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NHL: Nashville Predators’ banner ceremony was filled with controversy and laughter

The Nashville Predators had a banner ceremony prior to their home opener Tuesday. It drew more attention than their 3-0 loss to Calgary.

Frank Curto

The Nashville Predators had a great season last year.

They won the Central Division as well as the Presidents Trophy for having the most points in the regular season. Yet when they raised the banners to their rafters, they hung three banners. That’s right, three!

A Central Division Champion Banner, a banner for being the President Trophy winner and a third for the Regular Season Western Conference Conference Champions. Umm, that banner has never been presented before.

Winning the presidents trophy means you are the regular season champion in either conference.

Three banners going up with none saying Stanley Cup Champions is just wrong and a little embarrassing.

In the era of participation awards and no one should be left out, the Predators fell for the “they should get another banner” syndrome.

Social media, to no surprise, as had a blast abusing this banner decision. Blackhawks Talk tweeted a picture stating how adorable their banners were as they posted a photo of their Stanley Cup Banners.

Another tweeted what other creative banners Nashville will raise in the future.

Probably the funniest one I have seen that represents the “participation award” era was tweeted by @Bardown. The picture which represented another rival, the Arizona Coyotes, says it all.

The Nashville Predator organization will not be able to get away from this for a long time. They deserved two of those banners to be raised but, the third made the team look silly and desperate to be part of other winning programs.

These tweets that have been going around have given plenty of us some much-needed laughs at the expense of a good team. A team that made a very poor decision.

A graduate of St. John's University class of '91. I have been a fan of the New York Rangers since the days of Peter Puck. Founder of Ranger Proud, the Facebook page that covers all news, notes, pre /post-game stats, and player quotes. I can be reached at [email protected]