million homes. While the game has gotten better - new rules have increased scoring, and phenoms like Ovechkin and Crosby have given the game new blood - Bettman lost a mainstream audience to which he could market this improved product. So while Ovechkin-Crosby plays out in the wilderness, Bettman should wonder what might have been. (See TIME's picks...
Goodenow and league commissioner Gary Bettman also presided over a 103-day lockout during the 1994-1995 campaign...
...sport's leaders. With word of a salary cap being instituted, most agreed with the HOCKEY PUNDITS that the "owners won on almost all counts," and many called for the union head and NHL commissioner to resign. (For the lighter side of the issue, check out GARY BETTMAN SUCKS.) Yet, as the HOCKEY CRITIC observed, "both parties have a daunting task ahead of them as they try to ... win back the fans...