BattleBorn
50% to winning as many division titles as Toronto
I guess I'm not catching the December 2017 vs June 2015 dates, I assume you're thinking Seattle's application went in in December instead of February, but I don't think it matters much. Just providing a reference.Can't compare vegas' timeline with Seattle's timeline since the expansion process started in december 2017 vs jun 2015 for vegas.
So a December 2018 announcement would put it a year since process start in vegas terms that was jun 2016.
Also Seattle is on a very very advance timeline.
The only logical reason I can see for an "advanced timeline" was getting the city council on board with the Key renovation. Now that we know there's a waiver option and that Mayor Durkan will be at the presentation, I don't think that's in play anymore.
Outside of that, you can't advance the timeline too much because Seattle doesn't have an arena until Summer/Fall 2020 if things go well.
Most people are working forward from the application to get a December timeline for a Seattle vote. I'm working backward from the optimistic 2020-2021 start of play for a summer of next year vote, which just happens to coincide with what happened in Las Vegas.
Further, a summer 2019 vote/announcement would give the league an additional six months-plus to see progress on KeyArena once work starts under the waiver, as well as getting a little closer to the potential 2020-2021 lockout, which is likely a determining factor in when Seattle would start play. I don't think the league would want to have an expansion team's inaugural season be a labor dispute shortened season.
That doesn't even touch on the potential that NHL governors would likely be very likely to resist giving the 32nd team even more time to prepare for an expansion draft than they gave the Golden Knights, who wound up winning the Western Conference in their inaugural season.