OT: Where will the Coyotes end up?
With all this talk of re-locating the franchise, I wanted to see where you guys thought it would go. I'd like to see a team back in Winnipeg or in Hartford. I'd much rather see this than Hamilton, Ontario. In fact, if it came down to it, I'd even rather see the Nordiques before the Hamilton Coyotes.
Thoughts?
There's a good reason Winnipeg, Hartford, and Quebec lost their teams. They're too damn small. Hartford is the largest but it's like the Flint of New England. I think the Coyotes will still be in Phoenix when next season opens up.
Why would they stay in Pheonix? The fan base obviously just isn't there. They don't care enough about hockey in Pheonix. The only reason I could see people going to a game there is to get out of the heat. I just think they will be better off in Canada. They do need to find a bigger city in Canada though.
I think that it would be good for the NHL if the team went to Canada. They will be more popular there. Canadians love their hockey. My guess is it will go to Winnipeg, but idk really.
They will be in Phoenix next year. The league is doing everything they can to keep them there and I just don't see them moving. Maybe in 2010-2011 but not next year.
If they do move I'd love to see them move back north to Canada. Canadians are much more passionate fans and I think it benefit the NHL a ton to have more fan support for more of their teams.
On a related note, if they do move to some of the locations suggested (i.e. Hartford, Hamilton) then there would have to be some conference realignment. If Phoenix moves east, then I would assume they would have to becomes an Eastern Conference team. Then the question arises on who in the East would make the switch over to the West?
Any ideas?
*and to respond to Hart - Quebec, Winnipeg, Hartford lost their teams for a variety of reasons, but mostly because the NHL demanded they needed to build a new rink. When the city didn't do that the team was moved. That was the major reason why those 3 teams moved. A lack of interest and support in Winnipeg and Quebec was not a major problem, trust me.
I'm almost positive that the team was signed over to the NHL, or something along those lines. The NHL is saying the Coyotes don't have the authority to sell it, because Bettman wants them to stay. I actually just wrote a little opinion piece about this for KTAR, the local News Talk Radio show.
The culture needs to change here.
http://ktar.com/?sid=1157520&nid=680
Who in their right fucking mind would think a third team in Ontario is supportable? Putting them in Hamilton puts them in second-Toronto-franchise territory, which would be an epic fail.
This would be akin to the Devils moving to Jersey - they were forced to pay a massive sum to each of the Flyers, Rangers and Islanders for the right to muscle in on their territory, and then have been forced in the 27 years since to scratch and claw for every last fan they can get. And this is in the largest metropolis in either country.
Yeah, Toronto is hockey crazy, but it's entirely focused on the Leafs. The Coyotes would be forced to pay off the Leafs, and then what? Prove not only that another Canadian franchise is sustainable, but that it can happen in a canablizing situation? Madness.
My first choice: Winnipeg.
Second: Saskatoon. That's right, Saskatoon, motherfuckers. I'd call them the Saskatoon Metldown (Wikipedia: The world's largest publicly traded uranium company, Cameco has corporate headquarters in Saskatoon).
...who wants to bring the team to Hamilton / Kitchener secure something like 12,000 season ticket deposits when he almost secured the Nashville franchise? That area can support a team.
Bottom line - the NHL is hemorrhaging money and has too many teams in too many areas that don't care about hockey, other than the transplants of other teams (see: Detroit playing in CA or AZ). What the NHL SHOULD do is reduce their league to sixteen teams. Two eight-team conferences, one Canadian, one American. The teams get seeded according to record, regardless of conference, for the playoffs. Play off away.
The teams:
US Conference: Detroit, Chicago, Boston, New York Rangers, Philly, Pittsburgh, Minnesota, Colorado or St. Louis (be honest, no one would miss any of the other teams - yeah, it would suck to lose the Islanders and Devils but that area has half a million other things to before a 1/4 2 3).
Canada Conference: Edmonton, Calgary, Vancouver, Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto, Hamilton / Kitchener (if it happens), and two of Regina, Winnipeg, Halifax and Quebec (if H/K doesn't happen).
*facepalm*
Regina?
I really don't get this notion that just because a town is Canadian, it can support a team. Regina? Here's a list of metro areas larger than Regina. (Not necessarily better for hockey, but larger.)
Saginaw
College Station
Tuscaloosa
Springfield, IL
Burlington
Prescott, AZ
Champaign
Sioux Falls
Macon
Topeka
Yakima
Lynchburg, VA
Cedar Rapids
Duluth
Ann Arbor
Most of those are also bigger than Halifax. This isn't good thinking.
Huge problem #2: The league can't simply snap its fingers and make franchises disappear. They're owned by people. The NHL would have to buy them up. The average value of an NHL franchise is about $220 million per Forbes - if the league had that kind of money to do that, the last thing they'd do is even remotely think about contracting.
.....but they need to make a choice because most of their teams lose money. Lots of it.
As to point #1, I take hockey in Canada as I do soccer in Europe. Towns with 100,000 people in Europe put 35,000 people in the seats every other weekend. I'm pretty sure a Canadian city of any decent catchment can fill a 10,000 seat arena.
Heck, you're bringing up American cities larger than Regina. Phoenix has how many people and it can't fill an arena?
The NHL doesn't only play on nice sunny weekends. They play on Tuesdays in the dead of February, school nights, and every day of the week. I have no idea what towns or soccer leagues you're talking about since you didn't mention any, but they might play, what, eight or ten games, if it's once every other week? The NHL plays 41 home games.
Not only that, but, a 10,000 seat arena? If the Coyotes are doing so badly at 15,000 a game, how is a team that can only bring in half the revenue of everyone else going to survive? Mellon Arena in Pittsburgh is the smallest at 17,000 and the Pens almost had to move because of that.
Any NHL arena realistically can't be smaller than 18,000. That's 738,000 tickets that can be sold all season. Regina has 200,000 in the metro area, which means to sell out the season, every man, woman, and child in the entire town would have to go to 3 or 4 games every season. If the arena is small. And it's not like Regina is this major hub of a bustling region. It's three hours from anything even pretending to resemble another major metro area. This isn't even close to realistic.
18 teams made money and 12 lost money last year. (According to Forbes' 2008 figures.) That's not great, but it's nothing the league's profit-sharing can't cover, and it's nothing terribly out of the ordinary - compare to the NBA, which had 10 teams losing money during the same time.
"Huge problem #2: The league can't simply snap its fingers and make franchises disappear. They're owned by people."
Isn't that essentially what Chrysler just did?
The entire NHL is not in bankruptcy court as Chrysler is. Bankruptcy court lets you do that. You'll note GM is not laying the axe to dealers right away, just not renewing their contracts when that time comes up. Remember, GM had to pay dealers upwards of a billion when they axed Oldsmobile.
Dude, there are 12.5 million people in Ontario and approximately 11.5 million of them are obsessed with hockey. The province absolutely could support another team. For that matter, so could Quebec (pop. 7.7 million). Yes, right now everyone supports the Leafs, but that's because they're the only NHL team there. When the Devils moved to NJ, some of the people in that market started supporting them. When the Ducks set up shop in Anaheim, some of the people in the L.A. market started supporting them. There is absolutely no reason to believe the same wouldn't be true in Ontario.
It seems like Jim Balsille does everything underhanded and backdoor, and this whole bankruptcy thing seems the worst. I doubt he'll get control of this team. I feel like the Coyotes will stay in Phoenix for at least next year, and chances are good that they will find another owner and stay there for a while. From what I've read and seen, the problem isn't really with lack of interest, it's just lack on interest in a bad team. Like many other teams, people stop coming when the team hasn't made the playoffs in six years. If they can put a better product on the ice, a lot of the financial problems will straighten themselves out. I remember when the Wings played them in '97 or '98, and they sold out first round playoff games, and seemed to be doing great.
If the team does move to Hamilton, there's no good way of re-aligning teams. I can think of two scenarios that make sense: Colorado moves to Pacific, and Chicago or St. Louis replace them in Northwest, or St. Louis just goes straight to Pacific. In both cases I have Hamilton joining the Central. Now, if the NHL wants to make a Hamilton-Toronto rivalry, they'll have to move somebody like Pittsburgh, the closest team geographically, to the Central, but that will break up all their rivalries with Philly and Washington. Of course, this is hypothetical.
Since there are rumors that Atlanta and the two Florida franchises are struggling, maybe they'll move one of them to Hamilton, and try to keep the Coyotes in the West (Winnipeg?)
I think Hamilton would be great. I think the Tampa Bay Lightning should move, too. Fans down here are so stupid about hockey that they are still wondering why the Lightning didn't win multiple Stanley Cups and have no idea how lucky they were to win the one they did.
And the Lightning had to make it to the finals to turn a profit. Most warm-weather states won't support a hockey team. I'm all for a few of those teams moving to Canada where they will have a built-in audience.
I highly doubt the team will move back to Canada. In his continuing effort to destroy the NHL, Bettman will probably move the team to a non-hockey city like Oklahoma City or New Orleans to "expand" the game rather than move the team where it can be successful.
team in Hamilton, ON. you can't compare the tri-state area of NY/NJ/Con to S Ontario when it comes to hockey. you could have teams in Det, Windsor, Buffalo, St cathrines, Tor and Hamilton. and every one of those franchises would do fine. Canada is hockey crazy.
if anything, it would kill the minor league attendance.
They should move back to Canada, but Bettman's deranged goal of bringing a cold-weather game to warm-weather locales will probably prevent that.
Anywhere in Wisconsin that could support a team?
if they're actually able to move it. I seem to remember that city having all kinds of contingency plans ready if Pittsburgh couldn't make things right for the Penguins.
it's pronounced "mill-e-wah-que" which is Algonquin for "the good land."
and i have no idea if that market can support it. doubtful, i suspect.
I would think Milwaukee could support a team. I don't know why the NHL has never gone that route.
Milwaukee already has an American Hockey League minor league team. I don't know how hockey crazy that city is and if they could support an NHL and AHL team.
If Phoenix moves and they want to keep the team in the West, what about Portland or Seattle? I think the WHL (Canadian Major Junior) has teams out that way, Vancouver just up the road. I never see those cities involved in NHL talk, though I'm not sure how popular hockey is out that way. And for those who don't know and so as not to cause any confusion, Portland in the American Hockey League is Portland, Maine, not Oregon.
Hockey seems medium-popular in the Pacific Northwest. There's an entire division of US teams in the WHL: Everett, Seattle, Tri-Cities, Portland, and Spokane. I lived in Everett for a while not too long ago and the Silvertips get pretty good support for a junior team in what's essentially a northern suburb of Seattle. I never went to a game that had less than 5,000 people in it. By contrast, I don't think I ever went to a Norfolk Admirals (AHL) game that had more than 5,000. Norfolk's no hockey town. I think an NHL team would do well in Seattle. Hard to tell from just junior games, but I think an NHL team would be embraced there.
The only problem is, prospective owners probably can just look at the trouble the Sonics had with the city and Key Arena and decide it's not worth the trouble.
Given the frigid winter weather in Wisconsin and the college hockey culture that already exists there, I'd think Milwaukee would be a natural NHL city. And really, I don't think the NHL needs to worry about AHL competition (it's more the other way around). A Milwaukee franchise would be a natural geographic rival for Minnesota and Chicago. I don't know why the NHL hasn't put a team there. I guess the NHL figures that the city isn't quite big enough to support two major winter sports teams.
I agree that Seattle would also be a fine choice. It would give Vancouver a natural rival, which it's never really had.
it is "whale's vagina". Oh, my bad - that's San Diego.
put them back in winnipeg.
I would like to see the Coyotes move to Windsor. How sweet would that be! I would not mind at all crossing the border to watch an away game between Windsor and Detroit.
Also, here is a map of the NHL outlining the conferences and divisions. It would be tough to move Phoenix out of the west just because there is no other team in that vicinity to take its place in the division. I can still dream though about a team in Windsor...
http://members.shaw.ca/getbak/nhl_div_map.jpg
i think they should be the iron mountain coyotes
I think it would be cool if they moved the Coyotes to Seattle. At least Seattle has a history of winning the Stanley Cup.
remember it is not only the filling of the seats, which for the most part was accomplished in Wpeg and QC, but also the ancillary television, and other advertising revenue streams. Also you need a corporate base to afford the premium seating. Supporting an OHL or even and AHL franchise does not require nearly the financial base. While the salary cap will help any team compete on the ice, those additional revenue streams are only available in a larger market.
Regarding specific cities, I would think Seattle after losing their basketball team would be a good candidate, but Portland is usually considered to be more of serious candidate.
Bigger US cities without teams include KC, Houston, Cleveland, Indianapolis, Salt Lake City, Seattle and Portland.
The NHL has been in Cleveland, KC and in ancient times Seattle with varying success.
I would expect that one of those cities would be given a shot before Hamilton (much less Wpeg or QC), but I expect that there will be a push by Bettman to keep the team in AZ if it can be worked out.