The concern shared by some is whether or not the prospective ownership group for the NHL’s return to Manitoba would actually step into the faceoff circle when it counted. Some even suggest that this group doesn’t have the money to do so, contrary to what group spokeperson and/or leader Mark Chipman has said publicly in the past. Some even suggest that an owner still needs to be brought on board that is more akin to riding a white horse as a hockey messiah than businessperson.The public would be OFFside to believe that Winnipeg needs a hockey messiah as owner. (But if he/she wants to ride into the scene, who would turn him/her away?)The news today is that the NHL’s bid price for the Coyotes is $140 million. This is most likely the auction winning bid being the highest in the end. Balsillie's $212.5 million bid needs to have relocation fees deducted (which according to Judge Baum and the Raiders II case is equal to the value of a Hamilton franchise minus the value of a Phoenix franchise). Then compensation to the Leafs and Sabres would also have to come out of that total offer. So you could say that $212.5 million is knocked back by minimum $50 million for relocation plus at least $25 million each for the two teams at a minimum. Using almost best case numbers for the Balsillie camp that leaves the creditors a total of $112.5 million under his bid. This works out to being roughly a season of Coyote losses short of the NHL’s buzzer-beating bid.Is $140 million a doable goal for Chipman’s group to buy the team from the NHL and move it with NHL blessing “back to Bannatyne”? Considering that the Jets sold for $67 million in 1996 without meaningful revenue sharing and a salary cap, that $140 million figure sure looks good compared to other post-lockout team sale prices. more »

It is very curious that on the very same day the NHL bids on the Coyotes that Reinsdorf backs out of the same.And on the very same day that Reinsdorf via the NHL was to provide Moyes a binding letter of intent to purchase the team from him, that Moyes beats them both to it and pushed the team into bankruptcy court in the first place.It seems to me that the Moyes-NHL-Reinsdorf connection are alot closer linked than whatever the media has dug up so far.Have we all been OFFside in thinking that these groups have been rivals reaching for the Coyotes?If not, then leaks are commonplace between the parties but kept from the media and hockey fans alike.Yesterday’s news confirmed many suspicions on how this auction is to conclude. Should the NHL's bid be more than Balsillie's then it makes it easy for the court to rule in the NHL's favour as no remaining roadblocks threaten to hold up that cash going to the creditors in short order. If the NHL bid is less than Jim Balsillie’s then the NHL has put the court into a very difficult decision. And you can bet that the court will take that into account when making a ruling.This scenario would show to the world that the NHL itself values one of its 30 member clubs less than the free market system does. Not exactly a great position to be found in for the NHL. Since we have not heard a triumphant bid price from the NHL, we can assume that they "lowballed" the court with their bid.Say the NHL ends up with the team, somehow. Clearly, the City of Glendale won't budge on substantial bailout of losses. Nor should they. This negative response was reportedly what led to Reinsdorf's bid being pulled. So who is going to buy and keep the team there? Even if the team was sold to them for $1? After all the free publicity that this story has generated, any interested owner would have come out of the woodwork by now. Even the NHL was trying to prod ownership bids to come forward during this process and clearly by their silence they failed to ride to the NHL's rescue. Gary Bettman's email shows how true it was and still is: that it will be hard to find an owner excited to buy a team that loses $40 million a year.Based on assumption that the NHL gets the team and this lack of forthcoming owner to hold the team in Arizona, the team will play this season schedule (lame duck as it is and has been now for several months) and then it will move next spring.And if you believe Gary Bettman's April 4th email, as negative as it was for the NHL's own face-saving, then you have to conclude that Winnipeg leads consideration as Plan B.No doubt there will be other cities involved should relocation be considered by the NHL. Winnipeg and Houston are neck and neck for the lead, followed by Portland then Quebec and Seattle. Here is a summary of the NHL's options for quick relocation and how they stack up against each other!http://www.manitobamythbusters.com/facts_figures/Market%20Analysis%20Quickest%20Reloc.pdf more »

Jim Balsillie, the would-be owner of the Phoenix Coyotes and Eugene Melnyk, the Ottawa Senators owner dropped the gloves in the ever-widening Phoenix Coyotes wrestling match turned blood sport.The fans of NHL hockey would be OFFside if they thought this legal argument would avoid becoming public and ugly.The 38 pages of Balsillie dissertation on why he should be an NHL owner was reviewed yesterday. Most of it seemed logical, straight forward and fair. Any hockey fan would agree with most of it. The document challenged previous NHL assertions that seemed rather weak in comparison at best.Airing LaundryThe document also spilled the beans on the last minute conditions added by the NHL when the Pens were to be sold to Balsillie. If true, it would have forced Balsillie to turn over arena negotiations to the NHL after just 45 days and be bound by the results financially or otherwise including a 7 year non-relocation clause.And of course it detailed the problems between Leipold and Balsillie regarding the Nashville sale flame-out. It is somewhat unclear as the $10 million purchase deposit may or may not have been at Mr. Balsillie’s option in order to keep exclusive negotiation rights to the Predators.Consider this talking outside of school on the scale of multiple hundreds of millions of dollars. If true, Balsillie has shown the NHL to be hardball negotiators and also very much in the right to “lockout” Balsillie from their club for making public their private dealings. If false, Balsillie is sure to enrage the NHL leadership and 29 other owners by his allegations. Either way, Balsillie’s decisions in an Arizona courtroom alienates him further from NHL inclusion.While it was an interesting read, very little of it will have any use in a court of law. Clearly Balsillie is also trying to win the court of public opinion by airing all the laundry from the past.Crooked Accusations . . . more »

Desert Dogs: The Straw On NHL Governors' BackHow many NHL teams are looking to be sold?How many NHL teams are looking to move? Or both?The public would be Offside to think that Phoenix is the only bird up for sale.The NHL works hard so that the public only knows part of what is actually going on at any time. Yes Phoenix is for sale via bankruptcy. But out of the blue the Florida Panthers, its' adjacent properties and rink were sold and there wasn't a hint of it before it happened. There were rumblings that Lightning owner Davidson wanted to unload the team. So that sale was more public. The Nashville situation was public and the public watched (much like Phoenix) every move in the bidders positioning themselves for it. Yet we knew nothing about the Wild getting sold before it came down. Naegle said that he might consider selling in the next few years, but nothing was concrete and no media thought it was worth running with than one day's news. Edmonton was public only because Cal Nichols and Katz's entourage made it so. And of course, we know now that Balsillie spilled the beans about the sale of the Habs long before it would have been public info.So as you can see only about half of the time does the public know which teams are for sale and who is actually chasing the purchase. The rest of the time we find out when the sale announcement is made.So my hunch, which recent NHL history shows to be true, is that there are teams for sale at any given time. However, when you consider the financial state of certain teams, there is no question the owner would sell it in a heartbeat if similar dollars were offered to them.The real question is how many teams are for sale and would be "portable". . . more »

Today’s news had this tidbit regarding the Chase for the Coyotes: “Reinsdorf has asked for a special taxing district to be created near the arena that would pay the new owners as much as $23 million next year, according to documents obtained by The Arizona Republic. And if the team were still losing money after five years, Glendale would have to pay Reinsdorf $15 million for each year of losses or allow the team to be sold and moved without penalty, according to the newspaper.”Does this sound so familiar! Getting local governments to cover potential losses or allowing the team to leave if they don’t! Yikes! Been there, done that!One would be Offside not to believe that Kharma has struck yet again!So if the $23 million per year doesn't keep the team out of the red for the first 5 years, then the local government would have to pay the Coyotes $15 million per season for them to stay in years 6 and beyond. So that is $115 million in the first five years by "volunteer" taxation on local businesses around the rink? Then in year 6, the city would also cough up $15 million in addition to this $23 million per year?? All for a team that draws few fans to games and no more than flies to its local TV contract. And if the payers balk, then the team can (and will) leave.The taxpayers, led by the Goldwater Institute, will be furious at this revelation for concessions for something they clearly neither want nor support. The Goldwater Institute is like cross between PETA and Greenpeace rolled into one nasty, save-the-taxpayer-at-all-cost, association. more »