Hard to believe to be honest given that Gary Bettman just came out and shot down the rumours and insisted the team was not for sale. I know, I know he could be covering it but I don't see him being so open about it if there was legitimate interest.
there was a clear twinkle in his and Bill Daly's eye when the question came up. And he could have been technically correct that the team was not for sale if an agreement in principle was already made or if ownership will change hands by some other means (related to debt?)
A summary of events (by no means complete and probably missing something):
-November-multiple rumours start to surface from a variety of sources in different markets indicating 1 or 2 groups may be interested in purchasing the senators.
-December-Melnyk goes off script at the game discussing attendance and relocation. Seems a little angry?
-December-Financial circles talk of Senators Debt being purchased by someone-melnyk calls it standard refinancing.
-January-more rumours, nothing surfaces.
-January-Anselmi quits, no explanation, no replacement
-January-Agreement on Lebreton arrived but missing piece remains financing.
-February-Melnyk self appoints himself as CEO
-April-Melnyk musing he might stay in Kanata
-May-Mierens, one of the families linked to Devcore's Lebreton proposal sells 10 of their 11 dealerships
-May-rumours start up again, finance related-more discussion that Devcore has some hold on Senators debt
-May-Alfie openly discussing "hope for new ownership". Greenberg commenting he'd buy into that.
-May-MBNA bank announces termination of relationship with Ottawa Senators effective June 30
-May/June-more rumours, debt owned by Cirque, pending sale, commentary in this blog that Melnyk has gone from 100% not selling to "I can't tell you".
On top of all this, we have a complete void and vacuum in leadership decision making as it relates to a number of issues. I firmly believe all the noise since november is one big pending work in progress-the silence may or may not have to do with NCC and Lebreton, I really have no idea. But I remain hopeful (because there really isn't anything else to cling to) that the sum of events are indicative of a pending sale.