WordsOfWisdom Posted December 28, 2014 Share Posted December 28, 2014 The NHL played its first outdoor game back in 2003 in what was called the Heritage Classic. A game between the Edmonton Oilers and Montreal Canadiens in Edmonton. The success of the Heritage Classic spawned the Winter Classic, which the NHL holds every year and promotes as its flagship annual event. To someone like Gary Bettman, life was good. The Winter Classic achieved the only thing Bettman has ever wanted to achieve: to promote the game in the US. The Winter Classic has never been played outside the United States and has thus far featured only one Canadian based team: Toronto. (Hardly a showcase event for the NHL in the minds of Canadian hockey fans and the reason why nearly every Canadian hockey fan despises Gary Bettman.) Thus, the Heritage Classic returned and seems to be a bi-annual event these days featuring an outdoor game played in Canada between two Canadian based teams. (Created specifically to appease the often ignored hockey fans up north and solve everything that is wrong with the Winter Classic.) Question: Did the NHL mess this whole situation up? Can the NHL live with one outdoor game per year and distribute it fairly among both Canadian and American cities and teams? Or will both events need to operate side by side, in order to appeal to different fans and locales? - Would you like to see the two events merged into one?- Do you like one "Classic" better than the other? Heritage Classic History While the Winter Classic holds little to no appeal for Canadian hockey fans, the Heritage Classic has been very popular, despite the fact that there haven't really been any "marque" matchups thus far. Marque matchups would be Toronto vs Montreal, Edmonton vs Calgary (battle of Alberta), Toronto vs Vancouver (east vs west), Toronto vs Ottawa (battle of Ontario). Three Heritage classics have been played to date and not one has been a "gotta see it" matchup. How did these guys drop the ball so badly? How in the world is Toronto the only Canadian team not to be in one?2003 Heritage Classic, EDM vs MTL2011 Heritage Classic, CGY vs MTL2014 Heritage Classic, OTT vs VAN2016 Heritage Classic, WPG vs ??? TOR? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.