A Brief and Obvious Question About Outdoor NHL Games In Warm Weather

I Regret Leaving California

This happened today, and the tech worked.

Hockey was played (LA vs. Anaheim) in 63-degree weather with no one dying, the rink turning into a swimming pool, or the integrity of the game compromised.

Oh, and the game attracted something like 3X the number of paying customers, and no one seems to mind being an absurd distance from the ice, because, hey, they are outside and outside is nicer than inside. Besides, being really close to hockey just means you are really close to plexiglass and limited visibility, and seeing the damned puck has always been a challenge.

So, um...

Why don't they do this, well, all the damned time?

And if there are 30 to 50K people willing to shell out for the venue, why hasn't the NBA tried it yet?

Oh, and one last thing...

Why do we have hockey arenas in the first place, if we could just multi-purpose yards that people would rather be in, anyway?

(Yes, yes, I know -- it's a novelty that would not sustain long-term big crowd moments. But does the math still not work if, say, there's 30K people for every game outdoors, rather than 18K?)