Penguins, Bruins among teams exploring hosting outdoor games in 2021 originally appeared on NBC Sports Washington
It has been nearly nine months since the coronavirus shut down the 2019-20 NHL regular season. Since then, no fans have been in attendance for an NHL game and there may be no fans in attendance to start the 2021 season either. This realization is now leading some teams to get creative.
Several NHL teams are exploring the possibility of playing outdoors in order to have fans attend. Elliotte Friedman was the first to report this story on Thursday.
Friedman reported that Anaheim, Boston, Los Angeles and Pittsburgh are among the teams interested. Pierre LeBrun also reported that Carolina, Dallas, Florida and Nashville have expressed interest in hosting outdoor games. Per LeBrun, the Capitals were among the teams who told the league there were not interested, but he did not go into specifics as to why.
These games would not be singular events like we typically see with the Winter Classic or Stadium Series, but rather teams would host multiple games.
Since the NHL is much more dependent on fan-generated revenue than the other major sports leagues, the fact that fans will not be able to attend most arenas to start the season is a major issue. Exploring outdoor games is about generating at least some gate revenue
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There are, however, major issues with this plan.
Outdoor games are not cheap events. It costs money to play those games. Outdoor stadiums typically have a much higher capacity than hockey arenas, but even if fans are allowed to attend it will not be to capacity. How many fans need to go to these games just to make them financially worthwhile? Whatever that number is, is that a realistic goal over the course of multiple games?
Weather also has to be considered. The 2021 season is expected to be condensed. What if Boston is scheduled to host three games in four nights and it rains for two of them? What does that do to the league's timeline for the season? What contingency plans will be put in place to make up postponed games/?
I would expect most of the outdoor games would be held in January and February because of the cold weather and with the hopes that fans will be allowed back into arenas later in the season. But will fans even be allowed to gather outdoors for a sports game by the start of the 2021 season? The current wave of COVID-19 we currently see ourselves in has not yet peaked. Will things be bad enough in January that fans even at outdoor locations are not an option?
Friedman reported approval from both players and opposing teams would be an additional hurdle for the league "a survey completed by all 31 teams indicated several would not be thrilled with the idea of switching between indoor and outdoor venues during the season."
It is easy to get excited about the possibility of multiple outdoor games in 2021, but the more you look at it, it is hard to see how these games would actually make sense.
