Relegation

[FogBat]

Should the major North American sports leagues (including the NHL) look into the practice of relegation?
Your thoughts, please.

 

[WildCard]

It would never happen

[Eleven]

It would require a complete overhaul.  Those European soccer leagues don't have drafts, for example.  

[FogBat]

2 minutes ago, Eleven said:

It would require a complete overhaul.  Those European soccer leagues don't have drafts, for example.  

I wasn't aware of that. How does that work? Open tryouts?

Does this also mean that they don't have a farm system?

 

[Curt]

It would never never happen because owner have teams that are worth a certain amount.  If the team is relegated, the value o the franchise would drop significantly.  They don’t want to risk that for no reason, and they are the ones who would need to vote on and approve such an incredibly drastic change.  There is just no incentive.

[Eleven]

14 minutes ago, Crosschecking said:

I wasn't aware of that. How does that work? Open tryouts?

Does this also mean that they don't have a farm system?

 

They sign the players as children to what they call "academy" teams and no, there is no farm system.

[Curt]

4 minutes ago, Eleven said:

They sign the players as children to what they call "academy" teams and no, there is no farm system.

They do have farm systems.  They have “junior” teams for different age groups.  They work with these kids to develop as players.  It’s a farm system.

[Eleven]

13 minutes ago, Curt said:

They do have farm systems.  They have “junior” teams for different age groups.  They work with these kids to develop as players.  It’s a farm system.

Those are the academy teams I referenced.  They don't have farm systems as we understand that term in North America.

[Curt]

2 minutes ago, Eleven said:

Those are the academy teams I referenced.  They don't have farm systems as we understand that term in North America.

It’s more or less equivalent, no?

[DarthEbriate]

They don't need relegation. Instead, every so often when a team is underperforming (and coincidentally needs a stadium upgrade for leaguewide revenue purposes), they just threaten to up-and-move to another similarly sized market that doesn't have a team, or bandy about the word "contraction" for a summer.

That said, the Sabres would certainly qualify to be replaced by an AHL squad for a season.

(But I think we'd crush the AHL squads and be back in the bigs in no time unless Eichel happened to miss the entire relegated season.)

[Taro T]

3 minutes ago, Eleven said:

Those are the academy teams I referenced.  They don't have farm systems as we understand that term in North America.

Afaik, the academy teams work similarly to the way the NHL feeder system worked back before the entry draft where kids would get brought in extremely young and were beholden to that team unless their rights were eventually traded.

And agree, relegation will never happen to an NA sports league.

[Eleven]

3 minutes ago, Curt said:

It’s more or less equivalent, no?

Not really.  They're not calling up 16 year olds to play for the big club and then sending them down to the academy team for more training.  I'm sure it's happened, but it probably happens once or twice a decade.

[In The Buff]

No. I just see it not only as near impossible to implement at this point given how the sports leagues have formed to get to the point where they are now, but also there is not any real incentive for them to do something this drastic.

However for things like Esports this practice was used all the time & worked well. But now that theres been years worth of investment & developing & refining the industry & tournament structures, various Esports leagues have moved away from a relegation system into a more structured & permanent system.

I really only see relegation as beneficial to a major sports league thats starting out. Where youre not sure which teams will be viable or good enough to compete at the level you wish. Or for a sports league that has a ton of possible teams that wouldnt fit into a typical format. Something like college football for instance where theres 130 schools in Division 1.

For something like the NFL/NHL with millions/billions of dollars involved with each franchise, its pretty much don't rock the boat.

[Weave]

In principal I'm for the idea.  Would definitely discourage losing on purpose, which I think is a scourge on sports in general.  but I have no idea what systems of relegation I'd prefer.  I don't watch any of the sports that have relegation so I am rather ignorant of the details.  To be fair, it's really just combating tanking that makes it interesting to me.

It'll never happen.  No American sports league is going to adopt rules that could devalue a team.

[Curt]

16 minutes ago, Eleven said:

Not really.  They're not calling up 16 year olds to play for the big club and then sending them down to the academy team for more training.  I'm sure it's happened, but it probably happens once or twice a decade.

They do that all the time actually with younger players.

[FogBat]

Under normal circumstances, like everyone said on here, relegation is for poor performance. However, there are other reasons too, like what happened to Saracens in rugby. https://www.bbc.com/sport/rugby-union/51168926

[Sabres Fan in NS]

I like the idea, but as others have stated it would never work in North America, unless major changes were to happen to the set up of the leagues.

Of course, the Sabres would be the Canaries of the NHL.

Hey oh, @Eleven, it's a bad joke as I am now a full throated fan of Norwich City.

[MattPie]

@MODO Hockey

IIRC, MODO (the team, not the poster) was relegated a couple years ago. I don't remember the league names over there, so I'll use NA hockey equivalents of roughly what I remember

- The AHL does a whole playoff structure

- The best two AHL teams play the worst two NHL teams 7-games

- If the NHL team wins the series, they stay in the NHL

- If the AHL team wins, they're in the NHL; player contracts on the losing NHL team are largely voided and the players become free agents

 

[Neo]

$$$

[MODO Hockey]

4 hours ago, MattPie said:

@MODO Hockey

IIRC, MODO (the team, not the poster) was relegated a couple years ago. I don't remember the league names over there, so I'll use NA hockey equivalents of roughly what I remember

- The AHL does a whole playoff structure

- The best two AHL teams play the worst two NHL teams 7-games

- If the NHL team wins the series, they stay in the NHL

- If the AHL team wins, they're in the NHL; player contracts on the losing NHL team are largely voided and the players become free agents

 

How it works in SHL and HAS (NHL/AHL) in comparison is this, ill use nhl and ahl as ref

Top 2 teams in AHL when season is finished, have a series of 5 games.
- Winner of that series takes on the last team (31st) in NHL on a series of 7 games
    * Winner here go to NHL, loser go to AHL

The losing team (of top 2 teams in AHL) waits for another series to finish, which is playoff series between the teams that ended the season from 3rd to 8th in AHL

These 6 teams have a playoff series where every team faces eachother one time,
- Winner of this playoff takes on the losing team of the 2 top AHL teams for a new series of 3 games
  * Winner takes on the team that ended 30th in NHL for a series of 7 games
    * Winner of this goes to NHL, loser go to AHL





 

Edited January 28, 2020 by MODO Hockey

[MODO Hockey]

5 hours ago, Eleven said:

Not really.  They're not calling up 16 year olds to play for the big club and then sending them down to the academy team for more training.  I'm sure it's happened, but it probably happens once or twice a decade.

In hockey, speaking of Sweden it happends alot. Teams bring juniors up and down, to replace injury spots, to get practice and real games to teach em whats comming. 

[Eleven]

11 hours ago, Curt said:

They do that all the time actually with younger players.

I don't think this is correct.  They might loan out younger players.  Call ups are infrequent in my experience, but I really only follow one league (England).

[shrader]

12 hours ago, Taro T said:

Afaik, the academy teams work similarly to the way the NHL feeder system worked back before the entry draft where kids would get brought in extremely young and were beholden to that team unless their rights were eventually traded.

And agree, relegation will never happen to an NA sports league.

Those were my thoughts exactly when I read 11's description.  I have a hard time picturing the league operating like it did back in those days.  I think it was @millbank who told me some interesting stuff about that system at one point, something along the lines of even the most marginal of talent knowing exactly which NHL team would have them.

[Curt]

1 hour ago, Eleven said:

I don't think this is correct.  They might loan out younger players.  Call ups are infrequent in my experience, but I really only follow one league (England).

Pretty much every team has a few young guys who split time between the premier league and academy teams every year.

Go check their stats.

[Eleven]

2 hours ago, Curt said:

Pretty much every team has a few young guys who split time between the premier league and academy teams every year.

Go check their stats.

Here's my favorite team.  I'm not seeing it:

 

https://fbref.com/en/squads/1c781004/Norwich-City

 

Here's Liverpool.  Not seeing it here, either:

 

https://fbref.com/en/squads/822bd0ba/Liverpool

 

There is an 18 year old who played, but nothing on his player page indicates that he is an academy player.  His wiki page indicates that he is with the senior team.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curtis_Jones_(footballer)

 

And here's Palace, which I randomly picked from mid-table.  Not there:

 

https://fbref.com/en/squads/47c64c55/Crystal-Palace

 

I don't know what else I'm supposed to look at.  I'm certainly not going through every roster in English soccer.

Edited January 28, 2020 by Eleven