Unlike the Stanley Cup Final, the NHL Draft or the free agency courting period, which have all disappeared from the June hockey calendar, there is one piece of traditional business that is going ahead, on schedule, this month.
The Hockey Hall of Fame’s annual selection committee meetings will be held over a two-day period, June 23 and 24, just as planned.
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On the NHL’s critical dates calendar, June 13 was supposed to be the last possible day for the 2020 Stanley Cup Final; the annual NHL awards were supposed to take place June 17 in Las Vegas; and of course, the draft was set for June 26-27 at the Bell Centre in Montreal.
All have been pushed back indefinitely.
But the Hall of Fame will carry on and elect the class of 2020, though the scheduled meeting time is about the only part of the process that will remain the same.
A handful of selection committee members who live in the Toronto area will attend the meetings in person, as will Jeff Denomme, the HHOF’s president and chief executive officer, and Lanny McDonald, the HHOF’s chairman of the board. Denomme and McDonald act as scrutineers for the 18-member selection committee, the majority of whom will be connected to the meeting remotely, including three from overseas (Anders Hedberg from Sweden, Jari Kurri from Finland and Igor Larionov from Russia).
Once the voting is completed, there are still plans for a short television announcement on TSN in Canada, after the successful candidates are notified of the results.
As with so many activities in a world gradually reopening in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, these are tricky new waters for Denomme – and the rest of the Hall of Fame’s staff – to navigate.
“The deliberations have a fluidity to them anyway,” said Denomme, “and it becomes even more different when you hold them virtually. For one thing, we don’t know how long these meetings will last. It’s always more conducive to hold them in person, so this is a first, and we’ll see how it goes. We’ve got an online balloting system that we’ll be using to maintain the integrity of the secret ballot – and we have to make sure is working properly. That’s the priority – so we’ll do a practice round on the day before the meeting to make sure the flow works well.”
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Denomme acts as the moderator/ringmaster for the annual election. Procedurally, a successful candidate needs a minimum of 14 affirmative votes from the 18-member committee to be elected. The discussion is divided into four separate conversations – to elect candidates in the male and female player categories; the builder category; and in years that it’s applicable, a referee and linesman category.
A player must be retired three years in order to be eligible for Hall of Fame consideration.
For 2020, the two most prominent first-year eligible male players are Jarome Iginla and Marian Hossa.
Iginla is 34th on the all-time points list (with 1,300 in 1,554 games played) and is tied for No. 16 all-time in goals scored (625) with Joe Sakic. Iginla won the scoring title in 2002 and the Rocket Richard Trophy as the NHL’s goal scoring leader in both 2002 and 2004. And while he didn’t win the Hart Trophy as MVP in 2002, he was chosen by his peers for the Lester B. Pearson Award that year (now named the Ted Lindsay Award, the most “outstanding” player as selected by members of the NHL Players’ Association).
Hossa, meanwhile, is 57th all-time in points (1,134 in 1,309 games played) and is No. 35 all-time in goals scored (525), just behind Frank Mahovlich and just ahead of Bryan Trottier. Hossa is still officially under contract to the Arizona Coyotes for one more season, which will complete the 12-year, $63.3 million contract he signed with the Chicago Blackhawks in the summer of 2009, but he hasn’t played a game in the NHL since the 2016-17 season because of a progressive skin condition.
Under HHOF eligibility rules, the fact that he hasn’t played for three full seasons makes Hossa eligible for selection this year. Hossa was a three-time Stanley Cup champion with the Blackhawks and is 30th all-time in playoff scoring (149 points in 205 playoff games). Only Bobby Smith and Claude Lemieux, among eligible HHOF forwards, have more career playoff points than Hossa. (Active players, such as Jaromir Jagr and Joe Thornton, are not currently eligible for HHOF selection).
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Iginla seems like a lock in his first year of eligibility – and while Hossa has a strong Hall of Fame case, sometimes a player with his credentials doesn’t always get the nod in his first year of eligibility.
Who else might get a look this year?
Statistically, among players who’ve been passed over in previous years, Pierre Turgeon remains the highest scorer of all-time not chosen for the Hall, with 1,327 points in 1,294 career games. Three others in the top 50 all-time scorers have not gained admission as yet: Jeremy Roenick (1,216 points), Bernie Nicholls (1,209 points) and Vincent Damphousse (1,205 points).
Among defencemen, the highest scorers not yet chosen to the Hall are Gary Suter (14th all-time, with 844 points in 1,145 games), Doug Wilson (15th all-time, with 827 points in 1,024 games) and Sergei Gonchar (16th all-time, with 811 points in 1,301 games).
Most lists that consider Hall of Fame snubs will also reference the candidacies of players such as Alex Mogilny, Daniel Alfredsson, Keith Tkachuk, Theo Fleury, Rod Brind’Amour, Kevin Lowe and others. Goalies are notoriously underrepresented in the Hall – and the eligibility list there currently includes the likes of Mike Vernon, Curtis Joseph, Tom Barrasso and Chris Osgood.
The Hall introduced a 15-year maximum term limit for selection committee members some years ago. For this year, that means longtime NHL executive vice president Colin Campbell has rotated off the committee. Campbell has been replaced by Mike Murphy, the NHL’s senior vice president of hockey operations, who will be participating in his first-ever meeting.
In order to allow committee members to candidly assess the strengths and weaknesses of prospective candidates, the Hall of Fame asks committee members to sign confidentiality agreements to keep the internal discussions private.
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Accordingly, Denomme says they’ve put “a good system in place” and are “maintaining the secret balloting by providing user IDs that were all randomly sent out, so we don’t know even know ourselves who’s been assigned them. As the moderator, I’ll be handling the system on the back end, but we won’t even know who’s who, and that’s the way it should be.”
How the NHL’s return to play may impact the induction ceremony
The Hall of Fame is currently closed because of the coronavirus pandemic and Denomme says that making any plans – about reopening or even how to handle the induction ceremonies currently scheduled for Nov. 16 – remains problematic.
“There’s uncertainty about November, partly because of the uncertainty around the NHL and the return to play,” said Denomme. “Obviously, our induction is built around a Hall of Fame Game – and it’s unclear if they’ll be playing games in November. So, we’re just going to have to see how that plays out.
“For a mid-November event, we’d like to know one way or another by mid-August. The one thing we’re not going to do is put on an event where there’s a chance it wouldn’t be a success. That would be a disservice to everybody – the inductees especially. It may very well be, at the worst-case, that this year’s inductees are inducted in November 2021. Anything’s possible. I think we’re going to know a little bit more about the league’s plans in the next 30-45 days – and whether it’s even feasible to have a Hall of Fame Game.
“At the end of the day, we’re going to determine this well in advance. We’re not going to roll the dice with this.”
In theory, the Hall of Fame could turn the 2020 induction ceremonies into a television event, in the same way the NHL plans to resume play initially without fans in the building.
The problem there, according to Denomme, is that a made-for-TV event would take away one of the key elements of the ceremony – where the inductees get to invite family, friends and the people who were influential in their lives to attend the event as their guests.
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Most years, most inductees, have their own family get-togethers over the course of the weekend; and most years, most times, McDonald and Hall of Fame executives such as Phil Pritchard, Craig Campbell and Kelly Masse arrange to have the Stanley Cup drop by those events.
“If this goes on for one or more business cycles, we may have to react and do something different,” said Denomme. “But at the moment it’s basically, see where we go. I just know this: The inductees deserve to have proper lead time to plan. It’s a huge event for them.
“The bottom line is, the Hall of Fame induction itself has 2,000 people – and that’s not a physical distancing event. But if you can’t do it, you can’t do it.”
Opening soon?
Summertime tends to be one of the Hall of Fame’s busiest periods in terms of foot traffic. The Hall of Fame is located in Toronto at Brookfield Place, not far from Rogers Centre, home to MLB’s Toronto Blue Jays.
“There’s no doubt, we have for a long time, traded well on Blue Jay attendance,” said Denomme, “especially, when they’re filling the building. Our attendance variances often go hand-in-hand with attendance at the Rogers Centre. Baseball and hockey are usually synergetic that way. Baseball fans are also hockey fans. Because the Blue Jays are Canada’s team, we have a lot of Canadian tourists that will take in a ballgame and then make plans to go to the Hall of Fame.
“When the New York Yankees or the Boston Red Sox are in town for a three or four-day homestand, those are huge revenue days for us. Those are always our best days. So, we’ll miss out on them this summer anyway. About 25 percent of our visitors are American; another 10 per cent are international.
“With border issues, I don’t expect we’re going to be anywhere near full throttle any time soon. In fact, if we’re half-throttle, we’ll be doing well. I think it’ll be tough slogging for traction for a while.”
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In the meantime, during the closure, the Hall of Fame is putting a health and safety plan in place which will emphasize advanced ticketing and put a capacity on how many people can physically be in the building at the same time.
Best of sevens confirmed
If only to stay visible during the NHL’s current state of limbo, it’s been a good idea for the league and the players’ association to incrementally roll out plans for the resumption of play as protocols are firmed up.
On Thursday, two new further pieces of the reopening puzzle were unveiled:
- Even though the play-in round to determine the final eight places in the 16-team playoff field will be best-of-five series, once the actual playoffs begin, with 16 teams, each round will be a best-of-seven. No firm decision had been made on that part of the format when commissioner Gary Bettman rolled out the preliminary return to play plans. In fact, there’d been some thought that the first and even the second rounds could also be handled as a best-of-five in order to move the playoff along more quickly. That idea was ultimately rejected, on the grounds that if the league intends to hand out the Stanley Cup in 2020, it should be competed for under the normal procedures.
- The NHL’s current system – of a firm, cast-in-stone playoff bracket – was altered and replaced by a blast from the past. For this postseason, the league will reseed the following every completed round – with the highest remaining seed playing the lowest remaining seed as each round unfolds, throughout the remainder of the playoffs.
Generally speaking, the NHL likes the bracket format because it can do some promotional things with it. Bracket challenges on NHL.com that mimic the NCAA basketball tournament have proven popular in the past. If they try to resurrect the concept now, they’ll have to amend it and go round-by-round.
On the other hand, if the ultimate goal is integrity – as opposed to achieving promotional goals – then reseeding makes the most sense.
It also creates more uncertainty about matchups – and one of the best things about the 24-team format that’s been unveiled is we’ll see some fresh matchups – or rivalries that haven’t been renewed in decades.
For example, the 8 vs. 9 matchup in the West is between two teams, the Calgary Flames and the Winnipeg Jets, that haven’t met in the postseason since 1987.
Who’s hot, who’s not
Two of the participants in that series, Winnipeg’s Kyle Connor and Calgary’s Mikael Backlund, were among the hottest players in the NHL in the final month of play before the league hit the pause button.
From Feb. 6 to the final game played on March 11, Connor and Backlund each had 22 points, tied for sixth overall in that span.
The only players with the same or more? Two Rangers (Mika Zibanejad and Artemi Panarin), two Oilers (Leon Draisaitl and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins) and Minnesota’s Kevin Fiala. Zibanejad had 30 points in that span, Draisaitl 27, and Fiala, Nugent-Hopkins and Panarin 22 apiece.
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Backlund is back in Sweden and on Thursday, I wondered if he could get back to the same level after such a long time away. The break wasn’t great for any NHLer, but it was particularly tough on players who were having the best results of their career. But Backlund was philosophical about it, noting that every player was in the same boat – needing to start over again during an unusual and unprecedented time.
“The important key is going to be that I accept training camp isn’t going to be perfect – and that it’s been a long time away,” said Backlund. “It’s not going to be a perfect scenario going into camp. You just have to make the most of camp, and get the timing back, and get up to NHL speed, and just accept (things) and not get frustrated. Who knows? Maybe I’ll have a great camp.
“I’m just saying, I know going into camp, it’s going to be different. When you start playing – if we do play – it’s going to matter right away. I hope I’ll find the A-game right away. If it takes one or two games … you have to realize, it’s going to be the same for everyone.”
That last observation is worth further exploration because so many accomplished NHLers, past and present, identify themselves as slow starters. Iginla was like that for much of his career. Many times, he’d be slow off the mark in October but on fire in November.
The Jets’ Patrik Laine noted in an earlier Zoom call that he usually takes time to get into a good rhythm.
Playoffs past have often produced unlikely scoring heroes – and it’s easy to imagine that contributions from depth players could be even more important than usual, especially in the play-in round, where a team could be finished in as early as a week.
Back in February, or a month before the pause, I put a question to Craig Berube, coach of the defending Stanley Cup champion St. Louis Blues.
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What did Berube want to see happen before the start of the playoffs, to enhance his team’s chances of repeating?
More than anything else, Berube said: “I want to be a deep team. I want to have four lines and six D that I can throw out there the whole game and play them. That was a big thing last year – that we were really deep and that carried us into the playoffs and throughout the playoffs.”
Berube will get his wish on one important front. Vladimir Tarasenko, who’d missed almost the entire season, will be healthy and rested for the playoff run.
Presumably, when the dust eventually settles – and if the NHL can actually crown a 2020 Stanley Cup champion – it’s logical to think there’ll be a whole host of Chris Kontoses and Fernando Pisanis who could make unexpected contributions to a good playoff run. Maybe it’ll be another year like 2007, when the Anaheim Ducks’ third-line checking centre, Sammy Pahlsson, was legitimately in the running for the Conn Smythe Trophy as playoff MVP.
For those unfamiliar with his game, Backlund possesses many of the same defensive qualities that Pahlsson had, but was producing offence at a career-high level in February.
The NHL unveiled plans for Phase 2 of its restart plan on Thursday, which will allow players to return to their home training facilities for voluntary on and off-ice training. For Backlund, that might involve driving to Stockholm to skate and scrimmage with other NHLers in Sweden, who’d also gone home.
Sweden had far fewer social distancing restrictions placed on its society than the rest of Europe.
How has that played out for Backlund?
“When we were in Calgary, we were pretty much just at home,” said Backlund. “Not that we were running around here, but we’ve spent more time with family and friends here. You can tell it’s different than normal life, but you still see people out and about. When we do need to get things for the house, you see more people out about here than you in Calgary – or that you read about in the world as well.
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“Other countries, especially here in Europe, were totally shut down. It was a nice change, coming back to Sweden, and able to see more people; and being able to spend time with family and friends. I don’t know if it’s the right way or not, but so far – knock on wood – my family and friends have all been healthy.”
(Photo: Brad Watson / NHLI via Getty Images)
