NHL Heritage Classic should always be all-Canadian affair

The lack of interest in the outdoor games this season highlights the NHL's need to do a better job at marketing itself. On the latest episode of Zone Time, Yahoo Sports Justin Cuthbert says it should start with making the Heritage Classic an all-Canadian affair.

Video Transcript

- Cuth, you mentioned Buffalo earlier. I'm not going to lie. If it wasn't for the fact that we kind of talk offhand about it in between recording episodes of the Yahoo Sports Hockey Podcast, I would have forgotten that the Heritage Classic would have been at the Donut Box in Hamilton-- between the Sabres and the Leafs. Bitter rivals in Hamilton.

OK. Cool. Is that cool? Is that a cool game? Are we excited about this? Is this something we should be raring to be up for, even though we're-- I mean, Omar are you going to be at the game? Or are you going to be watching from home?

OMAR: Yeah. I'm going to go. I think it'd be cool.

JULIAN MCKENZIE: Oh, OK. Cool. OK. All right. Cool. That's nice.

OMAR: But I think the league, again-- it's been clear. The league has done a horrible job at marketing itself. Tampa and Nashville had that stadium series and completely forgot it was happening. So I think, if you are going to the game, if you're a fan of either team, or even if the game is happening in your city, then I think it's exciting.

And maybe advertising would be happening there. But yeah. The NHL needs to do a better job at literally caring about itself. Yeah, it's Toronto and Buffalo, but it's Toronto. So I don't understand how there aren't-- and yes. This will annoy a lot of people, but market yourself, man.

JUSTIN CUTHBERT: Yeah. I mean, it's Buffalo. It's Toronto, but it's Buffalo. So it can't really be that exciting, other than the Leafs needing revenge after losing to Buffalo last week. The Heritage Classic should be two Canadian teams. I don't think it's written into the rules. Of course, it's not, because there's an American team playing.

But there's a lot of stadium series games that are American teams, big markets, TNT and ESPN wanting to get them on. I mean, if you're SportsNet, is this the match-up you wanted? I don't think so. Let's get Toronto and Edmonton, Matthews McDavid, or Vancouver Toronto.

That makes a lot more sense than, hey. These two cities are joined by a highway. Maybe the highway will take these two fan bases to a middle point between them. Other than that, it's not that interesting. But I will be there, and I'll be leaving the house. So I'm excited.

SAM CHANG: Yeah, I'm with Justin. It should be two Canadian teams. I think in general, over the last few seasons, the league has done an atrocious job with outdoor games. I can't remember the last time I cared about one. The last time a Heritage Classic was actually interesting was-- and it wasn't even because the Canucks played in it.

It was just that John Tortorella benched Roberto Longo, and that was the end of that.

- (ALL) Oh. Yes.

SAM CHANG: But like, who cares about them otherwise? Can you name a game that's been interesting and that people have cared about?

OMAR: The game where Corey Perry got ejected and he had to walk all the way down?

JULIAN MCKENZIE: But that was seconds into that game, too. That wasn't that long.

JUSTIN CUTHBERT: I think Roberto Luongo is the last person who cared about an outdoor game.

JULIAN MCKENZIE: That's entirely possible. There's been some decent moments in the first few years of it, like Crosby beating the Sabres.

SAM CHANG: When they did the HBO series, that actually made it interesting. But since then, it just hasn't been good.

JULIAN MCKENZIE: Why did they get rid of it again? The 24/7 leading up to the Winter Classic? Why did they get rid of it? Because the league doesn't like fun?

JUSTIN CUTHBERT: The same reason why the Leafs one was terrible, because they didn't want to show anything that people would actually find interesting.

JULIAN MCKENZIE: No, man. I thought it was really cool to see Bruce Boudreau swearing up a storm in the locker room.

JUSTIN CUTHBERT: Fantastic.

SAM CHANG: Mike Green on his Vespa? Iconic moments.

JULIAN MCKENZIE: I don't get it, man. We're in an era now where leagues like F1, PGA-- I wouldn't surprise me if NASCAR started doing this. They said, you know what, man? Fans want access. Let's show them the stuff beyond the playing surface and let people get into these characters, beyond what they see on a normal broadcast.

And it just blows my mind that the NHL is just-- well, it doesn't even blow my mind. We shouldn't be surprised, because the personalities themselves don't want to be interesting. And well, if you're going to have that, you're already down deep in the water. But the fact that the NHL does not have its own equivalent to Drive to Survive is just like, come on, dude.

And when they tried it with the Leafs, it just didn't give us anything. Even something leading up to this like Heritage Classic, that'd be interesting.

OMAR: They've done that before. I remember the Centennial Classic, in the first Auston Matthews year. I forget what the other two teams that were playing were, but they had an outdoor game. And they covered the four teams. And yeah. There were short little episodes that built up and hyped up to it.

I'm surprised that not even that was done. So I don't know. Maybe they were not sure it was going to happen. Or did they maybe have bad experiences from the Amazon thing? But I don't know. That would have been actually pretty cool, especially with the season that's happening now.

Considering the Leafs are in this all or nothing type scenario, yeah. Actually, see, I am surprised. But I'm also not, because then you don't want to put that on camera, when the stakes are high and stuff.

JULIAN MCKENZIE: I love how you said all or nothing.

JUSTIN CUTHBERT: I know. You had the perfect little tag. You noticed how perfect it was.

JULIAN MCKENZIE: Yeah. I feel like Amazon should use that for something.

[LAUGHING]

OMAR: Yeah. Maybe.

JULIAN MCKENZIE: Could you imagine if they did the Oilers? I feel like one on the Oilers would be really interesting, even if Connor David wouldn't try--

OMAR: Like, take a shot any time Ken Holland says Detroit?

SAM CHANG: I actually think Buffalo would have been super interesting this year. It's just so messy, and then plus the Jack Eichel stuff?

JULIAN MCKENZIE: Oh, Yeah. And you're in some office where Jack Eichel is trying to plead his case for the surgery, talking to Kevin Adams. And you're a fly on the wall for hearing that discussion. That might be some of the most riveting TV in sports media, full stop. We're seeing that clip shared all over.

JUSTIN CUTHBERT: They really should do a smaller market. It'd just be like Hard Knocks. And try to like build it into something. And maybe you strike lightning in the bottle, or something like that, with someone or some team that just wants the exposure. If you keep going after the teams that don't need the exposure, then you're going to get the same results.

JULIAN MCKENZIE: So we're basically describing the Arizona Coyotes.

OMAR: I mean, only 2000 people can watch at once anyway.

JUSTIN CUTHBERT: Yeah. How much camera equipment can fit into ASU's rink?

OMAR: But all kidding aside, I think there are a lot of elements of the hockey world, especially on the business side-- a lot of people are interested in that. For me, one of the most interesting aspects of the Leafs documentary was how they told-- when they told Jimmy Vesey he was going to go on waivers, I never knew how that worked.

I thought the GM would text the agent, and the agent would text the player. I didn't know that they actually bring them into an office and say, hey, you're going on waivers. I don't know. I found that interesting, because one, that's kind of uncomfortable. But again, it gives you a deeper look at the everyday aspects of the GM world player transactions and stuff.

JUSTIN CUTHBERT: I wonder how they do it in Vegas.

OMAR: It's like a roulette wheel. It's like a roulette wheel. OK, waivers. No waivers. Ah, black. You're on waivers.

JULIAN MCKENZIE: Yeah. You hit on Black. Sorry. You're out of here. Hopefully you're going to Henderson, but you're probably going to end up in Winnipeg or something.