Who might be moving to Glens Falls?

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CHRDANHUTCH

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Mar 4, 2002
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Who cares if a team moved or folded? Bigger things to worry about.

it's a discussion, nobody's saying once the Phantoms do go back to Lehigh Valley as expected; that there's another franchise coming to GF.

WE like to know in advance btw, Gearhead82, because it helps to determine the history on who began where, etc.

what big thing is the AHL facing that we need to be aware of?
 

210

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Mar 5, 2003
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I am not going to go looking for some sports articles concerning minor league hockey teams to find something that says they folded. The Ice Cats do not exist. The Phantoms do not exist. The Riverment do not exist. The Iowa Hogs do not exist. The AHL Utah Grizzlies do not exist. The legal entities that owned those teams do not exist. What happened to them? Legal entities cannot just disappear? The get dissolved, folded, go out of business, whatever you want to call it.

The franchise license, the AHL's permission to operate a franchise, NEVER goes away, they just move who has control of it. The only ones that can increase and decrease the license amount is the AHL BOG and technically they folded the Texas Stars. They deleted the license under which they were operating when they acquired the Iowa Hogs license.

I am not going to rely on some sports writers to understand business terms.

So, that would be "no", you can't. And the reason you can't is because they didn't fold, they moved. I don't care if you are the Grand Poobah of Business, if you can't back up your contention that those teams folded with any sort of evidence other than "I said so" than your contention, which you state as absolute fact, is in fact false.

It's also not sportswriters, it's the leagues themselves. And I'n guessing they do have some Grand Poobahs of Business on staff...
 
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axecrew

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Feb 6, 2007
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210...not looking for a fight or the such but i will say this in tommy's defense.....he may not be the "grand poobah" of business etc....but I do personally know the guy and can tell you that his "real job" is to travel the world...not city or state or country....as a business consultant on job projects to assist companies in the start-up of their business and the building of their buildings etc. Truth is he has a degree in business finance and truthfully probably makes more in 1 month than you and i do in a year combined. Now having said that... I understand making money isn't knowledge, but his business degree and all the other is only a result of knowledge. That's why when it comes to business i usually just be quite since he knows vastly more than I ever could.
 

210

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210...not looking for a fight or the such but i will say this in tommy's defense.....he may not be the "grand poobah" of business etc....but I do personally know the guy and can tell you that his "real job" is to travel the world...not city or state or country....as a business consultant on job projects to assist companies in the start-up of their business and the building of their buildings etc. Truth is he has a degree in business finance and truthfully probably makes more in 1 month than you and i do in a year combined. Now having said that... I understand making money isn't knowledge, but his business degree and all the other is only a result of knowledge. That's why when it comes to business i usually just be quite since he knows vastly more than I ever could.

That's all great, but that doesn't change the fact those teams are considered to have moved and not folded.
 

Tommy Hawk

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May 27, 2006
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That's all great, but that doesn't change the fact those teams are considered to have moved and not folded.

I am not talking the license. I am talking the legal entity that owned the team and the team itself. There is no Ice Cats. There is no Peoria Rivermen. You can sit there and say they moved but if McDonalds in your town moved to California and called themselves Mickey D's, you wouldn't say "they moved". You would say the McDonalds in my town is no longer in business. They closed up shop and left.

Closing up shop and leaving is folding. This is what the Ice Cats did. Rivermen, etc.

This is what GF is going to do. They will close up shop and leave.

Moving involves moving employee as well as the team without a legal entity change.
 

210

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Worcester, MA
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I am not talking the license. I am talking the legal entity that owned the team and the team itself. There is no Ice Cats. There is no Peoria Rivermen. You can sit there and say they moved but if McDonalds in your town moved to California and called themselves Mickey D's, you wouldn't say "they moved". You would say the McDonalds in my town is no longer in business. They closed up shop and left.

Closing up shop and leaving is folding. This is what the Ice Cats did. Rivermen, etc.

This is what GF is going to do. They will close up shop and leave.

Moving involves moving employee as well as the team without a legal entity change.

Sorry, but until you post a single legitimate source that says those teams folded instead of moving you're just talking to make noise.

Just one legitimate link. Just one.
 

No Fun Shogun

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May 1, 2011
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Look, this conversation is much ado about nothing. 210's right. Fold means a franchise is entirely dead, like the Chicago Express. The team wasn't sold to another group or relocated to another market, it just closed shop entirely and no longer exists in any sort of form.

Relocation is a different thing even if the end result in the former market is still the same, i.e. no longer having a team.

What happened to the parent entity that formerly owned it is inconsequential. Them going belly up doesn't mean that the franchise is no more if they were sold and relocated.
 

Tommy Hawk

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May 27, 2006
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Look, this conversation is much ado about nothing. 210's right. Fold means a franchise is entirely dead, like the Chicago Express. The team wasn't sold to another group or relocated to another market, it just closed shop entirely and no longer exists in any sort of form.

Relocation is a different thing even if the end result in the former market is still the same, i.e. no longer having a team.

What happened to the parent entity that formerly owned it is inconsequential. Them going belly up doesn't mean that the franchise is no more if they were sold and relocated.

That is not a true statement about the Express. The license went back to the league who then resold the license. The license still exists, the team does not and, as you state, the team folded.

Your definition means that no team EVER folds. The Oilers had no team using the license so I guess the Roadrunners folded. Or maybe they didn't. But the Texas Stars folded. The license they used to operate no longer exists. So the Texas Stars Temporary Licensed team folded.

What happened to the parent entity is exactly the point. The legal entity that operated the team folds and sells the asset. The asset (the license to operate an AHL team) exists but the team itself was folded and became a new entity and a new team.
 

No Fun Shogun

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Valid points, but the problem is that you're making an argument that folding no longer happens, not that a number of the previously mentioned franchises that relocated folded instead. The first point is debatable, but the second is not. The IceCats were sold and became the Rivermen who were then sold and are now the Comets. That franchise has a direct lineage from Quebec to Springfield to Syracuse back to Springfield to Worcester to Peoria to Utica, even if they changed hands and names a number of times. Just as the lineage from the Kansas City Scouts to the Colorado Rockies to the New Jersey Devils is intact as is the case from the Philadelphia Athletics to the Kansas City Athletics to the Oakland Athletics. If you want to say that the old ownership groups (that didn't retain ownership of teams after said moves) folded, then that's one thing, but the franchises themselves did not.

Plus, if the status of a former parent owner is supposedly a critical point, as there are plenty of examples of teams remaining in a market after an old ownership went belly up, notably the Phoenix Coyotes and the Dallas Stars. These teams were sold, just as other teams mentioned were sold, but they managed to find local buyers. Other teams just found out of market buyers.
 

Tommy Hawk

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May 27, 2006
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Valid points, but the problem is that you're making an argument that folding no longer happens, not that a number of the previously mentioned franchises that relocated folded instead. The first point is debatable, but the second is not. The IceCats were sold and became the Rivermen who were then sold and are now the Comets. That franchise has a direct lineage from Quebec to Springfield to Syracuse back to Springfield to Worcester to Peoria to Utica, even if they changed hands and names a number of times. Just as the lineage from the Kansas City Scouts to the Colorado Rockies to the New Jersey Devils is intact as is the case from the Philadelphia Athletics to the Kansas City Athletics to the Oakland Athletics. If you want to say that the old ownership groups (that didn't retain ownership of teams after said moves) folded, then that's one thing, but the franchises themselves did not.

Plus, if the status of a former parent owner is supposedly a critical point, as there are plenty of examples of teams remaining in a market after an old ownership went belly up, notably the Phoenix Coyotes and the Dallas Stars. These teams were sold, just as other teams mentioned were sold, but they managed to find local buyers. Other teams just found out of market buyers.

The teams folded. The Scouts changed owners and location. Folded old team.

Just because the license did not go away does not mean squat because the license NEVER goes away. So, therefore no team ever folds, whether or not there is any direct linkeage to a subsequent entity and team. Even when teams merge the license never went away.

To me. folding is simple - the old team and ownership group does not exist in the same location as before. If the team stays in the same location but ownership changes, no fold.

If team moves and ownership stays the same, I am more leaning towards folding but will go with relocated.

If both change, old team folded and new team born.

The IHL folded so the Chciago Wolves and the other teams that went to the AHL folded and were reborn with a different license. Do you consider those teams to have folded? They still exist with the same owners, same team names, but in a different league?

And the IHL didn't actually fold now did they because the rights to the league and the licenses still exist.
 

No Fun Shogun

34-38-61-10-13-15
May 1, 2011
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That's nice and all, but you're presenting your opinion which just doesn't have a basis in reality now. The teams mentioned did not fold, as relocation does have a wholly different definition. You can disagree all you want, but that's not how any league, franchise, or major media outlet looks at the subject. Folding is simple... the franchise is kaput. Not with a different ownership, not in any different market, not even playing the game. The team's dead and buried and the only thing left of them is in the annals of the league's history or some nebulous license that may or may not be reactivated at some point down the line. That is not the case for a number of teams mentioned that still have direct lineages intact, even if they're nothing more than a footnote in an existing team's game program.

As for the IHL example, you'd almost make the claim that a merger or acquisition is more in line with reality. The Wolves, Griffins, Milwaukee Admirals, and others jumped ship from the dead league, so saying that they were folded and then reopened just doesn't sound right. Not to mention that the UHL later on just latched on to the IHL brand and trophies in an abortive attempt to stave off the inevitable before it too was gobbled up by a different league. There's a better analog between the IHL/AHL "merging" akin to the NHL absorbing the WHA back in the day, even if the end result in the higher level's example was a punitive stripping of rosters and even a forced renaming of a franchise (New England Whalers forcibly became the Hartford Whalers at the Bruins' insistence).

The argument you're making is that the definition of folding has become obsolete with the way that leagues claim to hold on to franchise rights, not that there's suddenly a broadening definition for what is folding to encompass things that have never been viewed as folding before. That is a talking point that is worthy of discussion and debate.
 

wildcat48

Registered User
Jul 16, 2005
4,273
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Portland, Maine
Not getting into the merits on the discussion because frankly I think its just silly and pointless, and yes I think Tommy Hawk is out to lunch on this. But, he's entitled to his opinion.

That said, the American Hockey League refers to the Hartford Wolf Pack as the league's longest continually operated franchise. That's a franchise that has been moved, changed affiliations, legal entities on several occasions, but the league nowhere claims it folded.

Providence Reds (1936-1977)
Binghamton Dusters (1977-1980)
Binghamton Whalers (1980-1990)
Binghamton Rangers (1990-1997)
Hartford Wolf Pack (1997-2010)
Hartford Wolf Pack/Connecticut Whale (2010-2011)
Connecticut Whale (2011-2013)
Hartford Wolf Pack (2013-Present)


Even the current Portland Pirates franchise has been continually operated since 1981 despite undergoing several changes in ownership, legal entities and relocation.

Erie Blades (1981-1982)
Baltimore Skipjacks (1982-1993)
Portland Pirates (1993-2014)
- Tom Ebright owned the team til his passing in 1997
- David Fisher/Chet Horner took over ownership til it was sold to 2000
- Portland Pirates LLC purchase the team in 2000 (Ownership included Lyman Bullard and Brian Petrovek)
- Ron Cain buy majority stake in team in 2014 and the team is now owned by Global Legacy.

Nowhere has the team cease to operate or fold.
 
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Tommy Hawk

Registered User
May 27, 2006
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Changing affiliations is irrelevant. The Bears have had many different affiliation but they have always been the Bears in Hershey.

How many other teams have been in the same location with the same name?

The Ottawa Senators were no longer in existence but now they are but with a different license.

A team that existed then doesn't is folded. They ceased operations. The Ice Cats ceased operations. The Iowa Chops ceased operations. All the teams that no longer exist because they were bought and moved ceased operations.

The only reason to call it moving or to have some lame "continuously operating" angle is to give the lcoals a sense of stability. The stability issue is why Bettman tries so hard to not fold and relocate franchises. Any league where there is an appearance of instability has a higher chance of financial troubles.

You can call it relocate all you want but the legal entity and the entire organization that ran most of those teams folded up shop and took their pucks and went home.
 

No Fun Shogun

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May 1, 2011
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What operations were ceased? The Rivermen season ended. The team moved in the offseason. The Comets started playing the very next season. Even with massive turnover in staff and rosters from changing affiliation, that's a continuity of operations and a franchise's history, and is something that happens in teams all the time in franchises that don't move, like when a new owner steps in or a management shakeup is initiated or an affiliation is changed.

Same with the Aeroes becoming the Wild and the IceCats becoming the Rivermen prior to that.

And, again, the simple fact is that nobody considers the examples listed as folding. You're just making an argumentative point for why the definition and application of the term should be different, but it's not in line with how it's used in reality by anybody involved in the process.
 

No Fun Shogun

34-38-61-10-13-15
May 1, 2011
56,091
12,752
Illinois
Heh, it has gone fairly off topic and the initial point of topicality has seemingly dried up as it doesn't look like Glens Falls is getting a team back at least next year, so this topic probably will get closed sooner or later.

Edit: and that time's now. A new Glens Falls topic's up with some speculation about the Heat.
 
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