On Tuesday night, the NHL held their third annual Frozen Frenzy, where all 32 NHL teams play on the same day.
The idea, in theory, is great. Every single team in action means there’s 16 different games going on. It gets eyes from every single hockey market in both the United States and Canada, and it gives the national broadcasters and rightsholders an insane amount of hockey to talk about and showcase.
But the NHL’s execution of the event was all wrong.
The Frozen Frenzy received little, if any promotion ahead of time. Unless you are one of the die-hard, all-in hockey fans, chances are you heard about it on the day that it happened.
Staged on a random Tuesday night in October, the first game didn’t drop the puck until 6pm, meaning every game in the slate of 16 was scheduled to start in about a five-hour span. Games were sandwiched together, and the only real way you could check in on other games (unless you pay for NHL Center Ice or Sportsnet+) was to catch the highlight package during an intermission report.
But as if airing it all on a Tuesday night wasn’t bad enough, the NHL’s prized event went head-to-head with Game 3 of the World Series. And not just any World Series, one that featured the sole Canadian team in Major League Baseball, the Toronto Blue Jays.
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