How can we lose the entire season of the National Hockey League?

How can the world remove us from one of the most storied sports in the world?

Remember the Miracle on Ice, Gretzky and Lemieux, and The Mighty Ducks? Now hockey is dead, at least in the main league.

Not many people in the South care too much about the sport. Sure, we have teams in Tampa and Miami, but with football and NASCAR ruling this region, many of us may not have even heard that there will be no hockey this season. And no Stanley Cup.

Nothing compares to the moment the winning team takes turns skating around the rink, Lord Stanley’s Cup high above players’ heads. The Super Bowl trophy can’t compare. Neither can the World Series. But those two will be played this year. Hockey won’t.

It’s for all the wrong reasons, too.

The owners want a salary cap. The players don’t. It’s a battle of greed, a battle of two sides that want more cash, and now, the hockey season is over. Before it ever started.

Don’t the owners have enough money? Isn’t that the reason they “own” the team? And if they play games, won’t they make money? It’s not like every seat in the house is free.

Are the players becoming too poor? Do salaries that resemble the Florida Lottery jackpot not give these players the ability to have a huge house, a few cars and enough money to feed their great-grandkids?

But teams like the Calgary Flames will have no one in attendance this year, or just a few more people than the Jacksonville Jaguars had. The Tampa Bay Lightning won’t be able to defend its championship. In New York, the folks are stuck with the Knicks, now that the Rangers won’t take some dates from Madison Square Garden.

This year will go down as the year hockey hung its skates. Minor leagues will get more crowds this year, at least from the die-hard hockey fans, those drunken freaks who want nothing more than a fight and the desire to catch a few “souvenir” teeth.

So for all you hockey fans out there, just remember Jacksonville actually has one of these minor league teams.

Of course, it’s in Jacksonville, where no one ever goes to the games anyway.

Contact David Rosenblum at spinnakersports@yahoo.com.