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You can read my last entry regarding possible cap change
here
Take a brief look at Wikipedia’s
history of the original 6 While most of my readers understand the the “original 6” weren’t really the only 6 teams in the NHL when it began, some may not. During the 1920s, there were 10 teams. The Great Depression and then World War II trimmed all but the 6 we think of with the monicker “original 6”. Toronto, Montreal, Chicago, Detroit, New York and Boston. Those 6 teams were all alone in the league from 1942 to 1967 when the first expansion of the current NHL took place. St Louis, Los Angelos, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Oakland and the Minnesota North Stars all joined in. Oakland went belly up, Minnesota moved to Dallas and are the current Dallas Stars.
These 6 teams have seen the league grow more than 5X as we ready for the 32nd team in Seattle to join up. That is impressive. Detroit fell off badly in the 1980s, and it was the Illitch family that saved them. A more blue collar story would be hard to find. A minor league pitcher is injured and has his career ended before he makes it to the bigs. He has a wife and a litter of children and needs to pay the bills. This young man opts to start making pizzas in the back of his father in law’s bar in Westland, Michigan. His tireless energy garners him a nickname from his wife. She calls him her “little Caesar”. And from the back part of a bar to a logo on top of a beautiful new stadium, Mike Illitch saved the Detroit Red Wings.
Early in his tenure the team would give away cars at games just to get people to come. Mike would invite perspective season ticket holders down to Joe Louis and walk them to the seats they were thinking about purchasing. He would then sit there and show what their view would be like. Hands on, he wants this team to make it. And then, in 1983, sweet salvation. Steve Yzerman is drafted. It would still be 13 years until Detroit ended a better than 40 year cup drought, but what #19 brought to the ice started putting more butts in seats. The 1990s saw Nick Lidström drafted and the Russian 5 became the talk of the town. In 1995, after a heartbreaking sweep in the finals by New Jersey, Yzerman was on his way to being traded. Depending on who you believe, Yzerman was about to board a plane when Illitch called it all off. He couldn’t bear to part with the captain who was more family than roster player. It paid off with cup victories in 96, 97, and 2002 all with Yzerman wearing the C. - I made the mistake of saying 96, 97. It should have been 97 and 98
The 25 years of successive post season runs brought a near drunken fervor for fans (myself included). Detroit, it felt like, was only a tweak or two away from making a real run. That seems like an eternity ago. Detroit planted a flag on last place so definitively this past season that the last dozen games wouldn’t make any sort of difference in that finish. It was awful to watch.
With the season a lock for being a worst in history type scenario, something happened. A worldwide pandemic shut down the machine and all sports went away. With 7/8s of the season played, everything is now completely different. Ek even mentioned that one team may not survive the loss and could be moved to Quebec. In my lifetime I’ve seen this with Quebec going to Colorado and Atlanta moving to Winnipeg (who had moved to Arizona before that, so the record books are really weird). Somehow Detroit made it through turmoil that clubs like Hartford couldn’t.
We’ve been spinning scenarios for weeks, and no one has a real grasp on what will actually happen next. Lower the cap and lower salaries? What about Escrow? If a player agrees to 25% less salary then they want to be protected against escrow at all costs. That would mean a new CBA that does away with the 50-50 split. The players are on the brink of making a decision based on “debt forgiveness” that came from a system that was never prepared for this scenario. “Sure, we’ll forgive the billion dollars we lost, but what’s in it for us?” The owners will ask. Players have already been making on average 10% less than their contracted salary due to escrow, all while not being privy to any part of expansion fees paid (which, ironically, between Vegas and Seattle is more than 1 billion). That money was not hockey related revenue, apparently.
Detroit will survive. It is now at the feet of the players and owners to decide what to do to defray the loss. Players have held off on their last paychecks of the regular season to see what will happen. Neutral site venues are making pitches for hockey without fans present. But, the CBA may have to be completely restructured to cover the losses for this past year.
We don’t know what the new era will look like. But, with pride, Detroit will be there in the mix. Woody Allen said that 90% of life is just showing up. Simply, opportunities come to those with the ability to seize them. If there are franchises that will be moving, it will be sad for fans who didn’t realize they had seen their team’s final games. Luckily, in Detroit, the best is yet to come.
Detroit Red Wings Blogger • 
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