Fans Furious With Gary Bettman and the NHL After Controversial Vote on the Draft

The 2025 NHL Draft was shaping up to be one of the most exciting in recent NHL memory, with the league promoting it as a brand new era for one of the biggest events on the league calendar.

Unfortunately, not only was it incredibly awkward and full of way too many celebrity cameos and unnecessary interviews with GM's and front offices, it was also incredibly long, with the first round lasting over five hours with many fans tuning out very early on.

This was the first ever de-centralized draft in league history, as the NHL attempted to make things the very same as every other big league in North America rather than staying unique, but now, according to Elliotte Friedman, the league may not be changing this format moving forward.

In a recent report, Friedman noted that there is a vote to keep things de-centralized despite the absolute disaster that was the 2025 event, and unsurprisingly, fans in the comments were absolutely furious at the idea of seeing another event such as that one in the future.

For once, fans are all on the same page with this one, as nobody enjoyed the long, drawn out nightmare that was the 2025 NHL Draft, and it's very likely that it's simply the price of flying the entire front office out there that's holding them back from making the necessary change back to the way things were.

Ultimately, the NHL General Managers are likely looking out for what made the draft easier, not what made it unique and fun for the fans, and even if we do see some changes for the 2026 event that make it a little quicker, it's safe to say that fans won't be happy until the old format returns.