The NHL is trying to establish a baseline quality for all of its telecasts. The guy in charge of this is John Shannon, the NHL's senior vice president for broadcasting. He looks at everything from the announcers to the camera work.
It's an interesting idea. One thing you learn watching Center Ice is the quality of hockey telecasts can vary pretty widely. Some have knowledgeable analysis and great production, while others look like they were shot by bootleggers.
One of Shannon's pet projects is having analysts break down plays, explaining why something happened. That's one of my pet causes, also. You can't cultivate fans if casual viewers don't understand the significance of what's going on. With hockey, so much of the action is away from the puck; it's not only a matter of getting the puck down the ice.
It all makes me wonder if eventually the NHL will want to approve all of its voices. I'm not sure it would be an awful idea.

Obviously, a lot of teams want Peter Forsberg and his magic foot, but how cool is it that the Avs and the Wings are both interested in him? A rivalry within a rivalry. It's brilliant.

Uni Watch, as you might expect, has a lot of information on the NHL's new uniforms. Reassuringly, he reports the Leafs aren't changing their logo.
OffWing has more on the uniforms.

Here in New York, there's an interesting undercurrent to the New York Rangers. The papers are hinting at a bit of a revolt in the organization, with Brendan Shanahan expressing some displeasure at the team's lack of grit and straightforward hockey. Interestingly, in most of the newspaper blogs, Shanahan's anger is a lot more explicit (here, too).
Basically, coach Tom Renney has continued to defer to Jaromir Jagr, even when Jagr's preferences don't seem to be working. For instance, the Rangers haven't really used Matt Cullen on the point of their powerplay (or even on the first unit), despite the fact he was so effective in that role for Carolina. As Shanahan implies, Cullen may night be on the first unit because that first unit is only looking to get Jagr the puck along the halfboards, not shoot it and look for rebounds.
Another reason for Shanahan's comments is that he's never really had a center who could get him the puck, and rather than try and develop someone into that role, the Rangers have just given Shanahan a parade of centers (and might even bring in Peter Forsberg for him; this after trying to claim Petr Nedved from the Flyers).
So while it might not be obvious to casual NHL fans, the wheels definitely seem to be coming off the Rangers bus. One effective line plus one increasingly angry superstar equals big trouble.

Larry Brooks says the NHL seems very hot to make the nets bigger, in an effort to increase scoring. Shockingly, goalie Martin Brodeur thinks it's a bad idea.
But he's actually right. If the NHL wants more scoring, I'd seriously clamp down on goalies freezing the puck. To start, stop goalies from coming way out of the crease to fall on a puck in play. And maybe reconsiders the goalies' ability to stop play at all. If the puck is constantly in play, scoring will go up.
* * *
Major League Baseball is puttings its Extra Innings out-of-market games package exclusively on DirecTV, the latest example of a sports league putting money ahead of fans. I mention this only as a warning to the NHL that if it enters into a similar deal with its Center Ice package, they risk losing even more fans.
Short term, I'm sure there's value in trading fans and audience for cash, but long term, people just find something else to do with their time.
And then you're not able to give these sports packages away.