Sens Board Perspective- NHL Expansion Into Las Vegas

[Caeldan]

Virgin Galactic is working on that, but they suffered a major setback with their first test flight in atmosphere blowing up horribly.

SpaceX I think is still focused first on commercial reusable launches into orbit.

So I wouldn't expect teams to be traveling via suborbital launches any time soon.

Also, if you think the jet lag on a West coast swing is bad... Imagine going to Europe without the benefit of an overnight flight to help partially acclimatize you.

Then there's the tv scheduling issues for local fans.

It's not feasible really outside of major tournaments. So if the NHL ever did expand beyond NA, they'd be separate leagues up to the finals.

 

[Caeldan]

Expansion into Vegas is interesting, and I think Quebec is being saved for a relocation... Though that might be further away than some may think.

 

[StefanW]

It all depends on the rules and officiating. If the less-skilled guys aren't allowed to hook & hold their way to NHL jobs, that will open up room for skilled guys. But, you need to have skilled guys who have enough hockey IQ to be able to adapt and play with less talented linemates (in other words, are able to make their linemates better). Then you could easily see an increase in scoring.

But yeah, if the NHL decides to allow bottom feeders to be competitive right from the start by allowing tons of interference to level the playing field, it will be dead puck era 2.0.

This is true, but it goes deeper than that. Only a small number of guys have enough skill to score a fair number of goals at an NHL level. When those players are spread out over a larger number of teams then scoring drops.

 

[ZekeA]

Too many teams now.....................

Expansion Oh God no.........................................

Too dam many teams now too many teams chasing to little talent, now in the league.......................

Case in point is some team paid Brian Lee $1.3M that says it all..............

You all recall Lee Muckler chose him 9th overall.....................

Wonder what he was drinking or smoking when he made that pick....

 

[Busboy]

I don't think diluting talent is such a bad thing entertainment wise. What's more important is parity. Is anyone saying the world juniors are no fun to watch because they're less talented than NHL players? Hello no!

Maybe I'm in the minority but I don't watch games for talented players, I watch for exciting battles and the drama that unfolds when two evenly matched teams compete head to head.

The NHL has probably the best parity of any major sporting league in the world which means any team can win on any given night and teams can move from the bottom of the league to the top in only a few years (Chicago, Pitsburg, L.A., Tampa, Montreal). Would adding two teams to the league have a negative impact on parity? I would guess it would in the short term but would even out within a few years.

 

[Canadian Time]

The bad side of dilution of talent is we see more marginal players, and scoring drops. It is not a coincidence that the dead puck era of dropping scoring rates coincided with expansion from 22 to 30 teams.

I don't think that's true at all, in fact it's the complete opposite. The NHL added 15 teams in very quick succession from 1968 until 1979. It should also be noted that all these players mostly came from Canada as the league hadn't opened up to the rest of the world yet. It's no coincidence that the high flying 80s scoring followed this expansion.

The NHL was far more conservative during the next two decades only adding a couple of teams every two or three years. Also, the talent pool was starting to be drawn from all over the globe. It's true that scoring dropped but that has more to do with a few factors like systems (Devils introduced the trap), goalies became much better and the talent was more evenly spread out amongst the teams.

There are more or less 750 NHL players playing in the league today, the world can easily add an additional 75 players of comparable talent, certainly enough that scoring because of talent will not drop.

I am old enough to have watched the entire expansion live, the highest scoring era had the worst collection of talent during any other period.

 

[bacon25]

Expansion into Vegas is interesting, and I think Quebec is being saved for a relocation... Though that might be further away than some may think.

Bettman could get more money from expanding into Canada, so why would he expand to Las Vegas? I guess maybe Bettman is keeping Canadian markets open just in case one of his experiments bottoms out like Atlanta did.

 

[DrunkUncleDenis]

Expansion Oh God no.........................................

Too dam many teams now too many teams chasing to little talent, now in the league.......................

Case in point is some team paid Brian Lee $1.3M that says it all..............

You all recall Lee Muckler chose him 9th overall.....................

Wonder what he was drinking or smoking when he made that pick....

I hear you on Brian Lee Hated that pick ever since I saw his mug on the front page of the Sun (wasn't following prospects when I was young).

Re: not enough talent, it's debatable. We know that expansion waters down the league and brings more Greenings into the NHL, but by increasing the talent gap, more dynamic plays by the star players might occur. The KHL is an example of this. Even with the larger gap, the NHL salary cap would ensure that parity remains as it is now.

 

[Caeldan]

Bettman could get more money from expanding into Canada, so why would he expand to Las Vegas? I guess maybe Bettman is keeping Canadian markets open just in case one of his experiments bottoms out like Atlanta did.

I think the expansion fee money is overexaggerated a bit for Canadian franchises, because while you might be able to try to charge that much - how many actual Canadian billionaires or companies are interested enough in hockey to pay for it?

Sure Quebecor media might want a team, but I think they'd want to do it as a business investment - so a relocation fee is more palatable to make sure the ROI will still please shareholders.

 

[ZekeA]

I hear you on Brian Lee Hated that pick ever since I saw his mug on the front page of the Sun (wasn't following prospects when I was young).

Re: not enough talent, it's debatable. We know that expansion waters down the league and brings more Greenings into the NHL, but by increasing the talent gap, more dynamic plays by the star players might occur. The KHL is an example of this. Even with the larger gap, the NHL salary cap would ensure that parity remains as it is now.

"DrunkUncleDenis":

On Brian Lee just hearing the name makes me shake what a Muckler waste of a pick + 9th overall makes me cry...................

Heard Lee retired and was going into banking well way I figure it Lee robbed NHL teams his whole time trying to play hockey. So he should fit right in being a banker...................

As for watering the game down more talent wise I am Not in favor of it myself but can see your point about the better players should dominate more if the NHL expands..................

IF they do expand I hope Quebec gets a team back they deserve a team and they must be called the Nordiques...................

What concerns me if they expand is making more millionaires out of worthless players like Brian Lee that name says it all ...................

 

[bacon25]

I think the expansion fee money is overexaggerated a bit for Canadian franchises, because while you might be able to try to charge that much - how many actual Canadian billionaires or companies are interested enough in hockey to pay for it?

Sure Quebecor media might want a team, but I think they'd want to do it as a business investment - so a relocation fee is more palatable to make sure the ROI will still please shareholders.

Balsilie (when he still had money) was willing to pay for it, if you look back at what he WAS going to pay to have Coyotes moved to Hamilton it dwarfed what any of the potential owners were or are currently paying to own the franchise. I think Balsilie offered something like 200 million, and that was just to relocate the franchise. For a new franchise I assume(perhaps wrongfully) that it will be north of that number. Is someone in Vegas willing to pay that much for a franchise, absolutlely no! Quebecor has already stated they would pay to get a franchise either through relocation or expansion.

 

[Engineer]

With flight technology, that is the old way of thinking. In about 15 years a flight from Canada to Australia will take two hours, European NHL expansion is an inevitability. I am completely supportive of a global NHL presence

Not likely. People don't like the supersonic boom.

We had a supersonic passenger plane, the concorde.

It was French, guess what happened? The USA blocked it from flying over the states at any speeds above the speed of sound. Then there was the infamous crash, which led to its retirement even though it had 27 years of safe flight. There won't likely be another supersonic passenger plane for a while, and when there is, it likely will cost an arm and a leg to fly, as for example, Lockheed is working on a 12 passenger plane (the sonic boom is only 1% the loudness of the concorde's amazingly), and most of the other discussion on SST (supersonic transport) is private business planes.

We probably will have supersonic flight in 15 years, but not at the speeds you have in mind, and unlikely at affordable costs. But we can always hope SST is the norm in the near future, it would be much more convenient.