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Post by subwayscoundrel on Jan 8, 2009 19:26:39 GMT -5
That's sick! Usually when I get NHL Tickets, I have to go through "Stubhub". I end up paying 2X what the normal ticket value is........unless I go to Atlanta! That's outrages! Simply ....mind warping to say the least! Eg. Anaheim: Face Value $80.00 I paid $150.00 each Minnesota: Face Value $75.00 I paid $140.00 each What's happening in Atlanta is amazing..how much longer can they AND OTHERS hold out~ I went to an Anahiem game and paid cost and I could have got it a lot cheaper in the parking lot. What I hear is there are tickets available with some planning at some/many Wild games. I paid $200 CND for a $140 CND ticket in Montreal 6 weeks ago Nothing against Stub Hub but I usually find other outlets to buy cheaper tickets.
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Post by jhendrix70 on Jan 8, 2009 19:57:57 GMT -5
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Post by jhendrix70 on Jan 14, 2009 19:53:21 GMT -5
I'm sick and tired of people telling me: "Well, the reason why there is nobody there at the start of the game is because of traffic.....etc.." JAN.14th/2009 Ottawa AT Atlanta ( game on currently )
Puck just about to drop......
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Post by TheDeuce on Jan 14, 2009 20:01:21 GMT -5
I'm sick and tired of people telling me: "Well, the reason why there is nobody there at the start of the game is because of traffic.....etc.." JAN.14th/2009 Ottawa AT Atlanta ( game on currently )
Puck just about to drop......Did you hear one of the commentators say "all those empty seats are because the Thrasher are in the basement in the standings"? Wow, I thought it was because the sunbelt was a crappy hockey market. m.
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Post by teemu13 on Jan 14, 2009 20:15:57 GMT -5
If the MTS Centre looked like that for a MOOSE game, we'd be embarrassed!!!
That is pathetic!!!!! I am also watching this game, just to see if there are unusually long line-ups at the washrooms, concessions, or to get into the PARKING LOT.
NOPE... I think what you see (above) is what you get!
BRUTAL!
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Post by TheDeuce on Jan 14, 2009 20:22:30 GMT -5
If the MTS Centre looked like that for a MOOSE game, we'd be embarrassed!!! That is pathetic!!!!! I am also watching this game, just to see if there are unusually long line-ups at the washrooms, concessions, or to get into the PARKING LOT. Yep, the lineup is all the way out the door and on to the streets. Oh wait, that's not Thrasher fans - it's their creditors! m.
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Post by jhendrix70 on Jan 14, 2009 20:28:39 GMT -5
Must be a blizzard.....
I do like however how Pierre has made references multiple times regarding the size of the crowd:
"Wow, not many people to watch these guys, this must be hard......really hard......."
"You can hear the players talking from up here.........."
"You have to wonder; looking around at this crowd, how much longer might they have here..."
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Post by djk on Jan 14, 2009 21:05:38 GMT -5
The lower bowl is fuller now but the TV shots of the upper bowl are so dark you can't see if anyone is there. I wonder if that is on purpose.
Anyway the building is so quiet that the players on ice can easily and clearly be heard on TV.
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Post by jhendrix70 on Jan 14, 2009 21:20:27 GMT -5
Yes, the Wide Shots are dark however; there is NOBODY ( i'm serious ) in the upperdecks! Nobody!
They are more than likely doing what the NHL always lets arenas do: Let people move down after the first period to empty seats so when showing highlights, it looks like they have a good crowd!
Wait for another wide-pan. Hopefully someone might be able to capture it! I can't as I am already running late for a hockey game!
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Post by dbp1990 on Jan 14, 2009 22:30:34 GMT -5
ABSOLUTE JOKE!
Atlanta almost 30 years after the Flames left and a 2nd chance, FAIL!
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Post by razorsedge on Jan 18, 2009 13:36:40 GMT -5
The Thrashers, meanwhile, are a bottom feeder in the NHL, ranked 28th in a 30-team league. On top of that, the team’s payroll is $44 million, just above the NHL’s minimum required payroll of $40.7 million.
The judge will not rule on who, by name, will own the teams. But after the buyout process is resolved and the legal feuding ceases, the fate of the Thrashers eventually may hang in the balance. Unlike the Hawks, the Thrashers are not tied to a 30-year bond payment-agreement for Philips Arena and could be moved.www.ajc.com/business/content/business/stories/2009/01/18/atlanta_spirit_dispute.html
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Post by scottie65 on Jan 18, 2009 14:27:20 GMT -5
Good find Razor
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Post by scottie65 on Feb 1, 2009 14:27:05 GMT -5
Hawks, Thrashers have lost $174M since 2002-03By KRISTI E. SWARTZ The Atlanta Journal-Constitution Wednesday, January 28, 2009 The Hawks and Thrashers have lost nearly $174 million since the 2002-2003 seasons, including more than $50 million in the last two years, according to court documents associated with an ongoing feud between the teams’ eight owners. The group, known as the Atlanta Spirit, bought the teams and Philips Arena operating rights from Turner Broadcasting System in 2004. The teams and the arena lost $48.9 million in the 2002-03 season; $37.3 million in 2003-04; $12.5 million in 2004-05; $24.8 million in 2005-06; $27.2 million in 2006-07; and $23.1 million in 2007-08. “That’s a lot of losses,” said Bill Sutton, professor and associate department head of the DeVos Sport Business Program at the University of Central Florida. “I don’t know if there’s a context for $174 million worth of losses.” Michael Gearon Jr., the group’s representative to the NBA, was unavailable to comment. Bruce Levenson, the group’s representative to the NHL, did not return phone calls seeking comment. The Spirit has been embroiled in a high-profile lawsuit that has dragged on for more than three years. Seven of the owners — based in Atlanta and Washington, D.C. — want to buy out Boston-based partner Steve Belkin. They haven’t been able to agree on a process or a price. A trial to resolve the issue is scheduled to begin Feb. 17 in Montgomery County, Md. “In this case, the ownership issue overwhelms everything else. That’s not a way to run a franchise … to have a consensus is difficult,” said Sutton, former vice president of team marketing with the National Basketball Association. “I’m sure you can say nobody’s happy because nobody wants to bleed that much.” Whoever ends up controlling the Hawks and Thrashers faces a number of issues around how long the teams can sustain those losses. The teams’ losses are listed in a footnote as part of a pretrial statement filed last week by lawyers representing the seven partners. Attorneys did not return calls seeking comment. The NBA does not comment on a specific team’s financial information. The teams may be losing more than the figures show. The numbers include income from the operating rights to Philips Arena, which has been turning a profit during those years. Philips’ naming rights contract calls for the company to pay $9.3 million a year through 2019. A Philips spokesman declined to confirm or discuss the financial arrangements. The Spirit bought the teams and arena operating rights from Turner in March 2004. Rather than having a single managing partner, the Spirit shares voting power equally among three subsets of owners: Atlanta-based partners Michael Gearon Jr., Michael Gearon Sr., Rutherford Seydel and Beau Turner; Washington-based partners Bruce Levenson, Ed Peskowitz and Todd Foreman; and the Boston-based Belkin. The Gearons have been longtime family friends of Turner Broadcasting founder Ted Turner, who was the vice chairman of the company’s parent, Time Warner, at the time of the sale. Beau Turner is his son, and Rutherford Seydel is his son-in-law. Seven of the eight Atlanta Spirit members have made nine cash infusions since they agreed to buy the Hawks and Thrashers , according to court documents. www.ajc.com/sports/content/sports/stories/2009/01/28/hawks_thrashers.html
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Post by wagner3 on Feb 10, 2009 15:22:00 GMT -5
some lower level seats are being sold at a huge discount for the rest of the season...$30...in this promotion... if you buy the 16 remaining games @ $30 x 16 = $480 but, that's not all, you actually get a refund of 50% of your ticket cost to purchase tickets next year...so your actual price for lower bowl seats this year is $15!!! thrashers.nhl.com/team/app/?service=page&page=NHLPage&id=29771
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Post by Smokie on Oct 4, 2009 17:13:39 GMT -5
Add to favorites Examiner Bio Thrashers moving to Hamilton ... yeah right ... and I'm dating Elisha Cuthbert May 10, 5:04 AMAtlanta Thrashers ExaminerPhil FoleyPrevious Next 14 comments Print Email RSS Subscribe Subscribe
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Any day I can sneak in a photo of Elisha Cuthbert into a Thrashers piece is a good day. (AP Photo/ Stuart Ramson)ATLANTA (Examiner.com) -- “Group wants to move Atlanta Thrashers to Hamilton,” screamed the local Canadian newspaper of the Ontario city of 505,000.
Wow, another headline of many in the Hamilton Spectator leading the effort to bring hockey to a town that will appear to do anything to get a team of its own.
The newspaper goes on to reveal that the esteemed mayor of Hamilton is going to meet with a second group that wants to relocate a Sun Belt hockey franchise to their town.
That group, according to “sources” is lead by Vancouver developer Tom Gaglardi.
His claim to fame? He tried to buy the Vancouver Canucks a few years ago and owns the Kamloops Blazers of the Western Hockey League.
Yep, this guy is going to buy the Thrashers, move them from the eighth largest television market in the US to a market one-eighth of its size and have the deal done for the 2010-11 campaign.
And I have a this nice bridge I’d like to sell you in Brooklyn. I own it, really. It’s got a great view of lower Manhattan. Any takers? It’s going fast.
If you also believe that, I have a hot date with Elisha Cuthbert next week, too. (Heck, I don’t care about sloppy seconds).
Yeah right. Her heart is taken by a guy a lot younger and richer than I.
Sorry Mr. Gaglardi, you can’t move something you don’t have either.
And last time I checked, that “For Sale” sign has not been put up on the Thrashers just yet.
I broached the subject with Atlanta Spirit co-owner Michael Gearon, Jr. after the Atlanta Hawks disappointing 97-82 loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers on Saturday night.
He had no comment for the record and referred me to General Manager Don Waddell. I will reach out to him through the proper channels over the next few days.
As to what privately may or may not have been said, let’s just say I am not waiting for Don’s response before posting this blog entry.
I don’t care what the hype is about the so-called Sun Belt teams bolting for the cold of Canada’s ninth-largest metropolitan area.
The Thrashers aren’t leaving anytime soon.
Here are 10 reasons why:
1) Let me say it again: the Thrashers are just not for sale. Nor can they be right now. The nine owners can’t agree on whether to order Chinese or Italian in for lunch or what the team is worth to buy out renegade partner Steve Belkin. Do you really expect them to be able to agree to sell the team to anyone until the legal saga is settled?
Seriously? The same group of fueding owners who couldn’t agree on whether to trade for Joe Johnson?
2) Hamilton? Why not just move to Akron, Ohio instead? I don’t care how much fervor and passion Canadians have for the sport of hockey, but Hamilton is not a big market. In fact, if placed in the United States, Hamilton’s metropolitan area would rank 73rd overall behind such “major league” towns like Columbia, South Carolina, Baton Rouge, Louisiana and Rochester, New York.
Do the economics really work? You’re going from a metropolitan area with a population of 5,376,285 to one of just under 700,000. Akron, Ohio is similar in size. Would you seriously consider moving a team to Akron?
If you’re going to move a franchise, why not at least to Las Vegas, Houston, Seattle or Portland? All those markets boast well over 1.8 million people, a large corporate base and, with the exception of Sin City, a world-class sporting venue that is as good or better than Hamilton's Copps Coliseum.
3) Coyote ugly. Let’s face it, the Phoenix Coyotes are in a lot worse shape than the Thrashers. If any team is destined to move to some tiny town in Canada, it’s the Coyotes. NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman’s arch-nemesis Jim Balsillie – you know the Blackberry guy – has plenty of money and a score to settle with the commish for not letting him move the Nashville Predators to Hamilton. (My money is still on Bettman in that one).
4) It’d be a nightmare on Marietta Street. Untangling the Thrashers from the Atlanta Hawks and the Philips Arena operating rights would be troublesome for the Atlanta Spirit almost to the point of being economic suicide.
5) It’s all about the name “P-H-I-L-I-P-S.” There are $9.25 million very good reasons why the Thrashers are staying here.
When the arena was completed in time for the 1999-2000 campaign, Royal Philips Electronics signed a 20-year, $185 million naming rights deal. The Thrashers and Hawks are required to both play in the arena or Philips can walk away.
Gee, do you think they would bolt in this economy?
Finding a replacement won't be easy.
The Washington Nationals still haven’t synergized with a corporate partner for their new ballpark. (They still haven’t found a way to win yet either).
The Miami Dolphins signed a one-year deal to name their digs Land Shark Stadium (a terrible beer by the way).
Simply put, that market ain’t what it used to be.
6) What will Brown Do? The Atlanta Spirit’s other signature corporate partners: Delta, Home Depot, UPS, etc. will most likely be able to weasel out of their sponsorships, which again were signed at the height of the sponsorship boom. Good luck finding corporations willing to fork over similar monies in this economy.
7) Living in the lap of luxury. Philips Arena has a ton of luxury boxes that are under long-term leases to corporations, which were entered into during the boom times at the turn of the millennium. Most of those leases were signed for -- you guessed it -- both the Hawks and the Thrashers. Lose the Thrashers, you may give belt-tightening corporations a chance to get out of the deal and save some ducats.
8) Fill that operational void. Keep in mind that the Atlanta Spirit not only owns the Hawks and the Thrashers, but they also own the operating rights to Philips Arena (a great way to claim that your hockey and basketball teams are losing money by the way).
Lose the Thrashers and you lose 45-50 dates on that schedule, forego rent, concessions and parking, etc. on those days. That’s a lot of Miley Cyrus concerts. There aren’t enough tweens out there to make that model work.
9) The Thrashers are not the Flames. Yes, the Thrashers average attendance of 14,626 was worse than any team not named the New York Islanders in the 2008-09 campaign. However, the Atlanta Flames woes were much worse.
The Omni, which housed the Flames from 1972-1980 sat 17,000 people. The arena did not have the revenue generating luxury suites that Philips does, nor did the team have a local TV contract to rely upon. The Thrashers have the benefit of both.
Attendance sagged for the Flames and Tom Cousins, the real-estate mogul owner of the team, sold it to the Canadian consortium for $16 million, double what any local group was willing to pay for the club.
10) Gary Bettman won’t let it happen. It was Bettman’s pet project to expand the league to the Sun Belt and there’s no way Mr. Bettman will let his experiment go awry, just yet.
Phoenix is in turmoil and litigation abounds as to whether the team’s owner had the authority to declare bankruptcy in an end-around attempt to move the franchise to Canada. However, the league has put the kibosh on any relocation request since the Hartford Whalers became the Carolina Hurricanes in the 1997-98 campaign and has come out swinging against the Coyotes.
Bettman gave the following test for any likely future team relocation to Hockey Night in Canada Radio (as reported by Yahoo Sports’ Puck Daddy).
"The biggest litmus test ultimately was that no one wanted to own the team there,” Bettman said referencing the moves of the Quebec Nordiques and Winnipeg Jets. “When the marketplace decides that they don't want to own a team there, it has no future.”
Using the Coyotes as an example, the league would rather find an owner to keep the team in Glendale (rumored to be Jerry Reinsdorf of the Chicago Bulls and White Sox fame) than to move it elsewhere.
The Thrashers haven’t even been offered for sale on the open market more or less offered to Atlanta-area investors.
Sorry Hamilton, the impending sale of the Thrashers appears to be just plain tabloid fodder.
I guess that date with Cuthbert isn’t looking so good, either.
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Post by Smokie on Oct 4, 2009 17:53:03 GMT -5
Some one want to email this donkey of a writer the HNIC hot stove clip from last night. ;D
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Post by roosta604 on Oct 4, 2009 20:03:02 GMT -5
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Post by jjhmclean on Oct 4, 2009 20:10:47 GMT -5
Yes, if he goes; there is a reason for it. I would put them in the same boat the Jet Fans were in when Selanne got traded. ( Although, we were in a lame-duck year already....) if memory serves......they announced they were going in January correct? I believe there is some sort of deadline for relocation. Would they announce a relocation in January? I would think no, only because Bettman will stick his nose in this before we know it. Also I have yet to see hard evidence of just how much this team is losing each year. Maybe someone could post it.
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Post by jhendrix70 on Nov 5, 2009 23:00:03 GMT -5
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Post by flippy on Nov 16, 2009 14:52:44 GMT -5
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