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Phoenix LXXII: Send in the Clowns

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Nordskull

Nordskull

WAITING FOR NORDS
Sep 29, 2011
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Saguenay, Qc
XX said:
On the contrary, the NHL is nearly the sole cause of this. Glendale built the arena under the guise that an NHL team would be the main tenant, and signed the club to a 30 year lease accordingly. The NHL, for whatever reason, allowed Moyes to place the team into bankruptcy which voided the lease that the city was counting on. The league then held the team hostage, with all parties aware that TNSE was ready and willing to take a team at any point. During this fiasco, Atlanta boiled over and the NHL's hand was forced. Do we send Phoenix or Atlanta? For the sake of keeping up appearances, and with the benefit of the money from Glendale, the league sent Atlanta packing. Now they've been forced to wait until a new market is ready and willing, which QC seems to be.

At no point was the NHL, throughout this entire process, forced to legitimately look for a local buyer. If you consider their moral imperative as a corporation (profits for stakeholders) then their actions to this point are actually rather predictable. Why sell the team for a discount when you can extract full price and then some from a new market? Optics be damned. If Winnipeg or QC had been built an arena specifically for a team, only to watch that team snake off, you guys would be screaming bloody murder. I think the league crosses over into dangerous territory, legally speaking, when they front buyers as legitimate (and deals as solid) when they have no intention of realistically selling the team to a local buyer. They managed to coax $50 million out of a city under duress, and this is somehow okay because the council deserved it?

Why should a city watch a major investment crumple before their very eyes because the NHL didn't handle Moyes correctly? Why should the city be coerced into giving up hefty subsidies because the NHL didn't do its job? Normally, a corporation would just write off that $70 million as the cost of defending their legal franchising rights. Why do you think the NBA, NFL and MLB were all hovering around, curious about the outcome? I believe at one point they even sent letters in support of the NHL. The right to dictate where you do business is worth everything. But when you have the opportunity to externalize that cost and pass it off to the public, why not? It's absolutely predictable, if you consider the amoral and pathological nature of a corporation.

I am thoroughly disgusted by this. The illusion that the league cares about the markets in which it operates has been totally shattered for me. It will be nearly impossible for me to support a business that conducts itself in such a way.



I'm curious to see your argument supporting the NHL (or any other business) in offloading costs onto taxpayers.
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You have to admit the lack of attendance doesnt help. I have no argument at all supporting the NHL in offloading costs onto taxpayers in this specific situation.

But on the 30 years lease thing, this is why I wrote I'd love to see Glendale sue the league.

They have a case? Go ahead and sue the *&? league. I wanna see Bettman going to testify. I wanna see him trying to convince a judge he is right.

Make no mistake: I don't like him, and I am using kind words.

I have no AZ law knowledge.

Screwed from the very beginning I said.
 
Confucius

Confucius

There is no try, Just do
Feb 8, 2009
22,587
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XX said:
This is absolutely abhorrent but it appears to be the case. You have to give credit to them for playing the long game so well. They had an easy out, should Glendale not cough up that $50 million. That bought enough time to get the arena juices flowing in other markets. I'm sure they would have sold to Reinsdorf, but once that ship sailed, we moved on to plan B. At any point during this entire process, the league could have cut the price and saved several of the deals. But they aren't interested in that. They want the $170 million, come hell or high water. If they have to trash a city in the process, so be it.

Without the CFD nonsense, Reinsdorf's bid was roughly ~$100 million. I'm sure there would be plenty of buyers at that price point, given the improved situation all around. I don't know how a city can take any pledge of support from the NHL seriously after this.
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On top of how big a subsidy from the city. As was stated a few times when this all started the team isn't worth 1 dollar without a large subsidy. You couldn't give it away.
 
Major4Boarding

Major4Boarding

Unfamiliar Moderator
Jan 30, 2009
5,432
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South of Heaven
If the League took a LOC/loan on the $140M to purchase it out of Bankruptcy, doesn't it stand to reason that it explains why there's zero flexibility on the $170M asking price? Potential purchase price and relo aside, I mean.

XX said:
On the contrary, the NHL is nearly the sole cause of this. Glendale built the arena under the guise that an NHL team would be the main tenant, and signed the club to a 30 year lease accordingly. The NHL, for whatever reason, allowed Moyes to place the team into bankruptcy which voided the lease that the city was counting on. The league then held the team hostage, with all parties aware that TNSE was ready and willing to take a team at any point. During this fiasco, Atlanta boiled over and the NHL's hand was forced. Do we send Phoenix or Atlanta? For the sake of keeping up appearances, and with the benefit of the money from Glendale, the league sent Atlanta packing. Now they've been forced to wait until a new market is ready and willing, which QC seems to be.
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I concur with the bulk of what you stated above. The question I ask of you, XX, is where or why does Steve Ellman escape blame for this? I agree that the League has done a piss poor job in majority but I get the sense, not only in your post above but a few others as well, that the chase has cut straight to the NHL and bypassed Ellman altogether.

Yes Glendale built the Job as the 'Yotes would be the anchor tenant but the arena was only a piece towards the grand scheme of things, a la Westgate. Ellman played Rock'em Sock'em with Scottsdale and they in turn told him to take a hike. Ellman didn't help his cause with his standoff-ish approach none either. To them the optics looked putrid. So various attempts to find other locations and behold, little ol' Glendale says "Over here!". Let the fleecing begin... suckers found.

Are you correct that the League does an abysmal job of consistent pulse-taking of it's troubled franchises? Absolutely. Atlanta was a perfect example. Don't let yourself be deceived however, that "For the sake of keeping up appearances, and with the benefit of the money from Glendale, the league sent Atlanta packing". It wasn't for appearances or Glendale's money.

When the bottom fell out of the ASG floor, you then had a franchise that immediately didn't have a home. With that occurence, the Thrashers immediately leapfrogged them. Clear back to 2004, Bettman should have been setting up residence in ATL to babysit ASG and because he didn't... well, the rest is history.
 

aqib

Registered User
Feb 13, 2012
5,302
1,355
XX said:
The NHL, for whatever reason, allowed Moyes to place the team into bankruptcy which voided the lease that the city was counting on

I'm curious to see your argument supporting the NHL (or any other business) in offloading costs onto taxpayers.
Click to expand...

The NHL didn't have a choice in Moyes deciding to file Chapter 11. He owned the team. An owner of an insolvent or illiquid business is allowed to file.

The sad reality is businesses get stuff from taxpayers all the time. Sears got a ton of tax breaks from Illinois because they had gotten a great offer to move their HQ to Ohio. I'm just curious why you think the NHL should take a loss on their investment to keep the team in Glendale as opposed to recouping their investment by moving it to QC or Seattle.
 
BnGBear1970

BnGBear1970

OopsICrappedMyPants
Jul 24, 2004
371
7
I agree with you pretty well across the board, and would've appreciated the transparency that the NHL no longer thought it was worthwhile to support the Glendale market unless it was paid to do so, however, there's one line...

XX said:
The NHL, for whatever reason, allowed Moyes to place the team into bankruptcy which voided the lease that the city was counting on
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Not to suddenly apply altruism to the NHL, but Moyes' bankruptcy move seems to have caught them as off-guard as anyone else. Yes, they were fronting Moyes some money to keep the Coyotes afloat until Reinsdorf could get his ducks in a row, but I don't think it behooves them to simply allow one of their owners to go rouge and use bankruptcy as a proxy to a sale said owner knew the league would never approve. If the league were truly as nefarious behind Moyes as you claim, the dog and pony show would've ended prior to last season, when the climate for the NHL became toxic. I feel bad for you, because Moyes was much more concerned with saving his bottom line than fostering the growth of the game in Arizona, but to believe that the NHL was the hand controlling Moyes to such a degree is a little much.

Now all that said, the fact that Moyes was approved by the Board of Governors speaks to the issues the NHL has with its owners: any member of the Rouges' Gallery has a seat at the table if they write the check, long-term interests be damned. It's funny how this situation rarely occurs in the NFL and MLB, occasionally in the NBA, and a disturbing level of regularly in the NHL.
 
XX

XX

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Dec 10, 2002
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BnGBear1970 said:
but to believe that the NHL was the hand controlling Moyes to such a degree is a little much.
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Where did I say that? They allowed him to place the team into bankruptcy through their inaction. It was revealed that he had turned over the keys to the league months prior.
 

aqib

Registered User
Feb 13, 2012
5,302
1,355
XX said:
Where did I say that? They allowed him to place the team into bankruptcy through their inaction. It was revealed that he had turned over the keys to the league months prior.
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eh I don't know about that. they objected to the filing but the court ruled against them
 
BnGBear1970

BnGBear1970

OopsICrappedMyPants
Jul 24, 2004
371
7
Fair enough then, and that goes with what Boarding said: the league is horrid at on-the-ground management. And as I said, the NHL runs into this problem far too much. That said, they didn't own the franchise, and I'd have to believe that if the league had an indication Moyes was going off the radar in order to cash in, it stands to reason that they'd step in before Balsille came sniffing. And Baum addressed the NHL's ability to prevent Moyes from putting the Coyotes in bankruptcy; IIRC, he said they had no ability to prevent it unless they owned the club in fact, not just in practice.

Now, as far as the NHL not recognizing troubled owners before they tank franchises, is there something to be done? In other words, how can the NHL learn from the triple embarrassment of Tampa Bay, Atlanta, and Glendale?
 
saskganesh

saskganesh

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Jun 19, 2006
2,368
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the Annex
QcBlizzard said:
But on the 30 years lease thing, this is why I wrote I'd love to see Glendale sue the league.

They have a case? Go ahead and sue the *&? league. I wanna see Bettman going to testify. I wanna see him trying to convince a judge he is right.
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There's no case. The lease was voided during bankruptcy court with Glendale's assent.
 

Puckschmuck*

Guest
XX said:
Yep. NHL wanted out of the 30 year lease, and thus out of any commitment to Glendale. Amazing.
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Not sure if you are being sarcastic or not, but regardless, I'll make my post.

Can you blame them? After almost 17 years of consecutive losses? If you were a businessman, would you actually believe that this market would ever become successful, regardless of "potential" that people may claim exists?

How many more years would you want to keep up the charade and bleed money?
 
BnGBear1970

BnGBear1970

OopsICrappedMyPants
Jul 24, 2004
371
7
Major4Boarding said:
If I may, I urge some of you to recall and digest this post by CF some time ago

http://hfboards.mandatory.com/showpost.php?p=54471089&postcount=734
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Yikes. That is damning.

So Moyes only went rogue in getting Balsille involved; otherwise, we would've gone down the same road with Kaites/Reinsdorf filling the void much quicker.

I guess the only question left is if the City of Glendale has a case against anyone. There may not be much against the NHL, but how about Beasley? Even if he didn't do something outright illegal, he did undermine the city council and damage an asset in their possession (the Moyes AMULA).
 
XX

XX

Waiting for Ishbia
Dec 10, 2002
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I mean, legally speaking, can you conspire to organize bankruptcy solely for the purposes of voiding a particular contract?
 
BnGBear1970

BnGBear1970

OopsICrappedMyPants
Jul 24, 2004
371
7
XX said:
I mean, legally speaking, can you conspire to organize bankruptcy solely for the purposes of voiding a particular contract?
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That's why I think the city's SOL against the NHL. The league can sit there and say that the team's liquidity had been exhausted and have a convincing argument. However, Beasley circumventing the council to help the league void an AMULA could be an interesting case.
 
ajmidd12

ajmidd12

Know-It-All
Apr 16, 2012
1,787
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XX said:
I mean, legally speaking, can you conspire to organize bankruptcy solely for the purposes of voiding a particular contract?
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According to my lawyer, one can sue for anything, it's just a matter of proving your case.

Problem is that not only would this be tied up in court for awhile, there's always the chance of an appeal after the verdict is made.
 
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