WSJ: "Diversify or Die"

A string of events has put hockey’s attitudes toward race in an incredibly unflattering light. Now, a phenomenon the league had proactively sought to educate itself on is raising the stakes as the sport faces a broader moment of cultural reckoning. https://t.co/9jNYBLVm3d @WSJ

— Louise Radnofsky (@louiseradnofsky) December 15, 2019

About a year ago, the National Hockey League brought in an outside expert to tell them about an existential threat. That expert was a demographer.

William Frey, who works for the Washington, D.C. think tank Brookings Institution, conducted a couple of talks and a conference call for the league. He told them that by 2020, the U.S. Census is expected to show that two-fifths of the nation’s population identifies with a racial group other than white; and that sometime after 2040, there will be no racial majority in the country.

The NHL, which had only 50 nonwhite players in the 2018-19 season, seemed to get the point. It kept going with ‘Hockey is for Everyone’ programs in 26 minority and low-income communities, and learn-to-play classes around the country. And it sent around a policy brief co-authored by Frey and Kimberly Davis, the league’s executive vice president for social impact, growth and legislative affairs, that acknowledged “hockey has a perception in some circles as being ‘not for some’ and ‘only for others.’ ”

“Now, more than ever, hockey communities and its leaders must focus on the drastic demographic and cultural change that is coming. It is incumbent upon those currently in the game—for the sake of the game’s future—to ensure that the sport is perceived as welcoming to all,” they said.

In other words, an entity whose members are generally whiter is going to have to diversify or die.