NHL chief content officer Steve Mayer faced a problem when he joined the league in 2016. Teams considered off-ice appearances to be distractions. Players feared reprisal for being self-promotional in any way. When ESPN reporter Emily Kaplan switched from covering football to hockey, she encountered similar roadblocks.
A team-first, grounded sport had produced an unwritten rule book that could be summarized in a single commandment: Conform.
“The truth is, NHL players have always had personality,” Kaplan said. “They’ve just been conditioned from a young age to suppress it.”
Then came Gen Z.
A new generation has reshaped the league—first as fans desperate for personality-driven content, and then as players willing to deliver it.
Responding to feedback from that growing slice of the audience, NHL commissioner Gary Bettman helped institute change by urging owners to increase access to players before, during and after games. General managers were pushed to get on board with their athletes being more public, too. “The commissioner is very much behind this type of content,” Mayer said.
Seeing the way Drive to Survive introduced new fans to Formula 1, league execs recruited the production company behind the show, Box to Box, to create something similar for the NHL.
At February’s All-Star Game, Box to Box co-founder Paul Martin met with individual players, scouting potential characters for what would become Faceoff: Inside the NHL, which dropped on Amazon Prime Video ahead of this season.
Martin found a crop of stars ready for the spotlight. “I think even the NHL and the NHLPA … were surprised about how receptive the players were to it,” he said.
Twenty All-Stars were age 26 or younger. For them, sharing came naturally. While Hart Memorial Trophy winners of the 2010s Nikita Kucherov, Patrick Kane and Sidney Crosby don’t have a public Instagram account between them, the last three winners—Nathan MacKinnon, Connor McDavid and Auston Matthews—boast 2.5 million followers combined. Nineteen-year-old Connor Bedard, 2023’s top pick and the youngest 2024 All-Star, already has 760,000 followers himself.
The league’s up-and-comers have grown up seeing athletes from other sports embrace off-field opportunities and benefit as a result. Many had even watched Box to Box shows such as Drive to Survive and Full Swing, recognizing the crossover appeal those programs fostered. Maybe most significantly, business-savvy players could see the bigger picture. This is what it took to grow the game.
“They understand it’s time to get mic’d during a game, and it’s time to not be afraid to show your emotions,” CAA player agent Pat Brisson said. “In our game it was taboo for many, many decades to open up. … At the end of the day, it’s the world we live in now, and we find that our players are a lot more open to the concept.”
Kaplan took notice when Bedard did countless media hits before his NHL debut, including The Pat McAfee Show—and got little pushback.
Back when Mayer arrived, executives felt like they were working around players to promote games. Now, stars are saying pick me for similar opportunities. For example, more top-liners now willingly show up for the league’s annual preseason media tour.
NHL executives took that opportunity this year to film a recently released ad highlighting its new faces of the game. The ad is simply titled: “Gen Z.” Over 30 seconds, close-ups of a half-dozen young players (and Sid the Kid) take precedence over action shots.
“What we spend a lot of time on, I should say, is debunking the myth … that you can show your personality but that doesn’t mean that you’re an individualist and that you just care about yourself,” NHL chief branding officer Brian Jennings said. “If we don’t do it, we will be falling behind.”
In an age of national TV, podcasts and social media conversations, it’s critical that a league has flashy, skilled players to promote in addition to the lunch pail grinders who might be favorites in a local market. For now, the NHL trails its peers when it comes to the percentage of revenue coming in at the national level.
“In addition to the new general managers and people in positions of power,” NHL SVP of marketing Casey Hall said, “there’s also been tremendous growth and progress through education and acceptance amongst people who’ve been there for a long time.”
Multiple guys are also featured in ad campaigns for NHL partners such as Chipotle and MassMutual. For the last three seasons, the NHL has leaned into pushing its new “Golden Era.”
Faceoff largely captures that transformative generation on its ascent, led by McDavid, the 27-year-old three-time Hart Trophy winner. Eight of the 12 headliners were 28 or younger at the start of this season.
The league is still collecting data on how many non-NHL diehards the series has reached as it remains Amazon’s No. 1 show in Canada after spending time in the U.S. Top 10. There’s hope for a second season as well.
Maybe even more encouraging? Mayer has already heard from players looking to be featured in future episodes.