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The most miserable fans in the NHL? A new survey of 2000 NHL fans by Casino.org reports that dishonour goes to the fanbase of the Calgary Flames.

How miserable are they? There’s still an NHL team in Calgary but Flames fans are even more miserable than fans in Arizona, who just lost their NHL team.

That’s pretty dreadfully miserable, I’ll suggest.

Toronto Maple Leafs fans are third most miserable, the survey says.

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As for fans of the Edmonton Oilers, the survey reports they are fifth happiest fanbase in the NHL just now. According to the survey’s numerical most-to-least miserable ranking, Flames fans are five times less happy than Oilers fans.

Overall, Carolina has the happiest NHL fans, followed by Tampa and Florida, the survey reports.

Oilers fans were asked detailed questions in the survey.

On a scale of 1 (never) to 5 (always), how often do you feel let down by your team?
Average: 2.6

On a scale of 1 (very disappointed) to 5 (very satisfied), how satisfied are you with your team’s performance over the past 5 years?
Average: 4.2

On a scale 1 (not upset at all) to 5 (extremely upset), how irritated or upset do you get when your team loses?
Average: 3.3

On a scale of 1 (very poor) to 5 (very good), how would you rate the competence of your team’s management?
Average: 4

The survey also found:

93.9% think the Edmonton Oilers stand a good chance of making it to the Stanley Cup Finals
90.9% of fans currently trust the Oilers’ management
100% are happy with the current players on the Edmonton Oilers
36.4% don’t find game day expenses to be too expensive (tickets, merch, food/drinks)
100% of fans find the overall game day experience to be enjoyable
62.6% of fans’ moods don’t negatively change when key players get injured

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My take

1. Not only are Flames fans miserable, but their misery is directly linked to the happiness of Oilers fan. When the Oilers beat the Flames in five games in the 2022 playoffs, it gave a huge boost to the Oilers but led to the immolation of that strong Flames squad, which had been one of the best teams in the NHL that season with 111 points, the most in the Pacific Division.

2. That team was led by what was heralded as the NHL’s top two-way line, Johnny Gaudreau, Matthew Tkachuk and Elias Lindholm. But not one of those players is still with the Flames. In fact, almost all of the top players on that Flames team have moved on, Gaudreau, Tkachuk, Lindholm, Andrew Mangiapane, Noah Hanifin, Christopher Tanev, Tyler Toffoli, Sean Monahan, Nikita Zadorov, and Jacob Markstrom. Only Rasmus Andersson, Mikael Backlund and Blake Coleman remain of their core group.

3. As for the Leafs, there have been massive expectations around the team for years now, along with plenty of chest-thumping at times about how brilliant Leafs management is, how great the team’s star players are and how close the Leafs are to the Cup.

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But in the entire time that Auston Matthews has been with the team, the Leafs have won just one playoff round. The core group of Matthews, Mitch Marner, Morgan Reilly, John Tavares, and William Nylander has never been surrounded with enough talent to win in the playoffs. This clash between unreal expectations and playoff failure has evidently been a breeding ground for misery.

Staples on politics

At the Cult of Hockey

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