Wetcoaster said:
Ed Snider, Chairman of the Board of the Flyers said the Flyers lost money while the Flyer's President said the team made a profit for that same year. His explanation??? - two sets of reports - the URO's given to the NHLPA showing a loss and the Flyer's internal reports showing a profit that he described as "more accurate" in an interview with the Philadelphia Inquirer when asked about Snider's claim of losses.
Forbes Magazine forecast profits of $.3 million in 2002-03 and $1.7 million in 2003-04 for the Canucks. Burke indicated on several occasions that the Canucks had made a profit of around $20 million in 2002-03 and $25 million in 2003-04. That seems credible when the sale of half of the Canucks to the Aquilini Group was recently completed at the reported price.
It is a very complex set of negotiations and if there is to be linkage then there must be complete full and frank disclosure of all financial information for the teams and all there related corporate entities as was done in the other sports. The NHL owners have admantly and consistently refused such disclosure while pushing the now discredited URO's.
That's only confusing until one recognizes things like:
- the sale of the Canucks also involved GM Place
- the profit/loss of the Canucks NHL team alone does not represent Orca Bay Sports & Entertainment who put on concerts and other events that make money. It's only convenient to forget that these are two different financial subjects when posting on a message board and trying to combine them as one to pretend there is more confusion on the subject than really exists.
- likewise for the Flyers.
Like any accountant would when rationalizing a product line, the value add of a hockey team can only be properly assessed by looking at the true value/or lack of it that it adds to the business and separately from the business. There is no legal entity on the NHL planet that does that and so you have the UROs to do it for you.
Therefore, you have two answers: one for each question:
Did Orca Bay S&E make money ? Yes, with concerts and other activity they did
Did the Canuck ? Not like Orca Bay did and they’ve lost $46 mil according to Forbes since ’99..
Again, you have two separate questions for the Flyers. One for the entity that run the team along with other non-hockey related business and one specific to the Flyers. Both the Flyers and the Canucks, the NHL, Levitt, etc have explained this many times. The time you’d really have to wonder, knowing how they are structured, is when they didn’t have two answers.
Even without the Canucks, evidence of the reasonableness of such separation exists today because, somehow, without the mighty Canucks, Orca Bay Sports and Entertainment continues to operate, putting on concerts and events as they have done in the past. If they are anything like MSG, they may be making more money at than they were.