Burlington Group Approached NHL for possible 2nd GTA/S.O. Franchise

[MNNumbers]

HugoSimon,

I live in Washington state and i know the market well our main RSN is root sports covers all 5 states. The NHL team will more than likely go with root sports so all 5 of the states will be able to watch Seattle NHL. This is exactly what i mean by the NHL gains viewership more than just the Seattle market but all markets in the entire pacific Northwest, alaska and Montana.

Those fans wanting more hockey then just Seattle NHL would tune in to NBC/NBCSN (and CBC for those in the seattle market) to watch other teams play.

Those fans wanting more hockey than just Seattle NHL would already be tuning in, wouldn't they? If I am right, then Seattle doesn't gain much for a NATIONAL TV contract, unless the Kraken (make it happen) somehow acquire a national following, with east coast fans wanting to watch their games.

I'm not against Seattle. It's a 650M addition to the league, and it will sit right in the middle of HRR, which is where the BOG would WANT an expansion team to be. But, given how much weight the traditional Northeast has in the fan balance of this league, I think it highly unlikely that ANY expansion city moves the needle on the TV contract at all.

And, none of that pertains to Burlington at all. I think, even in Canada, a new arena + the expansion fee is just too much money to sink in to start a market.

 

[TheLegend]

The important detail your missing is that three canadian provinces with a population equal to southern ontario has 4 teams, why all we have is Toronto.

The average western Canadian team has about 1.5 million residents in its metro/driving distance.

Southern Ontario has about 11 million. There is no leap of faith that 4 could be supported, again it's upwards of 6 or 7 where things would get dicey.

Same could be said for New York City and it’s vicinity and some people think 3 is too many there.

Besides you are leaving out some details as well. Corporate sponsorships, TV rights. Etc... etc... You end up divvying up the pie that’s already providing the major income there just to plant another 40-50k butts into seats.

 

[gstommylee]

This is literally a pre industrial understanding of economics.

Tv contracts are not the only one peace of the pie, ticket revenue merchandise, sponsorship etc is also massive.

By your logic MLS, MLB, NBA, CFL, etc would never be able to exist in this country because we've ran out of TV screens.

We should give all future teams in canada just the sake of giving canada more teams. You darn well know the NHL is not going to do a 16 west and 20 teams east just for the sake of having more Canada teams. Spiting up the Toronto market to 4 teams will not actually do much to gain more revenue to the league.

There is so much $$$ to go around before it drys up. Then you talk about the actually cost of the team which would be in the north side of 1 billion dollars Canadian. If it cost Seattle 833.5m Canadian dollar for a team, it'll probably end up costing 1b for the team then a 100-200million to pay off buffalo and Toronto, then the cost a couple hundred million for an arena. That's just to add 1 team try adding 4 and it gets even more costly to add 4. Then you have the weak Canadian dollar. Its not financially feasible. Its not something the NHL will ever approve.

Remember there was a TOR 2 group that asked for a application back in 2015, they didn't turn in a bid cause it would be very very expensive for them. Its even getting more expensive now and be even more costly later.

 

[gstommylee]

Same could be said for New York City and it’s vicinity and some people think 3 is too many there.

Besides you are leaving out some details as well. Corporate sponsorships, TV rights. Etc... etc... You end up divvying up the pie that’s already providing the major income there just to plant another 40-50k butts into seats.

That pie is also very limited. There is so much $$$ to go around.

 

[TheLegend]

That pie is also very limited. There is so much $$$ to go around.

Southern Ontario is still rich enough for at least one more team. The league admitted it as much way back during the Coyotes BK trial.

I’m just not buying into the 4-5 team thing.

 

[gstommylee]

Southern Ontario is still rich enough for at least one more team. The league admitted it as much way back during the Coyotes BK trial.

I’m just not buying into the 4-5 team thing.

Right but the issue becomes that it'll be very very expensive for any group to bring that one team.

 

[TheLegend]

Right but the issue becomes that it'll be very very expensive for any group to bring that one team.

Yet here we have a thread dedicated to a group who’s been talking to the league about it. Something tells me they’ve got some cash behind them.

 

[gstommylee]

Yet here we have a thread dedicated to a group who’s been talking to the league about it. Something tells me they’ve got some cash behind them.

But where's the team going to come from? I just don't see the NHL expanding again after 32 and making the league imbalanced again. If quebec can't a team why would a TOR 2 get a team?

Plus there is no way what ever TOR 2 is going to pay that any one out west will pay seattle's price yet alone even higher.

 

[doublejman]

Seattle is #12 in the tv market and happen to be one of the highest in terms of populatio growth in the country. It'll have an impact on the new TV contract especially when it also opens up the NHL to the smaller markets in the pacific Northwest + alaska and Western Montana in terms of tv viewership.

Seattle is 14th when you add up the Canada markets, right in the middle. I believe it has been reported that when the Thrashers left Atlanta there wasn't much affect to the following tv contract and the Atlanta tv market is 35% larger than Seattle. If anything being in the pacific time zone would be a negative for any primetime games, 70% of population live in the Eastern Time Zone and TV viewership drops off dramatically after 11, many games out west don't end until midnight to 1 am.

Photobucket

This map is a couple years old but it shows that many teams are aired in more that 2 or more states, the new Seattle team won't be that unique, and like I posted earlier outside of Portland most of the tv markets in those states are among the smallest in the country.

Would Seattle get a national following when the next tv contract or 2 expires? Highly unlikely. 20 to 30 years from now? possible but by then tv's could be obsolete.

 

[Melrose Munch]

Seattle is 14th when you add up the Canada markets, right in the middle. I believe it has been reported that when the Thrashers left Atlanta there wasn't much affect to the following tv contract and the Atlanta tv market is 35% larger than Seattle. If anything being in the pacific time zone would be a negative for any primetime games, 70% of population live in the Eastern Time Zone and TV viewership drops off dramatically after 11, many games out west don't end until midnight to 1 am.

Photobucket

This map is a couple years old but it shows that many teams are aired in more that 2 or more states, the new Seattle team won't be that unique, and like I posted earlier outside of Portland most of the tv markets in those states are among the smallest in the country.

Would Seattle get a national following when the next tv contract or 2 expires? Highly unlikely. 20 to 30 years from now? possible but by then tv's could be obsolete.

Atlanta didn't have as much an effect because it was 10 years ago. Now it would have. Seattle is not a big big market, so I agree with the rest of your post. If @gstommylee was talking about Houston, then I would see his point.

 

[gstommylee]

Seattle is 14th when you add up the Canada markets, right in the middle. I believe it has been reported that when the Thrashers left Atlanta there wasn't much affect to the following tv contract and the Atlanta tv market is 35% larger than Seattle. If anything being in the pacific time zone would be a negative for any primetime games, 70% of population live in the Eastern Time Zone and TV viewership drops off dramatically after 11, many games out west don't end until midnight to 1 am.

Photobucket

This map is a couple years old but it shows that many teams are aired in more that 2 or more states, the new Seattle team won't be that unique, and like I posted earlier outside of Portland most of the tv markets in those states are among the smallest in the country.

Would Seattle get a national following when the next tv contract or 2 expires? Highly unlikely. 20 to 30 years from now? possible but by then tv's could be obsolete.

1) Sigh that picture is 100% out dated especially now vegas and joined then again once Seattle joins. 2) I was talking about US tv market. Canada doesn't get included.

And stop saying Seattle will do nothing at all about increasing the NHL national tv coverage. NHL has been wanting a team in Seattle since the 70's its a goldmine. It'll help increase the US tv deal.

Seattle is unquie. Cause its RSN root sports again covers 5 states (alaska, Washingon Orgeon idaho and western montana)

No current team covers 5 states. And yes its unique cause there is no other big huge major market in the pacific northwest in the US.
Seattle is the only big one.

I'm moving on. Since it seems there is no point in having to keep defending the region.

 

[Bookie21]

No current team covers 5 states.

Wrong. Vegas regional deal covers: Utah, Wyoming, Idaho, Montana and parts of Western Arizona and Western Colorado along with Eastern Southern California and Nevada. 8 states

 

[powerstuck]

No, you are way off. Just because they’re numbers you don’t want to hear doesn’t mean they’re not right.

And building a new arena for $350-400 mil is the funniest thing I’ve heard all week. That’s a good one. Edmonton got their arena for an astoundingly cheap price and that was $500 mil. Little Caesar’s Arena cost over $850 mil.



If someone builds an arena it will be, but the municipl and regional governments aren’t interested in that now. Heard some noise that the City of Kitchener is planning a ~10,000 seat arena but that’s not particularly close either.

Quebec City built their arena for 370 millions. So it can be done. Obviously depends how the whole project is looked over.
In Quebec, the arena was supposed to cost $400M...it ended up costing 370...for a simple reason. The mayor over looked most of contracts and kept publicly saying there was going to be no overages. Most likely that none of the involved entrepreneurs wanted the publicity that their part of the contract cost more than planned.

 

[powerstuck]

But where's the team going to come from? I just don't see the NHL expanding again after 32 and making the league imbalanced again. If quebec can't a team why would a TOR 2 get a team?

Plus there is no way what ever TOR 2 is going to pay that any one out west will pay seattle's price yet alone even higher.

Could it be that TOR2 plays in West ?

I mean Toronto used to play in west. Detroit, who is a mere 200 miles (arena-to-arena) played up until recently in West. I know it's not ideal but to ''compensate Buffalo and Toronto'' have TOR2 play in west as a slight setback and/or the price(read condition) to enter NHL.

1) Sigh that picture is 100% out dated especially now vegas and joined then again once Seattle joins. 2) I was talking about US tv market. Canada doesn't get included.

And stop saying Seattle will do nothing at all about increasing the NHL national tv coverage. NHL has been wanting a team in Seattle since the 70's its a goldmine. It'll help increase the US tv deal.

Seattle is unquie. Cause its RSN root sports again covers 5 states (alaska, Washingon Orgeon idaho and western montana)

No current team covers 5 states. And yes its unique cause there is no other big huge major market in the pacific northwest in the US.
Seattle is the only big one.

I'm moving on. Since it seems there is no point in having to keep defending the region.

I think there is two things here. NBC with its current NHL TV DEAL can and probably air hockey games in the Seattle Market. So in that way, no Seattle won't move the NATIONAL TV DEAL needle much. It will move it a bit sure, but not significantly to be noticed, IMO.

On the other hand, Seattle as a team, will be able to negotiate for themselves a rather good REGIONAL/LOCAL TV DEAL because the network that airs in the arena RSN, does so in 5 states.

The big difference remaining is that the league splits evenly the NATIONAL TV DEAL among teams while each team gets various REGIONAL TV DEALS and count it as direct revenue.

Its something you could compare to the Islanders situation. It's been said times and times again that their LOCAL TV DEAL keeps them locked in NY Region. But in a same way, if you were to remove Isles from that region, the NATIONAL deal wouldn't move significantly enough.

 

[Bjorn Le]

Quebec City built their arena for 370 millions. So it can be done. Obviously depends how the whole project is looked over.
In Quebec, the arena was supposed to cost $400M...it ended up costing 370...for a simple reason. The mayor over looked most of contracts and kept publicly saying there was going to be no overages. Most likely that none of the involved entrepreneurs wanted the publicity that their part of the contract cost more than planned.

A couple years ago now, and real estate/construction costs in Hamilton are inflated by being in the Golden Horseshoe. I don't think you can build an arena in Hamilton for less than $400 mil. A safe estimate is $500 mil, give or take $100 mil.

 

[HugoSimon]

I'm moving on. Since it seems there is no point in having to keep defending the region.

There is no point because it's a false point.

No one is expecting Seattle to be a regional team.

Pretty much everyone agrees it's a solid market as a single metro.

The regional influence is unknown and everyone and there dog is curious to find out.

 

[Fogelhund]

Well connected and respected multi-generational family, of Italian origins, whose businesses that you can see and read about, are not all of the "family" business.

 

[Jeffrey93]

That would not happen because first ontario is too below standard now.

A study was just done on renovating it.....$250M to make it a higher end NHL venue. You're not going to get something built in Burlington for that. You're not going to have nearly as many people opposed to it either....

 

[TheLegend]

A study was just done on renovating it.....$250M to make it a higher end NHL venue. You're not going to get something built in Burlington for that. You're not going to have nearly as many people opposed to it either....

“higher end NHL venue” is a subjective statement at minimum without some documentation to go along with it.

 

[Jeffrey93]

They won't get any more people than what they already have in terms of the tv contract. A new fresh market already gets more to the league than a market that already has a team.

The thing is.....fans will still watch the Leafs....and they'll now ALSO watch another Ontario team. I might watch the Leafs a little bit less, but I'll end up watching more hockey. There are always opportunities to get current viewers to watch more.

Your logic is so absurd though. I mean, I get it...and in theory it makes sense. But....following your logic....there is no better place for a business to setup than where they have zero current customers. How many businesses do that?
Yes, you always hope to create new customers.....but if this logic of relying almost entirely on new customers was the most beneficial....well the NHL would be in South America, Starbucks would be opening up locations in Nunavut and Best Buy would be popping up in Amish communities.

The NHL isn't mining as much money as they could be out of the Golden Horseshoe.

 

[gstommylee]

There is no point because it's a false point.

No one is expecting Seattle to be a regional team.

Pretty much everyone agrees it's a solid market as a single metro.

The regional influence is unknown and everyone and there dog is curious to find out.

One last comment. Look at our main RSN is roots sports NW that the NHL team will is more likely to be going on. That cover 5 states. Hence its going to be a regional team.

All our pro sports (minus MLS) has been regional teams. Portland is the only other city that has pro teams here (NBA and MLS). No one else has any professional sports teams. So the only sports team someone that lives in boise ID has is Seattle for MLB, NFL and the incoming NHL team.

oh btw 1k of the Seattle season ticket deposits are from people living in canada.

 

[Jeffrey93]

“higher end NHL venue” is a subjective statement at minimum without some documentation to go along with it.

Yup.

I've yet to see the study....since it was a $250,000 study and the City only pumped in $50,000, while the rest was private interests....I'm not sure if it is even a public document.

BBB Architects said they were looking at what it would take to make it a 'state-of-the-art facility'.

These are the same architects that worked on Maple Leaf Gardens, Ricoh Coliseum, Madison Square Garden, LA Forum, Rexall Place, etc.

And now vying to manage Hamilton's 'Core Venues' is the Carmen Group who partnered with OVG, they are the management group behind the Key Arena renovations in Seattle.

So, if you want to believe the $252M price tag the study came to was for a venue that rivals NVMC or the Saddledome or something....go ahead. It's a current study with the purpose of making it state-of-the-art. Of course....that price tag will grow as time goes on.....but it was suggested renovation would save about $140M over building new.

 

[gstommylee]

Could it be that TOR2 plays in West ?

I mean Toronto used to play in west. Detroit, who is a mere 200 miles (arena-to-arena) played up until recently in West. I know it's not ideal but to ''compensate Buffalo and Toronto'' have TOR2 play in west as a slight setback and/or the price(read condition) to enter NHL.



I think there is two things here. NBC with its current NHL TV DEAL can and probably air hockey games in the Seattle Market. So in that way, no Seattle won't move the NATIONAL TV DEAL needle much. It will move it a bit sure, but not significantly to be noticed, IMO.

On the other hand, Seattle as a team, will be able to negotiate for themselves a rather good REGIONAL/LOCAL TV DEAL because the network that airs in the arena RSN, does so in 5 states.

The big difference remaining is that the league splits evenly the NATIONAL TV DEAL among teams while each team gets various REGIONAL TV DEALS and count it as direct revenue.

Its something you could compare to the Islanders situation. It's been said times and times again that their LOCAL TV DEAL keeps them locked in NY Region. But in a same way, if you were to remove Isles from that region, the NATIONAL deal wouldn't move significantly enough.

It depends on how well the NHL negotiates with NBC and if there are other bidders. Right now its too soon to know.

I don't see TOR 2 playing in the western conference. I think the league would want their eastern time zone teams in the same conference. I just don't see the NHL going beyond 32 and expect to get high $$$ out of it.

 

[TheLegend]

Yup.

I've yet to see the study....since it was a $250,000 study and the City only pumped in $50,000, while the rest was private interests....I'm not sure if it is even a public document.

BBB Architects said they were looking at what it would take to make it a 'state-of-the-art facility'.

These are the same architects that worked on Maple Leaf Gardens, Ricoh Coliseum, Madison Square Garden, LA Forum, Rexall Place, etc.

And now vying to manage Hamilton's 'Core Venues' is the Carmen Group who partnered with OVG, they are the management group behind the Key Arena renovations in Seattle.

So, if you want to believe the $252M price tag the study came to was for a venue that rivals NVMC or the Saddledome or something....go ahead. It's a current study with the purpose of making it state-of-the-art. Of course....that price tag will grow as time goes on.....but it was suggested renovation would save about $140M over building new.

I didn’t compare it to anything. You made the assertion that it would rival anything in the league. Even though you admit you haven’t even seen the study.

Back in the days of yore when the hot topic was Jim Balsillie moving the Coyotes there there was an understanding that THAT arena could never really be upgraded to even meet the league’s standard (the roof would have had to be blown off at minimum) and we’re talking nearly ten years ago. That standard has changed since Little Caesar, T-Mobile and Rogers Place opened.

You can throw hundreds of millions of dollars into an outhouse and it can still end up an outhouse to some. Just with a lot of gold plated seats.

 

[Jeffrey93]

It depends on how well the NHL negotiates with NBC and if there are other bidders. Right now its too soon to know.

I don't see TOR 2 playing in the western conference. I think the league would want their eastern time zone teams in the same conference. I just don't see the NHL going beyond 32 and expect to get high $$$ out of it.

Anything can happen.

Seattle makes 32.

Suddenly a person shows up and offers the same $500M to get a team in Milwaukee, Kansas City, Houston, Portland, San Diego, or wherever else a multi-billionaire wants to put a team.

If the league feels like making another billion in expansion fees....they'll go to 34 (talent pool could handle about 48 temas). They'll deal with the person wanting a team in whichever of those locations.....then suddenly take whatever interest there is in the GTHA much more seriously. Because now they'll need it for balance....it will benefit them greatly....and they can justify forcing it on Toronto/Buffalo.

The NHL might not realize a huge value in TV $ from another team in the GTHA.....but a team in Houston might get them a bigger US deal. The Canadian deal would increase as well.....the new GTHA team isn't going to not have local and/or national broadcasts. It'd be silly to think nobody would pony up more dough to buy the rights to a new GTHA team.