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A Dud of a Decade

December 31, 2019, 8:44 AM ET [6 Comments]
Jay Greenberg
Blogger •NHL Hall of Fame writer • RSSArchiveCONTACT
Patrick Kane’s solitary celebration was more than just confusing for several seconds. It actually turned out to be a look into a crystal ball. The fact that the first Stanley Cup of the decade was won on a goal that nobody but its scorer saw turned out to be a precursor of a blink-and-you-missed-it ten years.

Of course they contained some moments. Not so sure, however, there were any that will be remembered amongst the greatest in the game’s history; outside of the cities that won championships, we mean.

Good teams? Certainly. Iconic ones? That’s a stretch. You could make a case for Pittsburgh, which won consecutive titles, or Chicago or Los Angeles, which claimed three and two respectively, pretty good runs considering what the salary cap has done to counter sustained excellence. But both the Blackhawks and Kings are ending these ten years in the toilet, so they didn’t get close to wall-to-wall excellence.

Meanwhile, kudos to the Penguins, still going strong. But, will any of those teams be remembered with the Canadiens of 1956-60 or 1976-79, the 1980-83 Islanders, or even the 1962-64 Leafs?

Don’t think so. Neither will we recall from this decade the breaking or challenging of any intriguing and easily identifiable individual or team records. Because there are cases to be made for Sidney Crosby, Patrick Kane and Alex Ovechkin as player of the decade, there was no truly transcendent performer either, good as all those guys have been. None won multiple Art Ross Trophies.

As the decade came closer to its end, Connor McDavid did, emerging as a true can’t-take-your-eyes-off-of-him presence not experienced by the league since at least Eric Lindros or maybe even Mario Lemieux. But so far there have been no wowing playoff accomplishment by McDavid; let’s see what the Oilers can put around he and Leon Draisaitl to make the twenties roar again with something truly special again in Edmonton.

The first-year Golden Knights wrote the best story of the decade, but they didn’t win, and even if they had, Vegas would have been a commentary on the condition of a watered-down league. The NHL’s first full decade with the cap was a manifestation of what the owners wanted from it: six different champions, with only Pittsburgh’s repeat.

There was not a single final-series rematch drama, only one example–as Pittsburgh and Washington met three times–of the kind of multiple spring grudge matches as produced by the Avs and the Red Wings during the nineties. Was there a single longstanding rivalry further embellished by an incident that lifted the level of enmity between two franchises? Tell me, please.

Marquis teams whose success you traditionally admired or hated-Philadelphia and Montreal-were mired in mediocrity for most of the ten years and the guys who most got on your nerves soon got on the next plane to the next team. The cap forces teams to change grinders. They take their axes with them to the highest bidder, which might be their once most-hated opponent.

This is not to sing any sad songs for the goons who disappeared during the decade, when the twin asteroids of discipline and uniformity hit the hockey planet. Poof, went the tough guys; their deterrent value gone as they had come to be fighting for themselves and the ritual of it, rather than for their teams. We can’t even blame their absence for the draining of passion from the game because that ship had already sailed. Rather, we hold accountable the owners for the number of franchises and that Grim Reaper of continued excellence: The cap.

Really, since cost-certainty came in, what has happened in hockey¬–like a dynasty, or a heroic moment–that would rank in a consensus all-time top-ten? We can think of two in the last ten years that might challenge a top 20: 1) Crosby’s gold-medal-winning overtime goal to beat the U.S. in the 2010 Vancouver Olympics and 2) the lockdown performance of the Canadian team in 2014 at Sochi. Exciting the latter triumph was not, but brilliant it was, just for its sheer harmony, a magnificent example of adaptability and mindset by star players that may not have been seen since the magnificent 1987 Canada Cup final between Canada and the Soviet Union.

Good stuff at Sochi. So what followed? The NHL decided not to participate in 2018, heaven forbid that lifting the game should ever be put ahead of lifting the business.

Hope a lesson was learned. Hope that hope itself, which was richly rewarded at last in the drought-breaking titles won by Chicago, Boston, Los Angeles, Washington and St. Louis is enough to keep you interested in your team between championships now designed by the cap and a 32-team league to come few and far between. The owners got the communism they wanted, along with the same lie perpetuated behind the Iron Curtain–that life is better for everyone now. The concept of survival of the fittest went out with the end of the California Golden Seals.

Seattle is paying $650 million to get in. Can’t knock the business plan and, when you see the highlights every night, can’t knock the ever-rising skill level of the players, except that they are spread out over too many clubs that all pretty much play the same way.

Objectively, and thankfully, we must acknowledge the game made some advancements during the decade. Scoring increased. Smaller, quicker, players thrived like they hadn’t since the sixties. The advent of the three-on-three overtime put playmaking increasingly back into the process of breaking ties, diminishing the volume of the abominations that are the shootouts. Hate ‘em.

Like player movement, though, and the cap has brought plenty of that, except it is to the unglamorous, lower, ends of lineups. Intriguing trades during this decade? Free agent signings? Sure, some turned out to be steals or fiascos, and they have been properly credited for helping to turn franchises, but were there any true stunners involving marquis names?

We can argue whether it is a good or bad thing for the game that its stars overwhelming have stayed put with long deals that take them through their prime years.. Teams build identities through their best players of course. But with so few of the guys you pay to watch changing clubs, how many moves have really prompted wide wonderment about a coming season, as did how would the Oilers do without Gretzky and how much could he lift the historically sad Kings?

The trade of the greatest player who ever lived is an extreme case, of course, but between 2010-9 there was only one transaction involving a true franchise player, with all the sport-feeding speculation that led up to it—John Tavares’s signing with the Maple Leafs.

For now, the Islanders impressively have survived it, and the Leafs have yet to take it to another level; twins drama to be played out before 2030. So here’s to the next ten! At the very least the countdown of Ovechkin goals to Gretzky’s record 894 promises something to seize our attention. We love the game, want to love it as much as before.
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