How much will the expansion fee for the 33rd team be?
- Thread starter MMC
- Start date
Who says there will actually be more than 32 teams... Under a hyperthethical scenario it'll would be way more than what seattle paid to the point of you basically price out markets. Houston balked. Quebec probably would have difficult. GTA2 would really make it even more costly than it already is. I just don't see the league really wanting to split up the $$ even more to the point they just start losing more than they are gain.
mouser
Business of Hockey
This also assume there won't be any relocations in the meantime who knows what the coyotes will end up doing in a decade or even florida.
Trizent
Registered User
750M Quebec, $1B Toronto2. Plus expansion teams would have to pay extra to Habs or Leafs on top of that.
DudeWhereIsMakar
Bergevin sent me an offer sheet
And what makes you think there will actually be people willing to throw that kind of money for a team? Key would willing.
DudeWhereIsMakar
Bergevin sent me an offer sheet
Yes just cause we had people willing 650m for Seattle doesn't mean there will be people willing to pay even more for GTA quebec or some other market.
I suddenly don't understand the major appeal of Austin, though I'd love for them to have a team.
I just saw the updated rankings in the TV ratings section here -- and Austin is on par with Las Vegas! And of course, Las Vegas is small, around 40th. Grand Rapids, Michigan, follows just behind Las Vegas! Not the most prestigious of company, though I do hear good things about Grand Rapids nowadays.
Yes, Austin is maybe growing faster than even Las Vegas and may continue to for decades, jumping into the top 20 tv markets, perhaps, but won't that still take awhile? Maybe Austin is a better bet in 30 years, not the next 5-10 years?
Yes, maybe it's foolish to just look at tv market size; after all, isn't their city population over 900,000, three times Pittsburgh, St. Louis, and double the Twin Cities. But that's city, not metro population; those TV markets are much higher than Austin despite much lower city population.
Yes, even at tv market 39 or so, Austin likely has more corporate support and highly educated people than some cities much higher than them in the TV market rankings, but still...
Even Hartford is a higher tv markett than Austin! Maybe not in 5-20 years, but just pointing out some facts. Yes, I'm certain Austin's per capita income and education level is much, much higher than Buffalo, St. Louis, Tampa, etc., but...
Relating to Quebec City, there was a hand-shake agreement that their application, (as well as the application fee) would be deferred and was not actually denied. But does anybody know if the $500M expansion fee would still be honoured as well?
Austin was only brought up cause of an arena being built there that more or less probably has nothing to do with being an NHL ready arena.
The situation has changed since then. If there was a scenario that an eastern spot been open for quebec (via east to west relocation) the NHL could easily gone back to that application. At the time there was no guarantee Seattle would ever get things in order since OVG hadn't show up yet in Seattle for the key arena redo project at the time.
There is no way NHL would suddenly accept anything less of a fee after getting 650m from Seattle. So i don't think that 500m application for a team fee is valid anymore.
It’s all about location and market size.
would Portland or Milwaukee pay $750 mill in 5-6 years? Probably not worth it for that market. Houston market you can justify that price.
how many markets are left that you can justify that kind of price?
would someone realistically have paid $650 mill for a team in Columbus if say Seattle got a team back in the late 90’s over CBS? CBS typically is in the bottom 1/4 of the nhl teams in Forbes ranking of nhl team values.
btw houston already said no to 650 and that person has control over the arena.
I know. Just saying based on the size of the market that’s still a price that would be justified. But the rockets owners and the person controlling the arena isn’t interested. He views an nhl team as a business investment more than a guy who has the money to buy a team.
TheLegend
Megathread Gadfly
Just because Fertitta said he thinks $650 million is too much below the Mason Dixon line means someone else couldn’t say “yes.”
Or do you keep forgetting that three different groups were working on Seattle (at the same time) before anyone even heard of the Oak View Group plunking nearly $2 billion down to get in?
Jetsfan79
Registered User
Unless another group in Houston is building an arena on their own dime (would the city of Houston even green light something that competes with their funded Toyota Center?), that's a pricey proposition for an NHL team to put down $750 million in the future, plus $500 million for an arena, so a total of over $1.25 Billion.
If Fertitta sells then maybe the new group wants an NHL team. But, any expansion potential for cities with an existing arena with a primary tenant, there is only 1 entity that can put in a bid for an expansion franchise.
Seattle did not have an arena in place. So, they can have multiple bids. Same would go for another team in the GTA.
Places like Houston, Milwaukee, Portland, OKC, Atlanta etc. who have NBA teams controlling the revenues of the arena are dependent on the NBA owner wanting a team. Can an NHL team survive in a market where they don't control or at least split the arena revenues with an NBA team?
I just want to comment on this last part. As far as I know, the Coyotes are the only team in the NHL right now who are in this situation. Every other team has at least partial management rights to their arena. Strangely enough, GRA, where the Yotes play, has had a very hard time breaking even in the last 5-8 years or so, even before the pandemic. As a result, they may actually be better off without such rights.
But, in every other case, you are exactly correct.
