Decade Denying Relocations Ended Today For Bettman

Local radio station CJOB with Bob Irving's sports report at 25 past the hour this morning ran an audio clip of Gary Bettman talking while in Calgary last night.

http://www.cjob.com/other/audiovault.html
Friday January 22, 2010 7am slot (scroll to 7:25 am)

As you know, Gary Bettman has tried for many years to avoid the use of the word 'relocation', categorically refusing it as a possibility UNTIL NOW.

Anyone actually believing the "official-speak" would include Gary Bettman's own family and those clearly OFFside.

Bettman made comments regarding the possible relocation of teams. Trying to do everything he can to keep teams in place, Bettman said that relocation might occur. Specifically, if there's no owners, for example for Phoenix, then the NHL will move the team because the NHL will have no choice.

Now this is as clear to most NHL stakeholders as the need for humanitarian support for the victims in Haiti.

(Please donate here: www.redcross.ca )

But for the NHL to move off its' official decade-long policy of denying any possibility of team relocation is almost a watershed moment in the NHL Commissioners' ruling tenure.

So why change now? It's only one man's opinion, shared by thousands NHL fans and media, but I think the NHL is "softening the shock potential" because the league realizes that it has to, to save face later on, when the relocation process must happen.

This glacial-like movement of the NHL on official policy just might turn into a flood gate bursting open once the first team moves. This may force the remaining nearly-insolvent teams to race for survival to find a safe haven like Winnipeg among other Canadian cities. To not join that race, leaves better relocation target cities to the other failed teams in a sort of "every owner for themself" frantic scramble.

And what skin is it off the back of the richer teams to allow these other troubled owners the only tangible way to exit themselves from annual revenue sharing cheques, paid for by the same richer teams? Yes that was a rhetorical question!

Players would stand to make more money as overall league revenues would stand to increase outside of potential relocations to Las Vegas, Kansas City and Oklahoma City. These relocations would be like jumping from the frying pan to the next frying pan. And that's no way to save your team's bacon!

Sponsors at either the national or team level would pay more for advertizing since more seats are filled with more potential customers for their products.

Seems like this future bursting floodgate is win-win for the owners, players and sponsors. But who loses?

Notice TV sponsorship wasn't included with sponsors? That's because the NHL national TV deal has evapourated along with the "potential" fanbases across a string of failed NHL teams based in the US. After milking $600 million out of ABC and ESPN a few years ago, the dream of a national TV contract is over. This was a major reason for pushing the NHL footprint across America over the past 2 decades.

Now that this driver is effectively gone, there is much less upside to various locales where NHL was warned that it would only hold a "fringe" status. To make matters worse than before expansion, these markets have demonstrated this "fringe" status for over a decade. The momentum going into these cities just like the US TV dream is rapidly becoming a nightmare. Unless US customers demand more coverage, Versus and a handful of NBC games may be the best the NHL can hope for on a television dial much more fractured with 500+ channels than it was 15 years ago. And that demand won't happen for cities where apathy is a stronger opponent than any team they face on ice. The vicious circle that is the NHL TV contract hope is now complete; much more worse off now for having tried and failed, leaving TV executives almost completely gun-shy of the NHL. Remember that NBC pays the NHL only out of profits made, if they are made.

Beyond those TV execs who bet with the NHL and lost big years ago, the only real losers out of relocation, as Manitobans know all too well, are the true NHL fans left in those cities.

So it seems that there is no reason for Gary Bettman to protect the weak teams any longer, as almost everyone has an interest to see teams relocated to financially greener pastures and hopefully icier climates.

The tide might be changing and changing hopefully in our favour, at a time when the dollar is high, effectively cutting the cost of purchasing a team and moving it to Canada.

If you have a differing opinion then enter the faceoff circle, down at the forum at www.mbmbforum.com

Chris
President, www.myNHLincludesWinnipeg.com
~ The Reality May Surprise You! Excite You! ~