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Originally Posted by straka91
Canada buys just as much from us as we do from them. America and Canada are probably the 2nd best trading partners next to China and America. Heck Canada is even under the protection of the bloated US military and that alone is worth Canada's GDP in terms of money.
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Isn't GDP money? What do you mean by GDP in terms of money?
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Some Canadians like to rag on us, but they fail to realize the world views them as Americas smaller clone only known for 2 things, cold and hockey with a few eskimos thrown in.
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That's a very American thing to say.
The NHL will NOT recover from another lockout. They should do anythin and everything within their power to avoid that situation. The NHL is not like the NBA, which has the ability to lose part of a season then continue like nothing happened. The NHL is a niche sport in the USA, which, face it, is the country the NHL really cares about due to its television contract with NBC. It took the NHL SEVEN YEARS to finally get a legitimate TV contract and start breaking some of its old ratings records. What will happen this time is anyone's guess, but I don't think any of us care to find out.
The biggest problem the NHL has is these outrageous contracts being thrown around to Kovalchuk, Parise, Suter, Weber, Luongo... The Suter/Weber situation is especially bad because it involves a small market team losing one of its star players and almost losing another. I admire
Paul Holmgren's brass set signing Weber to that ridiculous offer sheet, but how is it in any way good for the NHL to have its small market teams get handcuffed by richer teams and lose its best player(s)? The NFL and MLB can survive with haves and have-nots; they make billions upon billiona of dollars every year and have enormous popularity. The NHL, on the other hand, goes as its smallest markets go. When its small market teams struggle, the NHL struggles. Small market teams can't make money unless they win. They can't win unless they can keep their best players. They can keep their best players when teams like the Wild and Flyers throw around absurd contracts like no one has to pay them. THAT'S the NHL's biggest problem, and I have very little faith anything is going to be agreed upon that will reign it back in.