Back in the days of the wild west, cowboys dueled to the death on the dirt roads of vacated towns as the open wind carried tumbleweeds across the vast empty space. The townsfolk would retreat to their homes and hide from the deadly shootouts.
You can’t exactly experience that long-lost part of American history anymore, but you can get pretty close (minus the tumbleweeds) by heading down to the BB&T Center and catching a Florida Panthers game. It’s got all the fixings for an old western reenactment. Two gangs of rough ridin’ competitors, a nearby saloon, and most importantly, the arena is a ghost town when the fight starts.
The thin BB&T Center crowd will most likely get even smaller, along with plenty of other NHL arenas on account of the Coronavirus.
With the spread of the coronavirus reaching an alarming rate, NHL teams and venues across the league are beginning to issue warnings and close their doors to fans for remaining regular-season games. It started with the NHL media shutdown preventing reporters from entering team locker rooms last week. Shortly after, The SAP Center restricted fan access for the remainder of the San Jose Sharks season (which might not be that bad considering how terrible they are) and the Philadelphia Department of Public Health issued a statement recommending fans to avoid public gatherings of 5,000 people or more.
Hockey fans aren't the only ones being affected. The NBA has officially suspended the remainder of the regular season, going as far as cancelling a game between the Thunder and the Jazz just before opening tip-off.
This could have serious implications for the remainder of the NHL regular season. The NHL could suspend play as early as Thursday according to Darren Dreger.
Seeing what Dregs said made my heart drop to The bottom of my stomach. I don't know about you, but I'd rather head on down to the airport and get a one-way ticket to Wuhan, China before I see my beloved hockey get cancelled at the most important stretch of the regular season.
Luckily for the entire planet, we have an unsung hero with expertise that could potentially save the season. Those pesky Panthers, whose attendance numbers have been the laughing stock of the NHL since '93, have finally found themselves on the right side of history.
Closing off fans from entering the venue could be a balanced solution of safety and continuation. Sure, the quality of broadcasts would be drastically worse without fans yelling “Shoot the puck“ every 13 seconds, but it’s much better than no hockey at all. The Panthers have been conducting the empty arena experiment for us for decades and we ought to thank them for it. You better think twice before retweeting that annual picture of the sorry opening day crowd at the BB&T center.
The Panthers put it all on the line for the sake of humanity, AKA the prevention of cancelling the 2019-2020 NHL hockey season. I had the chance to do a 'totally real' and 'not-at-all fake' interview with a high ranking Panther's executive about what it takes to keep a building empty, and in turn, how it could save lives during this crisis.
Me: Hello Mr. -------, Totally 'real' and 'not-fake-at-all' Florida Panthers executive. How're you doing today?
Mr. -------: Thanks for having me
Me: With all of this recent Coronavirus buzz, a lot of people are worried about the safety of players and fans. Some teams are going the lengths of playing games without fans in attendance. What are some of the precautions the Panthers are looking at taking?
Mr. -------: For us, nothing needs to change; Business as usual. Here in Sunrise, Florida, we have built a very solid foundation of minimal fan attendance that has allowed us to shine in moments like these. We take great pride in what we have accomplished.
Me: And what would that be? What would you say you've accomplished?
You know, staying just above the threshold of mediocrity which allows us to continue our franchise in Florida. We would hate to relocate from the deep American south that already has enough NHL teams, to a place like Quebec, a Canadian market with a rich hockey history and fans who would actually show up. We would also like to thank the thousands of fans from other teams that drop by and pump some extra crowd noise in BB&T. Really grateful for all hockey fans out there.
Me: The NHL is contemplating suspending the rest of the 2019-2020 season. Would having nobody show up to the games be your solution? Why?
Mr.———: Oh, 100 percent. It‘s the best of both worlds. We get to continue playing our season out without the potential spread of the virus. Other GMs are too coddled with high attendance numbers and are blind to the idea, but it’s really not that bad. There’s no line at the alcohol stand and its much more quiet allowing me to do absolutely nothing to improve the franchise in peace.
Me: How does it feel seeing teams so unprepared by having packed houses night in and night out?
Mr. -------: I mean, its tough to watch for sure. Having all those fans screaming and cheering for their team and potentially spreading disease is awful. I feel bad for them. I really do. I wish we could help but we have our own building to keep empty; you know?
Me: Yeah I understand. What has been the main contributor for keeping the BB&T so empty for so long?
I mean it really all starts with the draft. Our ability to miss on so many prospects has really kept us going strong. We have had some outliers like Hubby and Barkov, but for the most part we have done an exceptional job preventing our farm system from growing even the tiniest bit. For example, take Lawson Crouse. We used our 11th overall pick on him only to ship him off to Arizona a few months later for nothing. Could that pick have been used on Matt Barzal or Thomas Chabot who went a few picks after? Sure. But that would have just put more butts in the seats and we would have been woefully unprepared for this epidemic. We also just don’t develop our guys. Vinny Trocheck was an anomaly that we somehow developed into a solid second line center, but we traded away for some easily replaceable third line guys. That's been our plan and its worked well for us so far.
Me: You guys recently changed your branding and jerseys. Was that to help your cause?
Mr. -------: Oh, of course. We had an interesting logo and a unique color palette that was attracting too much attention so we swapped it out for something much more boring. I mean, why have a cool and recognizable logo when you could throw a docile, disinterested panther on a shield and put our state name on the top? We also wanted to use a stripe through the center of the jersey, but just like everything we do, it's incomplete and doesn't wrap all the way around.
Me: Former Panther Reilly Smith has recently been quoted saying "I also played a few years in Florida with not many fans," when asked about how weird it was to play in front of nobody due to COVID-19 concerns. do those kind of statements bother you?
Mr. -------: No, not at all. I mean, yeah he's really blossomed into a great player since leaving Florida. He's also been to the playoffs for two straight seasons and even made it to the Stanley Cup Finals, but what's it worth? He's ten times more likely to contract some sort of illness with the amount of ravenous fans that pack the T-Mobile Arena and cheer him on every night. We wish him the best.
Me: The game of hockey has really started to grow over the last 10 years. How do you plan on combating the growth of the sport in Florida and keeping the arena free and clear?
Mr.-------: Well, we are just going to keep doing what has been working for us. We have been a team for 24 seasons and have only made the playoffs five of those years; something we take pride in. Bad drafting and development is where it all starts, but it goes further than that. I really liked where our head was at giving an aging goalie 10 million a year for seven years and trading away hard-to-find assets like Trocheck in the midst of a pivotal playoff push. If we keep making moves like that, we’re bound to continue our success.
Me: After this whole Coronavirus situation blows over, will you try and maybe get some people back in the building? Maybe grow the fan base?
Mr.———: i doubt it. We want to remain prepared for a situation like this that may arise in the future. We are trying to stay on top of things. We have done a good job maintaining that and it starts in net with Bobrovsky. Unfortunately, we signed Hubby and Barkov to really solid team friendly deals hoping they would completely blow it, but instead they’ve done a great job for us. ideally, we want to see how much worse we can get when those two eventually ask to get the hell out of Sunrise. But right now our focus is missing the playoffs and we are taking it day by day.
With the impending doom of the coronavirus on our tail, it's important the NHL take the necessary precautions to protect the fans and players.
Luckily, having a team like the Panthers with their expertise will help the NHL come up with a proper plan in dealing with this scary time. Other teams around the league like the Coyotes, Senators and Sabres have already started to follow in the Floridian footsteps.
While we poked fun at the Panthers with all their empty seats, Karma came sliding in with a nice sock to our ear holes. They’ve been doing it right the whole time. It seems that the joke was on us all along.
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