Variations in NHL attendance: the impact of violence, scoring, and regional rivalries - Discrimination and The NHL

American Journal of Economics and Sociology, The, April, 2003 by Rodney J. Paul

In Canada, most of the boost in attendance comes from playing other Canadian teams. Of the six teams in Canada, three teams are located in the east, all within the Northeast Division. The three teams located in the west are all located in the Northwest Division. The Canadian opponent variable was found to be highly significant, showing that the increased games against the Canadian divisional rivals and the unbalanced schedule that allows for cross-conference Canadian teams to play each other more often has increased the attendance at Canadian arenas.

III

Conclusions

PROFESSIONAL HOCKEY IS A GAME OF DIVERSE ATTRIBUTES, which can appeal on many levels to fans. This study has looked at attendance on a game-by-game basis and has examined factors that influence the number of people that attend a National Hockey League game. In relation to the timing of contests and location-specific effects, the expected results were found. Weekend games and games during the stretch drive to the playoffs increase attendance. Income effects on attendance were found to be negative, which supports the idea found in previous research of hockey as an inferior good.

The main topics of focus, the role of scoring, violence, and the effect of regional rivalries, revealed some expected and some surprising results. Fighting was used as a proxy for violence. The empirical results revealed that teams that fight more often tend to draw more fans. This was consistent across countries in terms of a positive influence, although the size of the coefficients reveals that this effect is magnified in the United States. Even though the NHL has tried to crack down on violence through rule changes and the league has been criticized in the media for incidents such as the Marty McSorley trial, violence still tends to draw fans to the arena.

The scoring side was more surprising. It appears that for teams that have the same level of regular season and playoff success, more scoring actually decreases attendance. The coefficients on past scoring and the goals per game average were both found to be negative and significant. Although the NHL has made rule changes in recent years to increase scoring, the impact may not help team revenues. It appears that fans prefer teams that win and have tendencies toward fighting and violence, as opposed to high-scoring, low-violence teams.

The other major factor examined in this study was the NHL's emphasis on regional rivalries. Since the second expansion, the NHL's division boundaries have not coincided with geographic boundaries. This has been alleviated in recent years by going to regional divisions within eastern and western conferences. In addition to the region-alization of divisions, the schedule is now unbalanced, as divisional opponents and traditional rivals play more often during the season. The empirical results reveal that this strategy is a major success. In the United States, the divisional match-ups have increased attendance across the league. In Canada it appears that fans prefer to see other Canadian teams play. The grouping of three Canadian teams each in one division per conference and the unbalanced nature of the schedule, allowing Canadian teams in opposing conferences to play more often, has had a substantial impact on attendance.