Nashville sale thread--Leipold PULLS OUT of sale, Balsillie's bid OUT

[nomorekids]

http://www.nashvillepost.com/news/2007/6/14/sources_competing_bid_for_predators_in_the_works

A little late, guys...but it's a glimmer of hope.

Click to read more...

 

[Resolute]

Actually, this may set up a best case scenario for all involved. And right after I finished explaining how the WHL had the same scenario play out just two years ago, and that all was missing was a local owner.

The league rejects Balsillie with a promise of an expansion team. The new, local Nashville group takes over. Leipold is compensated somehow for getting less money on the sale. KC gets the other expansion team, since an odd number of teams is unruly.

Everyone wins. With luck, it will play out exactly as the WHL situation did.

 

[Metallian*]

Bettman won't let them expand to Hamilton....relocation is the only way unfortunately

 

[Resolute]

Bettman won't let them expand to Hamilton....relocation is the only way unfortunately

Bettman does not determine who gets expansion teams.

 

[nomorekids]

Speculation is that one of those involved is Franklin billionaire Todd Wagner, who reportedly attempted to buy the Stars a few years back.

 

[Ted Hoffman]

Nashville / Hamilton Possible Relocation Thread (part 2; NSH putting together bid)

http://hfboards.com/showthread.php?t=382886

If it has to do with the potential move of the Predators to Hamilton or any other city in Canada, put it here - don't start a new thread.

We now return to the discussion, already in progress ...

 

[toastman344*]

SLake :

I for one believe that the use of "NHL" and the team name "Predators" when used for the purposes of collecting money for a future potential "NHL" event is trademark or copyright infringement. But I also believe that if it was, the NHL would have shut it down already. I don't know...but what I do know is that Balsillie doesn't own the Predators yet, so I don't understand how he can collect money using the franchise's identity yet.

Hmmm...I guess if Nashville's still owner, Leipold who owns those rights ...expresses in writing that Basillie can use the Pred's name/ logo etc modified to read Hamilton if need be...for promotional/ sales / ticket deposit purposes ...since part of this useage is also related to their ( pending NHL approval ) $ 240 Million sale ...which has been entered into by both parties in good faith ...and if the NHL execs likewise dont complain about it...

Then there is no injured party here...No Harm= No Foul Eh ?

 

[Metallian*]

Irish Blues killed my thread on league-wide season ticket prices even though it had nothing to do with "The Move", so here goes again...

Anyone have a rough idea what the ticket prices would be for either lower bowl or upper bowl season tickets? A team to compare to? (Minnesota?)

thanks

 

[Sotnos]

The classless act isn't helping you guys garner much sympathy, that's for sure.

Karma.

I would like to address this from the other thread (would also like to highlight your name calling). First off, my post wasn't classless, but the person wishing Nashville would move because they didn't "honor" Modano was ridiculous. Second, who is "you guys", what makes you think I'm a Preds fan? Is it the Lecavalier avatar that gives it away? Big hockey fan like you should know who he is, no?

Anyway, that's great news NMK, hope some good comes out of it! If the team does manage to stay, they'll at least have a much raised profile out of this mess.

 

[GSC2k2*]

I am directing this question to gscarpenter2002 but others can chime in.
A lot of what is happening leaves me puzzled. However, I am hearing over and over that even if Balsillie moves to Hamilton he plans to build a new arena eventually.
Let's say for the sake of argument that he would be able to bring a team
to Southren Ontario. If a new arena is in the works anyway, would you have
chosen Hamilton over say the 401 at Cambridge?

To answer your valid question, fourier, the correct answer would of course be Mississauga. I remain thoroughly unconvinced that corporate Ontario will be able to convince their clients to go to a game in Hamilton. I have on this board repeated the example of what happens when the Canadian Open is played in a barely decent golf course in Oakville instead of a legendary golf course in Hamilton; for the former, the tickets are a hot commodity for us folks who get comped a fair bit, while for the latter I could have my pick of several people offering me tickets. THe only reason? Hamilton was too far a drive.

It is a solid 75-80 minutes from downtown TO to Copps in rush hour, in good weather. Anywhere in the north end of TO? An even more horrible commute. And that is now, without five thousand extra cars going to Copps on top of the traffic now.

There is no corporate base (by pro sports standards) in Hamilton itself. It is that simple. It is a paper thin layer of companies that are big enough to even consider dropping $100-300k on a box (which does not exist as of now).

Here is the thing that escapes people which I find most surprising. IF you are going to violate Leaf territory and either win in court or else pay a territorial fee, why would you position yourself out of range of two third of TO's 8 million people? IF you believe you will get away withotu a territorial fee, and you are going to pay $150 million anyway to upgrade a decrepit arena to merely make it barely standard, why not build a spanking new arena in Mississauga? Companies will take their clients there. Then you will be drawing on more like 6.5 to 7 million of the 8 million in the area, instead of the 2-3 million within an hour of Hamilton (not 8 million as some suggest). If you dont have to pay the fees, then you are really marketable. IF you do, at least you are paying for something tangible.

 

[Metallian*]

I agree about Mississauga (and not just because I'm from there)

Mississauga is clean, crack-head-less, on the GO lines, and also close to Toronto

 

[GSC2k2*]

BLS:

I was including the GTA and the sourrounding Golden Horshoe Region + anywhere In Southern Ontario...reasonably close to Hammertown...So Ok might be an hour drive + for some folks...so sue me .Still many would certainly be willing to travel a fair distance to see NHL games in Hamilton, which is only about 40 miles away from the GTA ( population 5 million , if memory serves ) ...plus of course over 600K in Hamilton...and that still leaves out another who knows how many K population in places like London, K-W Markham etc etc etc...So Yeah 7 Million in the GTA + Golden Horseshoe + points N-E- S- W. ...all within reasonable commutting distance...Certainly sounds about right ...and only 20,000 can fit at any one time into the ACC...so How is my math flawed ...wanna run that one by me again ?

Blase:

The population of the Greater Golden Horseshoe (which includes Kitchener-Waterloo, Barrie, Brantford and other outlying cities) is 6.7 million, or 59% of Canada's population. 5.1 million of these are in the Toronto census metropolitan area.

I have posted on this topic before. I will re-post for your benefit:

An hour's drive" from Hamilton is most of Mississauga, the KW area, Guelph and St.Catharines/Niagara Falls. At best.
Going by Statscan figures, that equals:

Mississauga (give them all of it, but see below) - 668k
Oakville - 165k
Burlington - 164k
SC/NF - 390k
KW (Kitchener, Waterloo, Cambridge) - 451k
Guelph - 127k
Heck, Let's even throw in Milton's 53k, although it takes Milton residents 20 minutes even to get to the 403

Total = 1,998,000

As for Mississauga, one might want to take into account that it is a very large place geographically. When I say "an hour's drive from Mississauga, we are talking "on the QEW/403". It can take 15 or 20 minutes even to get to the QEW/403 from MANY parts of Mississauga.

This "5 million/7 million people in the area"as thrown around here is and always has been ridiculous. It comes for the most part from the Statscan census numbers for the Toronto CMA, which is about 5.1 million people (which goes east/west from Milton to Pickering and north all the way up to but not including Barrie). As anyone will tell you, the idea that some of those places are viable for a Hamilton team to draw from simply defies rationality. It is time someone stepped up and corrected it.

Incidentally, I am stretching those figures favourably to include KW and Guelph. There are two ways from Hamilton to those areas: Highway 6 and Highway 8 through the countryside. Highway 8 is a bucolic one lane highway with an 80 kph speedlimit that I took to Cambridge for 5 and a half years. It was a 50 minute drive to Cambridge driving like a bat out of hell. KW is further still. The other way, Highway 6, is partly a four lane highway with stoplights and a 80/90 kph speedlimit AND where you have to wind your way for a while through a single lane little hamlet whose name escapes me. They are an hour that way in the absolute best case good weather scenario.

Edit: BTW, if you want to cheat and throw in Brampton, which is not an hour away from Hamilton, add another 433k

Also, one should include the 500k living in Hamilton itself.

Total? 2.5 million people living within an hour. AT ABSOLUTE BEST. Based on current road conditions, which do not involve an influx of 5000 extra cars going to HAM for a game.

Hopefully, that analysis should give you an indication of the real facts, rather than those who would blithely throw out "8 million peepul in the Golden Hoarseshoe!!!11!!", without even a moment of analytical thought (looking at you, BLS).

 

[kdb209]

Replying to posts from the other (closed) thread, Part I.

Carpenter, TV money is eventually predicated on ratings. Advertisers will not pay significant money to hold television rights for a team with weak ratings and small viewership. The concept shouldn't be open to too much doubt. Now the Islanders may have a rich local TV deal - I have no clue what their specific ratings are or what the circumstances surrounding that deals was- but I would wager that's not the case for the overwhelming majority of other franchises. When most US teams have viewerships that are many times smaller than those of Canadian teams - why would I have any reason to logically expect they have TV contracts that are appreciably larger?
The only other outlier may be local financial demographics: i.e. Advertisers may pay more for NFL rights in the US than cricket rights in India due to viewership per capita wealth... that would hardly be the case in comparing NHL teams. With the obscene amount of wealth in a place like Alberta (for example) I would expect our financial demographics and economic future are the most promising of any region in North America if not the world.

Bleed, that concept, while seemingly obvious, has never applied to sports programming. I do not disagree that logic would dictate a different result, but rights fees have increased for many sports, including the NHL (with one negotiation excepted), in spite of increasingly fragmented ratings.

You touched lightly upon a major issue that escapes those on this board who do not really understand ratings - demographics. In truth, both networks and advertisers these days pay little to no mind to the overall number; it is all in the money-spending demos (18-49, I think). THAT is the number that drives ad rates, not the overall number.

Incidentally, i am led to believe that the ratings for teams in their local markets for the regional sports channels are often reasonably satisfactory and at times impressive. In that context, national ratings matter not at all. The regionals only care about regional ratings; if they are good, hockey is a very valuable property, as it is cheap programming.

PS - we have gone around regarding this before, but you are vastly overstating Alberta's prospects and financial standing in the world. I know you disagree, so let's leave it at that.

gsc2k2, I think part of the picture that both you and bleed_oil are missing is the fundamental difference between broadcast networks and cable ones - subscriber fees.

Many US cable networks (including ESPN and the local RSNs) make the majority of their revenues not from ratings driven ad sales, but from per subscriber fees paid to the networks by the cable cos and satellite providers.

The mother of all subscriber fees is ESPN, which received an average of $2.91/mo from every single US cable subscriber in 2006 (~93 Million), whether they ever watched ESPN or not.

Thats why the Mouse could make more money by paying $1.1B/yr for Monday Night Football (which never garnered great ratings on ABC) on ESPN than it did when it paid $550M/yr on its previous ABC deal.

The same holds true (to a much lesser extent) with the RSNs. They get paid per-subscriber fees by the cable cos and need programming and 40+ nights of NHL games does a good job of doing just that.

 

[PhillyPhantic]

Columbus, OH (Columbus CSA <combined statistical area>) actually have a population of 1,936,351.

 

[toastman344*]

So none of those additional 5.1 million from the GTA...can possibly get to Hamilton ( Toronto to Hamilton closest city limits to closest city limits =about 4o miles ? ) for a game...Is that what ur suggesting Mr GsCarpenter ???

 

[Fugu]

Replying to posts from the other (closed) thread, Part I.


gsc2k2, I think part of the picture that both you and bleed_oil are missing is the fundamental difference between broadcast networks and cable ones - subscriber fees.

Many US cable networks (including ESPN and the local RSNs) make the majority of their revenues not from ratings driven ad sales, but from per subscriber fees paid to the networks by the cable cos and satellite providers.

The mother of all subscriber fees is ESPN, which received an average of $2.91/mo from every single US cable subscriber in 2006 (~93 Million), whether they ever watched ESPN or not.

Thats why the Mouse could make more money by paying $1.1B/yr for Monday Night Football (which never garnered great ratings on ABC) on ESPN than it did when it paid $550M/yr on its previous ABC deal.

The same holds true (to a much lesser extent) with the RSNs. They get paid per-subscriber fees by the cable cos and need programming and 40+ nights of NHL games does a good job of doing just that.

Do you know what Versus would get?

 

[Resolute]

So none of those additional 5.1 million from the GTA...can possibly get to Hamilton ( Toronto to Hamilton closest city limits to closest city limits =about 4o miles ? ) for a game...Is that what ur suggesting Mr GsCarpenter ???

Obviously he isnt. What he is suggesting is that the time frame to get there is a heckuva lot longer than you are arguing. The Flames can draw fans from Medicine Hat and Lethbridge too, but not a lot are going to make a regular trip out of it.

 

[nomorekids]

So none of those additional 5.1 million from the GTA...can possibly get to Hamilton ( Toronto to Hamilton closest city limits to closest city limits =about 4o miles ? ) for a game...Is that what ur suggesting Mr GsCarpenter ???

A game? Maybe.

Season tickets, and battling that 41 times a year? Maybe not. Especially when a lot of them are already Leafs fans and have no desire to suddenly drop that loyalty.

 

[toastman344*]

Well Toronto's like forty miles from Hamilton...Thousands make that commute everyday ! Hell my father used to commute from Winona ( far far east of Hamilton/outskirts ) to Oshawa daily...Smthng like 90 miles if I recall correctly...

Toronto to Hamilton is no Biggee at all...IMO

 

[bflohockeygirl]

So none of those additional 5.1 million from the GTA...can possibly get to Hamilton ( Toronto to Hamilton closest city limits to closest city limits =about 4o miles ? ) for a game...Is that what ur suggesting Mr GsCarpenter ???

No, what he's saying is that people who live in the GTA aren't going to drive that far on a regular basis to go to games in Hamilton. And he's absolutely right. People who live in a city/metro area are used to having things relatively close by or convenient to get to. They don't sit in rush hour traffic to drive to a city an hour and a half away to see a hockey game.

 

[kivaerijo]

If the sale doesnt go through by june 30, is the intent to sell agreement null and void?
if so and the bog dont discuss it next week, there would be no way that the sale would go through until after that date. new local owners buy, and we are in nashville for years.

 

[jkrdevil]

Well Toronto's like forty miles from Hamilton...Thousands make that commute everyday ! Hell my father used to commute from Winona ( far far east of Hamilton/outskirts ) to Oshawa daily...Smthng like 90 miles if I recall correctly...

Toronto to Hamilton is no Biggee at all...IMO

It would depend on what's around the arena. If there is nothing but highways around the arena then attendance won't be what some are expected once the honeymoon period is over, especially if the team is bad. The pain of getting to the arena for just a hockey game and nothing else (like dinner) well effect attendance no matter how hockey mad the area is. People will just watch on tv (or if the Leafs or Sabres are also playing they will watch them). Now if it is in a more downtown setting with restaurants within walking distance and such attendance will be a bit better (but still might be below what people are saying in the propaganda). From what I have read on here that would have to be developed but those things would probably happen with an arena.

 

[toastman344*]

just hockey girl

No, what he's ( gscarpenter 's )saying is that people who live in the GTA aren't going to drive that far on a regular basis to go to games in Hamilton

Well I would disagree...many many would IMO...just as untold thousands make that Hamilton to Toronto commute daily for work...if memory serves GScarpenter also said there was not much of a Corporate Presence in Hamilton...Nor potential interest in corporate boxes etc...Which seems a pretty strange thing to even suggest IMO...Hmmm better provide the exact quote

GsCarpenter

There is no corporate base (by pro sports standards) in Hamilton itself. It is that simple. It is a paper thin layer of companies that are big enough to even consider dropping $100-300k on a box (which does not exist as of now).

There certainly are deposits for corporate Boxes in Copps being sold even as we speak...Ok Scratch that...my understanding is that these have been pretty much sold out already according to TSN

Here's the link to the story...Not sure what happened to it...cause I posted it already...but it disappered..small matter

Link www.tsn.ca/nhl/news_story/?ID=210839&hubname=

Cheers Et Al

 

[toastman344*]

Sorry that link doesnt seem to work...lemme try again

http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/news_story/?ID=210839&hubname=

 

[Seth Lake]

SLake :


Hmmm...I guess if Nashville's still owner, Leipold who owns those rights ...expresses in writing that Basillie can use the Pred's name/ logo etc modified to read Hamilton if need be...for promotional/ sales / ticket deposit purposes ...since part of this useage is also related to their ( pending NHL approval ) $ 240 Million sale ...which has been entered into by both parties in good faith ...and if the NHL execs likewise dont complain about it...

Then there is no injured party here...No Harm= No Foul Eh ?

Based on Leipold's statement yesterday that at no point did he discuss relocation of the franchise with Balsillie and that he was "unaware" and "shocked" by the news that Balsillie had submitted a relocation application to the NHL along with his sale paperwork...I would guess that Leipold did not grant him the right to use the team identity for purposes of collecting deposits for the "Hamilton Predators".

But again, I think that it would have been shut down by the NHL legal department if there was something there. Maybe just maybe though they didn't want a PR nightmare caused by stopping the deposits and will simply address this with Balsillie at a later date...as in hopefully the BoG meeting regarding his application to own the Predators.