As the NHL playoffs have seen its Original Six franchises depart in silent, Frasier-like fashion (as opposed to a bleary-eyed, civilization-ending-as-we-know-it Friendsification...), so too will pro hockey soon go the way of roller derby and that stupid bouncy-trampoline-basketball thing on SpikeTV. Which is to say: soon the primary use for your average quick-wristed Canadian will be really, really efficient masturbation.

The NHL Players' Association and its franchise owners are (surprise!) squabbling over money. Most pundits predict a lockout this summer, followed by a protracted cancellation of much of the 2004-2005 season. And that should just about do it: hockey will be relegated to eighth-tier sports status, alongside soccer, lawn jarts and the propped-up-by-ESPN-in-their-quest-for-world-domination professional bowling. All the world's statues of Wayne Gretzky will simultaneously weep.

Those of us who actually enjoy the frozen game, those of us reared on, say, decades of Boston Bruin futility, can only shake our heads in frustration at the immolating tendencies of The Game Bobby Orr Loved. Nor can we listen to one more fucking player talk about how unfair a salary cap might be. For God's sake, you're a hockey player. You're two levels up from substitute teaching, one level up from Zamboni maintenance. Do you know what they call a hockey player with no professional franchise to play for? "Alan Thicke."

I get worked up enough when Don Fehr and the other baseball-union vampires use the ghost of Samuel Gompers to justify killing the Grand Olde Game. But hockey on TV gets worse ratings than post-Richie-Cunningham Happy Days, guys. Most U.S. cities can count their hockey fan bases on fingers and toes, and minus Teppo Numminen Bobblehead Night and those t-shirt-firing cannons between periods, NHL arenas would be most notable for the difficulty of telling apart an official's whistle from all the crickets chirping. Here are four reasons hockey is so effing messed-up:

That league needs 30 teams like you need the DirecTV WNBA Season Package. 30 teams??? Really??? Were citizens of Nashville and Columbus really leading such incomplete lives without the neutral-zone trap? Talent in this league is stretched thinner than spandex on a Sumo wrestler, which means more goons and more schlumps, which means less scoring, which means ho-friggin'-hum.

The worst cities are rocking the 2004 playoffs. Terrific, just what ABC and ESPN needed: a Calgary-Tampa Stanley Cup Final. Yeah, there's simply nothing like tapping into Tampa's septuagenarian market for a little pulse-pounding action. Jesus, two months ago, Tampa was the city most likely to get its franchise snuffed. Now they're toting Lord Stanley down Pink-Hair Boulevard?

The Detroit Red Wings spend $80 million every year and lose. Sure, the New York Yankees are evil incarnate, but sheesh, at least they blow enough cash to actually get to the World Series. The Red Wings and their spend-happy ilk buy up veteran superstars like Mark Cuban buys bad Hawaiian shirts, and then lose to, like, the Arizona Rattlers or whatever. Meanwhile, the $35 million Flames and $10 Lightning look like the Red Army reincarnate?

Brett Hull and Jeremy Roenick are player mouthpieces. No offense to either the Golden Brett or J.R., who seem like perfectly nice guys to drink (a lot of) beer with, but these doofuses have the combined business savvy of the Roman Polanski School For Teenage Girls. One minute they're disgusted with the lack of speed in the modern game, the next minute they're accusing owners of decades of lying. Earth to players: the asteroid is hurtling toward you. You are five minutes from extinction. The NFL is the nation's most profitable and popular sport, and its players are worshipped, and it has a salary cap. A salary cap is the least of your worries. Figuring out how to reload the ketchup machine, now that's a toughie....