Has their ever ben a more inept/poor owner in pro sports than Katz?

[Billybaroo*]

Since he has taken over ownership of the Oilers in 2008:
1) missed playoffs every year
2) 3 straight last place finishes (or close enough). On way to another pathetic finish
3) amongst highest seat prices in league despite putrid product
4)Gets City to basically gift him a shiny new 450 mil arena, in the process implicitly threatening Oilers to move (Seattle, Hamilton, Quebec trips anyone?), despite unparalleled attendance & prosperity 75% of franchises would kill for
5) in the negotiations with City, moved goalpost many times thus exhibiting character, in an effort to extract/extort more out of City taxpayers
6) continued on with horrific draft beer for sale

Cant imagine a worse owner.

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[Tad Mikowsky]

This is the type of things I was talking about in the rant thread.

 

[Seedling]

Ballard.

 

[CorpseFX]

"stuff sucks, i see through your lies. i will remain here because i have nothing else to do."

typical consumer culture attitude about anything-everything.

 

[Moneypuck]

Wait till he's entrenched in that new building.

#slumlord

 

[oilinblood]

his team in vancouver is doing fine...his business in edmonton is real-estate

 

[Gone]

Man what I wouldn't give to have Pocklington or the ownership group back.

Though Harold Ballard would be worse.

I guess, we just need to wait for this owner to 'pass on down the road' and we can have a winner again. The next 20 or 30 year's will go buy fast.

 

[Tarus]

Since he has taken over ownership of the Oilers in 2008:
1) missed playoffs every year
2) 3 straight last place finishes (or close enough). On way to another pathetic finish
3) amongst highest seat prices in league despite putrid product
4)Gets City to basically gift him a shiny new 450 mil arena, in the process implicitly threatening Oilers to move (Seattle, Hamilton, Quebec trips anyone?)
5) in the negotiations with City, moved goalpost many times thus exhibiting character, in an effort to extract/extort more out of City taxpayers
6) continued on with horrific draft beer for sale

Cant imagine a worse owner.

If you think any of that makes Katz the worst owner in pro sports, you haven't been following pro sports for very long.

The stuff you are listing has all been done many times, by many owners, for many decades

 

[Senor Catface]

Plenty.

 

[alanschu]

Ballard.

This. Someone like Bill Wirtz is also a contender IMO.

 

[Billybaroo*]

If you think any of that makes Katz the worst owner in pro sports, you haven't been following pro sports for very long.

The stuff you are listing has all been done many times, by many owners, for many decades

Really?
Where?

 

[Everest]

Katz hasn't handled the delicate process of an Arena deal very well. It is probably fair to suggest there are others who...hypothetically...could have done better in a similar predicament.

It also needs to be acknowledged though...that the potential for ugliness was/is overwhelming & maybe even a neccesity.

The aspect of Katz time as Oilers' owner I despise is the lack utterly laffable amount of leash/leeway he gives management.

That...to me...is unforgivable.

And yet...weve still had a worse owner here!

Pocklington sold our soul. Bottom line.

 

[Billybaroo*]

This. Someone like Bill Wirtz is also a contender IMO.

Ballard & Wirtz had the nuts to own their own buildings. And not to try & extort the citizens of their City by implicitly threatening to move every few months. And I dont recall them having 3 #1's in a row.
Maybe they had disgusting, grossly over priced draft though. I dont know about that one.

 

[Quinteoilers]

Since he has taken over ownership of the Oilers in 2008:
1) missed playoffs every year
2) 3 straight last place finishes (or close enough). On way to another pathetic finish
3) amongst highest seat prices in league despite putrid product
4)Gets City to basically gift him a shiny new 450 mil arena, in the process implicitly threatening Oilers to move (Seattle, Hamilton, Quebec trips anyone?)
5) in the negotiations with City, moved goalpost many times thus exhibiting character, in an effort to extract/extort more out of City taxpayers
6) continued on with horrific draft beer for sale

Cant imagine a worse owner.

Jeffery Loria (sp) the Miami Marlins owner, could take Katz to town. He got a 650 Million dollar stadium, paid for by the tax payers, then gutted the team and sent the best players to the Blue Jays.

 

[shoop]

NBA - Donald Sterling LA Clippers missed the playoffs the first 11 years he owned the team.

MLB - George Steinbrenner the richest team in baseball missed the playoffs for 13 straight years.

Interesting how both of these guys decided to open the purse strings as the got older and their teams became better pretty dramatically.

 

[Billybaroo*]

Jeffery Loria (sp) the Miami Marlins owner, could take Katz to town. He got a 650 Million dollar stadium, paid for by the tax payers, then gutted the team and sent the best players to the Blue Jays.

Yeah, he was/is bad. But he at least put together a championship team.
And did he often threaten to move? I dunno. Maybe he did.

 

[Quinteoilers]

Yeah, he was/is bad. But he at least put together a championship team.
And did he often threaten to move? I dunno. Maybe he did.

He used to own the Expos and ruined them as well. As far as current NHL owners go, Charles Wang gets my vote as the worst owner. Take a look at the crazy contracts he has given out.
I believe Katz has put to much faith in his "hockey men"

 

[Silver]

Jeffery Loria (sp) the Miami Marlins owner, could take Katz to town. He got a 650 Million dollar stadium, paid for by the tax payers, then gutted the team and sent the best players to the Blue Jays.

Yep. Loria for sure.

For now. I think very little of Katz as an owner (and I wasn't a hater when he bought the team at all) but he keeps surprising me.

Howson. Bwahahahahaha.

 

[KeithIsActuallyBad]

Ever hear of the Cleveland Browns?

 

[oilphan]

It is a stretch to say he is the worst ever, but you sure can not have much worse of a start.

 

[Slicknitty]

His ineptness has given us 3 cornerstone players to build a respectable team around, cool throwback jerseys, a new arena and other developments which will generate income for the city and people who work here, a good farm team and development system (nonexistent before Katz arrived)...

Yeah he's a bit of a dbag for the not so subtle threats of moving the team to get what he wanted but he wanted something and he found a way to get it. I don't see his team sucking ass forever with the core it has. Like the rest of you, I am hopeful his vision of a Pitts,Chicago tank model bears fruit. I am reluctant to stop cheering for this team...something really awesome about it. A lot of us are impatient. That's okay, though.

 

[CantHaveTkachev]

NBA - Donald Sterling LA Clippers missed the playoffs the first 11 years he owned the team.

MLB - George Steinbrenner the richest team in baseball missed the playoffs for 13 straight years.

Interesting how both of these guys decided to open the purse strings as the got older and their teams became better pretty dramatically.

to be fair, only 4 of 27 teams made the playoffs in baseball when he had that drought

 

[bucktown]

hes got a master plan. we are just pawns with wallets in his game, unfortunately.

everything will come together once the new building is opening its doors. easiest way to maximize his investment.

he tricks us into buying in on a rebuild, distracts us with draft picks and the fancy new toy (arena), nobody sells their season tickets, we continue to sustain his hockey business while he amasses assets, and when the time is right, he cashes in and we all fall over each other to get in the new building and spend twice as much on playoff beers that aren't northlands.

being nearsighted isnt part of a recipe for a successful business plan, its the slow play.

in 5 years, he will be seen as a genius.

 

[Tarus]

Really?
Where?

Jeff Loria(Florida Marlins/Montreal Expos) - Tanked the Expos, threatened his way to a 650 million dollar arena, promptly gutted the team before he had to pay anyone.
Pocklington(Oilers) - Sold the greatest hockey player ever to keep his house of cards empire alive, blackmailed the city many times, sold the Oilers to Houston, and is now nothing more than a common con-artist who was recently on trial for fraud.
Charles Wang(Islanders) - One of the worst run franchises in pro-sports
Mike Brown(Cincinnati Bengals) - terrible team, rarely makes the playoffs, Owner insists he runs the franchise himself and refuses to hire a GM
Art Modell(Baltimore Raven) - up and decided he didn't like Cleveland anymore, broke contract and moved the team to Baltimore.
Marge Schott(Cinncinati Reds) - Big time racist, hated her own players, once refused to pay for ambulance transportation for one of her players injured on the field.
Harold Ballard(leafs) - Legendary in how awful he was.
Peter Karmanos(Carolina) - Intentionally tanked the team after he purchased it, to justify moving it out of Hartford.

Those are just off the top of my head.

Tons of owners out there were blackmailing cities during the arena mass builds between 1980 - > 2000, inspiration for the old Simpson monorail episode. Many of those teams in other leagues did in fact move.

There are many owners out there that never made the playoffs, let alone championships. Still more owners out there who were flat out frauds and charlatans, ending up in prison in several case. The NHL has had quite a few of those around due to lax background checks.

Sports history is long, and there were some truly horrible owners out there, and that doesn't even touch on the European sports/soccer leagues which I don't know much about. Katz isn't doing a good job, but he's not in the realm of "worst ever".

 

[Six in O6]

Holy over dramatization. You can really tell the age of this forum when the kids don't know a simple history lesson nor even bother to look outside the world of hockey. He's a great owner, fighting for the future of this franchise in Edmonton. It's a business folks.