Jarqui
Registered User
DuklaNation said:From what I heard the Chicago revenues were $3M ($3M over $2.1B is immaterial). Immaterial means too small to affect any decision using the $2.1B revenue figure.
Wirtz probably booked a sale in a prior year for a lot more than that. Therefore, easy solution is to use more than 1 year for your basis. What other claims by players have actual hard numbers and facts to them NONE! The only way to substantiate anything is to do some kind of audit on the teams. Even the Chicago revenue number is ambiguous. How do they know what it is without a proper audit?
I'm pretty sure Chicago was audited. The two bankrupt teams (Ottawa & Buffalo) and two others in deep fiscal difficulty or transition were not. Chicago doesn't fit either of those descriptions.
From the post-gazette (via ESPN):
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/wire?section=nhl&id=1992467
Accused of failing to disclose luxury box revenues in former U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission chairman Arthur Levitt's report of NHL finances in February 2003, Wirtz was cleared of any wrongdoings by another member of the commission.
"Let me say without reservation that when the Levitt Report was done, it was ensured that all hockey-related luxury box revenues were included in the reported revenues," former commission chief accountant Lynn Turner wrote in an e-mail to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. "Unfortunately, the players have refused to accept Mr. Levitt's written offer to sit down with them and take them through the numbers. This has led to such uninformed statements."
The accusation was made by Penguins defenseman Brooks Orpik, who told the newspaper Wirtz "declared no revenue from luxury boxes at the United Center in Chicago."
All Saskin had to do if leaving out the Chicago box revenues was really true was sit down with Levitt on that one issue. Can you imagine the damage if Saskin was able to emerge from that meeting and head into a press conference to show those numbers had really been left out ? I'm sure the NHLPA can.
Can you imagine Arthur Levitt offering such a meeting if he couldn't back up his numbers ? I can't.
There's a good reason why they never met. Levitt could prove his numbers and the NHLPA knew it.