Nashville Predators moving to Canada? NOPE! Sorry, Canucks (and KC!)...

Re: Nashville Predators moving to Canada? Sure seems like it...

If I'm the city I send someone to audit the attendance every night as long as this guy owns the team. He could start down-reporting the attendance to get what he wants like George Shinn did when the Hornets were in Charlotte.

 

Re: Nashville Predators moving to Canada? Sure seems like it...

That is if the city cares about losing the team or not.

The two sides fought most of the year about who should take the Gaylord Entertainment signs from the arena. Both thought the other should pay for it, so they stayed up the entire year, even though Gaylord didn't pay any fee this year.

 

Re: Nashville Predators moving to Canada? Sure seems like it...

But Chicago and Boston have track records of supporting hockey. Nashville has a track record of not supporting hockey very well. It's not a part of the sports fabric in Nashville, where it's UT football/Titans football, then Vandy/Bama football, then prep football, then perhaps the Predators. It was a crappy town to put a hockey team in. The fact that it's drawing when the team is challenging for the top record is utterly uninstructive.

 

Re: Nashville Predators moving to Canada? Sure seems like it...

I always thought the NHL would make more sense for KC than the NBA, simply for that reason. That and with KU (and to a much lesser extent, Mizzou) nearby, it's not like people who want to catch a basketball game don't have options.

 

Re: Nashville Predators moving to Canada? Sure seems like it...

As well, Boston and Chicago fans stay away because they know their teams suck shit and their owners are violators of farm animals.

 

Re: Nashville Predators moving to Canada? Sure seems like it...

If he's smart, he'll move the team to the Rosemont Horizon, and if HE's smart, Bettman will let him.

A competitive, winning hockey team in Chicago would take the place by storm, sell out wall to wall from day one, and if there's any justice in the world, run Bill Wirtz straight into Lake Michigan.

 

Re: Nashville Predators moving to Canada? Sure seems like it...

Kitchener, Ontario - smack-dab in the middle of millions of hockey fans, yet outside Toronto and Buffalo's 50-mile radii. Perfect!

 

Re: Nashville Predators moving to Canada? Sure seems like it...

If Balsillie moves the franchise, I'd put my money on the Kitchener-Waterloo area up here in Ontario. Balsillie's the founder and CEO of Blackberry and their head office is located in K-W.

I believe it's outside the 50 mile radius so Buffalo or Toronto couldn't claim compensation and the guy has enough coin to build his own arena. It's got a great corporate base (unlike Winnipeg)--the area is essentially the Silicon Valley of Canada.

Plus Southern Ontario can easily support another team since the Leafs have sold out every home game for about the last 40 or 50 years.

Makes a helluva lot more sense than Kansas City.

 

Re: Nashville Predators moving to Canada? Sure seems like it...

Double J and I share the same brain.

 

Re: Nashville Predators moving to Canada? Sure seems like it...

And please, don't anybody say "Hamilton" who can't sell more than 2,000 playoff tickets to their AHL Bulldogs team.

It's the closest thing we have to a Third World city in this part of the woods.

 

Re: Nashville Predators moving to Canada? Sure seems like it...

Which, unfortunately, is exactly why KC will get an(other) NHL team before KW.

 

Re: Nashville Predators moving to Canada? Sure seems like it...

This could be the franchise that brings the Jets back. The Tories in Winnipeg vowed they would bring back a franchise if they won the provincial election and this could be their ticket.