Capitals/Penguins Series: Fans Are Ready, But Is The League Itself?

When the Washington Capitals and the leading scorer in the NHL Alexander Ovechkin take the ice against Canada's golden boy Sid The Kid and his Pittsburgh Penguins this week, plenty, and I mean PLENTY will be at stake.
For starters, both Ovechkin and Crosby are among the top 5 most talented players in the world, and to many they are easily the top 2. With great talent comes great excitement and this series is guaranteed to be full of it. The supporting cast of the Penguins is Oscar-worthy as well. Evgeni Malkin, a 22-year old scoring machine cannot go without mention (so there, he was mentioned). Jordan Staal, Sergei Gonchar and an experienced Marc Andre-Fleury in net also bring lots to the table for a Penguin Squad that made it to the Stanley Cup Finals last season. Ovechkin will not be coming alone however either. His fellow Russian Alex Semin and hilariously big-headed coach Bruce Boudreau look not to be outdone. The caps also have a sharpshooting blue-liner who goes by the name of Green.
The last times these teams met in the regular season it was a violent affair. Crosby and Ovechkin shared lots of ice time and things got hot. Both had words for the other after the game, and with the natural talent of both players and both coming into the league at the same time, quite the rivalry has ensued.
Despite all this drama, the question of the series is not "Who will win?" The real question, the one that will matter perhaps 5 or 10 or 50 years from now, is "Is the NHL ready"? Are the NHL and commissioner Gary Bettman ready to promote and sell this series in a professional sports market currently dominated by the NBA playoffs and the NFL draft?
Plain and simple? No. They aren't. Think of it this way, when the Lakers and Celtics met in the finals last year, the tenured David Stern marketed the rivalry geniusly. He employed commercials showing Magic Johnson playing with Bird, reaching out to a past generation of fans. The Lakers were marketed with the showtime aura again while the Celtics boasted their usual blue-collar, get-here-on-defense mentality. Yeah, but, that was the finals right? If Ovechkin and Crosby were playing in the Stanley Cup Finals I'll bet this would get more publicity...
Maybe so. But still, let's look at the NFL. In the regular season, exciting games are marketed with no mercy and the same games are milked schedule after schedule simply because they are the biggest money makers. For example, have you ever seen the Patriots play the Colts? Yeah, me too, probably ten times, and they aren't even in the same division. But Brady vs. Manning justifies it, and part of the reason is because the league itself has gotten us so excited about this rivalry. Marketing creates interest, not vice versa.
I have yet to see any Crosby vs. Ovechkin commercials. I have yet to see any slow motion, black and white plays of Ovechkin scoring one of his countless brilliant goals behind a dramatic piano score, only to have "Where Amazing Happens" appear on the screen and give us shivers. The NHL is not the marketing machine that other leagues are. They do not sell the soap well enough to compete.
The series should be incredible and certainly one of the highlights of the post-lockout era. Goals should be pretty, hits should be nasty, and the intensity high. As Washington's coach Bruce Boudreau said if you thought Washington and New York was nutty, well "This is Washington/Pittsburgh. Welcome to the circus." But I'll probably have to check the highlight reel, as I'll be watching more interesting sports. Sports who have made an effort to to get my ratings. Bulls/Celtics anyone? Seinfeld Reruns anyone?