GMHL League Review.

League In Review
1/1/18
Anthony D.S

Greater Metro Hockey League

Part- 1

Throughout the past few years, we took on a new project, a project where we would help diminish misunderstandings when it comes to some hockey leagues; although, in some cases we cannot.

The first case we present to you, the viewer is the notorious "pay to play" league, the 'Greater Metro-Hockey League' (GMHL) a league where it is NOT sanctioned by hockey Canada, where it is forcing great quality hockey despite the detouring factor of how much it is to play for some of its hockey clubs.

Leading off into the paying to play aspect of this league, there are teams asking a ridiculous sum of money from younger players in order to ensure free spots for some ex major players wishing to play one last year of junior in hopes to go somewhere or "live the dream" for one last ride, we will bring you to last season, starting with arguably one of the best teams in GMHL history, the Niagara Whalers, we had the opportunity to sit down with some of the players parents during some of the playoff games last season to speak with their overall satisfaction with the team; to our surprise what was said was shocking; there were multiple players playing their first year of junior, promised many things from management/owners that were never upheld, despite the money paid, the sickening part was that in one case, a very promising goalie paid thirteen-fivehundred THOUSAND to only play one period in the entire season, was never given the opportunity to even dress in the college showcase at least, games where it is all about the players, no records to be upheld, nothing to go towards their season totals.

That is downright sickening to hear, and the sad thing is, that it just the beginning that poor young man is now playing in a top toughed junior league this year playing in 22 games, oh yeah, as a STARTER, we applaud your love for the game, as for many young players their love for the game would have been torched.

This leads us to more and more players, paying way more than what they should have, another case is where they pay upmost of nine thousand to play, and we use the word "play" generously.. as the team was notably stacked from top to bottom with all ex all star talent, these young players would easily fit into any other teams top lines, teams like this, is what gives the league a bad reputation; where the cost of winning outweighs the cost of development, money driven owners outweigh the love for the game. As much as we would love to continue about this atrocity, and trust me we could go on and on, but we must move on to different topics.

Furthermore we move onto the teams that fold, in the past two seasons we have witnessed many teams just give up, pack up, and leave town with their tails tucked between their legs leaving these young men out to dry, the sad thing is most of these teams are the ones dedicated to developing these players, they love the game but they cannot keep up with the running costs of a team; you would think that the league would be more supporting towards teams like this.

These great owners, coaches are devastated not only because they wanted to give back to a game they loved so much, they cannot bare to even give the face to face of their players, unfortunately that is the case for a lot of these teams, the players that do give out all this money are left out to dry without a place to play, for the most part some won't even play for the rest of the season despite their skill level which is heart breaking to say the least; leading off of this there are a few owners that are only in it to make some profit, but when they see their money dipping they abandon ship right away!

The players that are forced to leave their homes to these folding teams are even worse, they have to stay away from home, confused, worried and angry; on top of paying this absurd amount to play they must be the ones to pay for their billets as well? if they are willing to leave their home to play for your team, you must be crazy to charge them the same as everyone else, if they must pay their billet fees take that into account of what you charge them to pay, because the minimum billet payment per month is five hundred, for the case of players that are on teams that do not fold the average season is from September-February *excluding playoffs* that is six months! three thousand dollars on top of playing fees, are you fucking kidding me. unbelievable.

Our final piece to this topic is, for the kids finding new teams, they must undergo the most belittling and heart wrenching process of talking to teams that are willing to "accept" them despite possibly having little to no chance making it to the playoffs with barely any games left in the season they must still pay to play, even though they just gave some other fool their money before,

As a league, they must be careful, make new rules and regulations that teams must uphold, every player deserves a chance, not every player has the money to fund this league forever.

Ex major players should still have to pay, at least one thousand, max payment from a player should be no more than four thousand.

Now as much negatives as there are to this league when it comes to money and unreliable expansion teams, this league is a top tier league when it comes to talent.

Currently you have ex major players and ex div.1-2-3 players from Europe here to play amongst the local players creating an extreme environment, for the many people say that this is not a junior level league, that is where you are wrong, they take in top tier talent from all over the world in hopes to give their fans a great game night in and night out.

Like we said before despite the costs detouring a lot of players it is still an awesome league when it comes to development, of course if you find the right team, but never the less you should be thinking one year here is a great way to develop as a player, as long as you find the right home.

This league is where young players can learn from the old and soak in as much as they can while they are there, you have veterans from the GOJHL,NOJHL and other junior leagues coming here, all of which can share their experiences with team-mates and help them get better.


In addition to everything I had said in regards to the outstanding fees, it is abundantly clear that they are in it for the money, as is any business.. there is no need to sign in this league unless you have done every bit of research you can on the team you may go with, and even when you think you have done the right amount of research, stop, and look around some more... for a first year of junior, there is no need to spend any more than the league minimum, which isn't hard to find the teams that are genuinely interested in pure development in their players; we can easily be differentiated when you come across teams demanding close to eight grand; however, playing in the GMHL should be a second option to leagues such as GOJHL and NOJHL.


We here at 'UP' really do believe this league can be at the top of the totem pole when it comes to high quality junior leagues, however this high pay to play must stop, especially for when it comes to younger players and their billeting players; an easy fix to this issue is to have closer teams and different divisions made up so it can help eliminate costs to owners in travel expenses, can easily disperse the money when it comes to out of division games, which can also lead into the bigger and better things for the league, such as out of conference games during the season; bigger game schedule and of course more of an interest from players all around Ontario and Canada, not to mention internationally considering its pull on import players now, this is only the tip of the iceberg for idea's that can drastically help improve this league!


For the first instalment of GMHL's league in review this is based entirely off of knowledge we have accumulated off of scouting reports and multiple interviews and games watched, we will be still helping out teams as we go, along with trying to finalize this report.



Our final GMHL league in review will follow the end of this years Russel cup.

-Anthony D.S