Re: 2007 NHL awards, draft and off-season running thread
Mirtle's blog shows a complete lack of understand of why Nashville has struggled attendance wise. It has nothing to do with hockey being "beloved" or not. It has everything to do with Leipold and his front office ticking off Gaylord and other corporations in Nashville enough that they no longer purchase the expensive season tickets in the lower bowl.
I hate columns like that. "It's not that we don't want hockey there, it's that it obviously doesn't work" when that's not the case.
Several of the now thriving markets - San Jose and Tampa to name two - struggled early with growing the sport, even as much as 8-10 years into the franchise in the case of the Sharks. Nashville's struggles, especially since they stem from a personal dispute in the corporate world, may be more of the same.
I think a team in Hamilton is the last thing the league needs, quite frankly, especially with an owner like Balsillie who has a clear disregard for how to handle things in the business world.
Finally, how is Bettman treating this like an afterthought? The way the scenario plays out is this - Balsille and Leipold come to a handshake agreement for $238 million. The franchise cannot be moved yet and may not be moveable in the next few years (the 14,000 attendance out clause has not been triggered, the city of Nashville can prevent that clause from being triggered by purchasing the extra tickets, and season ticket sales in Nashville have jumped significantly, especially among the corporate world, since he announcement). And even if they could be moved, the teams in Buffalo and Toronto could block a move to Hamilton, so that city may not even be in the mix.
Instead of waiting for the sale to be finalized on paper, before he gets approved by the BOG, before he finds out if the Preds even can move, Balsillie goes out and makes an ass of himself by all his K-W/Hamilton area campaigning. While he's doing this, he refuses to enter into a binding agreement with Leipold. Leipold understandably gets peeved and says "screw you" to Balsille.
I see nothing that Bettman or the Preds did wrong to deprive the poor Hamilton natives of their hockey team. I see a Canadian businessman who did everything wrong and screwed up any chance of him purchasing a team while putting a big dent in his shot at being granted an expansion franchise.
I would like to see a breakdown of revenue and exactly how much of that comes from a.) the Habs and Leafs and b.) the Canadian television deals. Plus, I've heard both "one-third revenues" and "one third non-gate" revenues - which is it?