It’s springtime, the Toronto Maple Leafs are again out of the Stanley Cup playoffs, and the powers-that-be who run the National Hockey League are eyeing the next stop on hockey’s long-time mission to conquer the United States. The destination? Las Vegas, which is where the NHL Awards show will be held next month.
Hockey in Las Vegas makes as much sense as it does in Phoenix, Nashville, Atlanta, or any number of other U.S. cities where the culture of hockey is non-existent. Curiously enough, NHL franchises in Phoenix, Nashville, Atlanta and the like teeter on the brink. The one in Phoenix, of course, has filed for bankruptcy, despite the league throwing in millions to try and keep the leaky ship afloat.
Ever since the NHL expanded in 1967, it’s been under the illusion that hockey matters in the U.S. I’m surprised that those Americans who run the NHL don’t grant a franchise to General Motors or make Obama Chairman of the Board in Phoenix and have the U.S. taxpayer rescue “an essential industry.” That would make as much sense as everything else they’ve done over the years.
Back in 1982, I wrote a piece for The Financial Post Magazine called ‘Is Hockey Healthy?’ The NHL had just absorbed four teams from the rival World Hockey Association (WHA), an upstart league that had signed such NHL stars as Bobby Hull and Gordie Howe – and for one season a 17-year-old phenom named Wayne Gretzky – and had raided and decimated several NHL teams, the Toronto Maple Leafs among them. With the WHA gone, good times were supposed to be here again. The NHL, in its wisdom, was again eyeing the huge U.S. market with its millions of sports fans and potentially huge TV revenues.
For that article, which was a financial look at the NHL, I interviewed several NHL owners, including Harold Ballard of the Maple Leafs, Peter Pocklington of the Edmonton Oilers, and Ed Snider of the Philadelphia Flyers. Snider impressed me because of his honesty. He said the league didn’t have any central planning, its marketing was awful, unlike other major sports leagues the teams shared nothing which resulted in have and have-not franchises, and this gem: “In the U.S. we are considered a fringe operation.” He also said Ballard was bad for the game.
As for Pocklington, he said the league had installed franchises in American cities where they didn’t have a hope. I later mentioned this to then NHL Commissioner John Zeigler, who promptly blew up at me over the phone and went ballistic.
It’s now 2009 and little has changed. Ballard and Snider have both passed on, and Pocklington was recently arrested in California on charges of bankruptcy fraud, which makes him the latest in a long line NHL men who got into trouble with authorities. The list includes the aforementioned Harold Ballard and his Maple Leafs partner Stafford Smythe, one-time NHL Commissioner Clarence Campbell, former Los Angeles Kings owner Bruce McNall, former players union president Alan Eagleson, and such owners as John Rigas of the Buffalo Sabres, Henry Samueli of the Anaheim Ducks, and William Del Biaggio III of both the San Jose Sharks and Nashville Predators.
Aside from the fact that a number of crooked fingers have been stuck into the NHL over the years, the league has been plagued by this so-called ‘vision’ of American millionaires and billionaires who think the future of pro hockey is to be found in the United States. The list of failed, and in some cases still struggling, U.S. franchises would fill a page in National Geographic: Oakland Seals, Atlanta Flames, Kansas City Scouts, Cleveland Barons, Colorado Rockies, Hartford Whalers, Carolina Hurricanes, Phoenix Coyotes, Nashville Predators, Columbus Blue Jackets, to name a few.
Franchises in such cities as Pittsburgh would have moved long ago if they didn’t land superstars Mario Lemieux and, more recently, Sidney Crosby. And even Original Six stalwarts such as Boston and Chicago were in serious trouble until their team’s on-ice fortunes turned around. The NHL has planted and supplanted franchises in U.S. cities where the game has no tradition, little if any following, no understanding, and no appreciation. It would be like putting a multi-million-dollar cricket operation in Montreal. But the league has done this over and over again.
Consider this. New York City and environs, with a population of about 15 million people, has three NHL hockey teams – the New York Rangers, New York Islanders, and New Jersey Devils. The Greater Toronto Area, with a population of about 5 million, has one – the Toronto Maple Leafs. If we used simple math, that 3:1 ratio might make sense, but it doesn’t make sense because when the number of hockey fans is the measuring stick, there is no comparison.
How about Southern California? It also has three teams – the Los Angeles Kings, San Jose Sharks, and Mighty Ducks of Anaheim. Does Southern California have more hockey fans than the GTA, or better still, than Southern Ontario? Of course not. It’s not even close.
The biggest hockey market in the world is Toronto. The arena is always full and the team always makes buckets of money even when the product stinks. Forbes Magazine penned the value of the team at $448 million U.S., making it the NHL’s richest team, despite having the highest ticket prices in the league and not winning the Stanley Cup since 1967.
Today it’s front-page news all over Canada that Jim Balsillie, billionaire co-founder of Research In Motion (RIM), has put in an offer to buy the now bankrupt Phoenix Coyotes and move the franchise to Southern Ontario. You can rest assured that NHL President Gary Bettman will fight tooth and nail to prevent that from happening.
Former Philadelphia Flyers owner Ed Snider was right. In the U.S., the NHL is not only fringe, but is regarded as little more than a circus. In Canada, however, the game is entrenched in the country’s culture and psyche. Neither of these things will ever change. And now the NHL is taking its awards show to Las Vegas, probably with the hope of landing a franchise.
Roll the dice.
Jerry Amernic's Weblog 