Major4Boarding
Unfamiliar Moderator
I used to be pretty easily convinced, the worries of the talent pool and lack thereof.Yeah at some point you have to start thinking about how large hockey's talent pool is. Adding multiple teams at once when we're at 32 already weakens the product team quite a bit. But I mean, we'd get to see McDavid hit 180 points or whatever.
I'm not there anymore though. During the 90's and 2000's expansion process I was. But my mindset was, "We're getting a team, so I didn't care about anyone else's problems". With the North Stars, Jets, Nordiques and Whalers relocating that cushioned that talent pool depletion.
I'm not there anymore because I see more and more 6–9-year-old players with tons more skill than 10 years ago. 13-16 year-olds looking like solid U18-caliber players already. On both sides of the border. There's more Collegiate talent rolling out now than before. More College Hockey programs are churning out more NHL-ready players. If some ECHL/AHL owners could get out of their own way, there'd could be more talent flourishing and being cultivated there as well. That's just here in North America.
Look at what's emerging in Europe. Germany, Switzerland, and Denmark. That's not including the heavyweights Sweden, Finland, Slovakia, Russia (current climate excluded). Hell Austria can really start making a push to give some of these teams a run for their money.
There's an immediate gap right now, sure. But with each passing year, that gap's gonna shrink. And you all will really get sick and tired of hearing "generational talent" every other year pretty soon instead of what we've been accustomed to now (every 10)
That's just me though.