Cheers To The Eakin Weekend: The AHL & Hershey
The AHL (American Hockey League) is apparently the developmental/minor league for the NHL. It seems to be like a smaller scale MLB minor league/NFL practice squad hybrid. Unlike the NBA D-League, which is the biggest joke in the world, the AHL actually is important.
This season the Caps have already called up a few guys. I believe both goalies have come up to practice with the team and Something Collins actually got some ice time. As everyone on Twitter reminds me every day, I need to not only go to a game, but I need to follow the Bears.
Maybe this Christmas if I win the lottery I will go on a Hershey Christmas Hockey Spectacular vacation. This would be 2 nights at the expensive Hotel Hershey with skating at the outdoor rink. I would hit up the expensive Christmas town followed by the expensive Christmas song show. I would go to Chocolate world and watch the hoards of obese people fill up shopping carts with candy. And of course I would go see a Hershey Bears game and my favorite player [Insert a player I learn about later]. (This trip with exact costs will be a future blog post)
I'll figure out what the hell the KHL and WHL are later...
2 comments:
Don't forget the ECHL, OJHL, college, junior college and also mites leagues which you should probably start following at well.
KHL = Kontinental Hockey League, the top hockey league in Russia (and a few other former USSR republics). A few years ago, there was talk that the KHL-- fueled by Russian oil barons' massive troves of cash-- would attempt to buy up a bunch of NHL players and eventually join or supplant the NHL as the world's premier hockey league. Hasn't quite worked out for them. A few over-the-hill East European players "defected" to the KHL (Jagr, Evgeni Nabokov, Pavol Demitra), as did a few younger Russian players that weren't very good in the NHL. But the KHL never seduced any truly elite players to take the Big Rubles in Mother Russia. The rising revenues and salary cap thresholds in the NHL certainly contributed to that. Jagr and Nabokov have since come back to the NHL. And, back in September, a plane crash killed an entire KHL team, so the number of NHL players considering making the jump likely fell from "few" to "hardly any."
WHL = Western Hockey League. One of the 3 Canadian "Major Junior" leagues, the others being the Ontario Hockey League (OHL) and Quebec Major Junior Hockey League (QMJHL). The WHL's teams are in Western Canada and the Northwestern US. These 3 junior leagues act as the equivalent of high school and college basketball. The lion's share of NHL players, including virtually all Canadian players, play in one of the major junior leagues from age 16 until they're good enough to make the NHL. I believe the age limit in Juniors in 20.
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