>>149267996 (OP)They love the sport. Unfortunately, that makes the NHL take them for granted. It’s all about profit, and Canadians already care. So while Gary Bettman sucks every sunbelt dick he can find, Canadians sit in front of their TV or at the stadium either way. But the sunbelt needs some incentive. Teams and players also pay higher taxes in Canada and have a disadvantage. It’s supposedly a statistical anomaly that there hasn’t been a Canadian champion since 1993, but it somehow keeps continuing with no end in sight.
Canadians allowed the NHL to be turned against them. It was their alone, but then they invited Americans - and now there are 7 Canadian teams and 25 American teams, and the organization has been led by Americans since the 1970s. The share of Canadian players used to be 95%, but now it is barely 40% and dropping. We will witness Canadians not being the relative majority in the NHL in our lifetime. They still have the best national team as of now, but I wouldn’t count on that being the case in 20 years