What's in Garry Bettmans Watercooler?

Sorry for yet another delay. That nephew of mine is commanding a lot of attention these days.


Just in case you didn't notice, last week the Anaheim Ducks won the Stanley Cup. Actually, you likely didn't notice because you weren't watching. This years ratings for the NHL Finals were down a full 20 percent for network televised games, the final game down 28 percent from last years numbers and game threes numbers(a Saturday game) down over 30 percent. The city of Anaheim itself was almost oblivious to the fact a national championship was being played. Yet a funny thing is happening, Commissioner Garry Bettman is talking about expansion.

Seriously, this league stretched itself to the breaking point cramming teams into markets like Nashville, Phoenix, Atlanta, Sunrise Florida and Columbus only to see teams play to half-empty arenas and have their TV ratings plummet. Bettman put his seal of approval on the removal of two teams from Canada but refused to sell a struggling Pittsburgh team to a Canadian billionaire in Jim Balsillie because he could have moved the Penguins back to Canada. Oddly enough Bettman may approve the sale of the Nashville Predators to Balsillie and let that team be re-located simply because there are no other takers.

The move into American markets and away from traditional ones in Canada and the northern USA has proven to be the downfall of the league. Rich owners who simply wanted to boast they owned a pro sports team paid out huge franchise fees(rumored to be around 175 million) to set up teams in places where the only ice people saw was in their glasses of Coke. Once the novelty wore off people stopped watching a game they didn't understand, so the owners started spending tens of millions on free agents to try and sell star power. The resulting salary explosion lead to the lock-out of 2004/05 and the current salary cap and one-way revenue sharing system(the teams that make money have to pay the bills of the teams that don't)

The fallout from the lockout has of course been the massive drop in ratings. The NHL has only one network deal with NBC, and it stipulates that the league will only make money if NBC does. Should NBC lose money, the NHL has to pay them back. They have one cable outlet, Versus, which most people can't find. Yet Bettman thinks we can have more teams.

And which city's could get them? Could it be Winnipeg, Quebec City, Kitchener/Waterloo? Nope. Las Vegas, Kansas City, Houston and three other un-named citys. Ottawa Senators President Roy Mlakar guested on Team 1200 morning show and said there were six viable markets in the USA and one in Canada that could have an NHL team. Apparently the local numbers are good, so good that a failed WHL market like Kansas City could support a team and that Vegas, a city even the NFL won't touch, could get a team. Suuuure they are.

Look around the NHL these days. The markets Bettman set up are pathetic. Teams in the mid-west can't sellout to save their lives, the Predators violated their lease agreement with the city by having their average attendance drop below 14,000 per game(hence the sale of the team), the St. Louis Blues announce 13,000 per game but have less then 10,000 in the stands. Even last years Stanley Cup winners the Carolina Hurricanes could barely sell out a third of their home games this year. The NHL is a gate driven league, and if the Toronto Maple Leafs are forking over nearly ten percent of their profits each year to pay the bills in Nashville it's pretty obvious no one in the USA is showing up.


Yet Bettman has convinced himself and other owners and team Presidents that there's room for more. Canada will only get a team if the Predators sale goes through and Balsillie moves them yet California gets more teams then Ontario. Florida gets two teams while Quebec gets one. Texas could get another franchise while Winnipeg has nothing. Mlakar insists research shows there are more viable markets in the USA, yet somehow remains oblivious to the biggest hockey market on the planet. Here's a hint Roy, it's that country you currently live in.