Post by jaylon1970 on Apr 30, 2009 14:24:54 GMT -5
slapshot.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/01/12/the-morning-skate-how-did-the-coyotes-mess-happen/
the article is little bit long...here are some important points from article about the history of NHL's involvement in the "southern strategy"...
One fact forgotten by Brunt and others is that the business of hockey changed drastically when Alan Eagleson (whom Brunt skewers in his excellent book, “Searching for Bobby Orr”) was ousted as head of the N.H.L. Players Association — a move few of those who now rail against Sun Belt teams would condemn. But his ouster set off a Rube Goldberg-esque chain of events that changed the course of the league and set it southward.
When the Eagle was replaced by Bob Goodenow, the union’s accommodations to ownership were gone too. One brief strike later (in 1992), and salaries began to skyrocket. That was followed by one half-season lockout (in 1994), and the rocket’s booster kicked in. The N.H.L.’s trajectory completely changed.
To cover those escalating salaries, owners needed new revenue. Since hockey was an arena-based gate-receipts business — as it always has been and continues to be — the owners found that they needed more seats, more amenities, more luxury boxes and, yes, even better parking revenue. Many owners got those things. Not all did.
Norman Green, the North Stars owner, issued the ultimatum and was the first to make good on it, in 1993. Unable to coerce a new deal out of the Twin Cities (and with his local mall business failing and facing a sexual harassment suit in the Minnesota courts), he packed up his team and headed to Dallas. Other teams followed, each with their own local twists, turns and absurdities.
In the case of the Jets/Coyotes, there was political wrangling galore and ever-shifting demands from the Jets owners, led by Winnipegger Barry Shenkarow. The public, some politicians and some in the business community exhausted all avenues to save the Jets. But the civic and commercial forces in Winnipeg could not make it work, and perhaps Shenkarow would never have relented anyway.
For those with dim or no memory of these events, we recommend Jim Silver’s excellent history of the Jets’ demise Thin Ice, which demonstrates that the money and will to responsibly fund a new arena just wasn’t there. “There were more pressing needs in Winnipeg to which public funds could be applied than building a new arena that differed from the old one primarily in having luxury suites which would be the exclusive and tax-deductible preserve of the corporate elite,” Silver writes
In the end, as Silver recounts, Shenkarow, who at one point was going to sell to local interests, had a better deal from Richard Burke and Steven Gluckstern — the very same Steven Gluckstern who later owned part of the Islanders — for $65 million. Yes, they moved the club to Phoenix (while Shenkarow turned a handsome tax-free profit on the sale), but not before Burke explored his first choice, moving them to Minnesota, where he lived. Hardly a Sun Belt destination.
All this gets forgotten amid the somewhat understandable clamor against the evil conspiracy of the Sun Belt. It’s hard to disagree with those who mourn the loss of clubs in traditional markets, and there’s a lot of sense in it when Brunt, a proud son of Hamilton, Ontario, writes, “It’s tough to thrive in the long run in the big-league hockey business in places where the game doesn’t run deep.”
Perhaps, although it’s also true that it can be tough to thrive where the game does run deep. But in any case, the real story of the current N.H.L. map and how it came to be, as we have seen, is not quite as simple as an American commissioner with little feel for the game’s roots manifesting his desires by forcibly transplanting teams to where he sees fit to grow U.S. TV ratings.
the article is little bit long...here are some important points from article about the history of NHL's involvement in the "southern strategy"...
One fact forgotten by Brunt and others is that the business of hockey changed drastically when Alan Eagleson (whom Brunt skewers in his excellent book, “Searching for Bobby Orr”) was ousted as head of the N.H.L. Players Association — a move few of those who now rail against Sun Belt teams would condemn. But his ouster set off a Rube Goldberg-esque chain of events that changed the course of the league and set it southward.
When the Eagle was replaced by Bob Goodenow, the union’s accommodations to ownership were gone too. One brief strike later (in 1992), and salaries began to skyrocket. That was followed by one half-season lockout (in 1994), and the rocket’s booster kicked in. The N.H.L.’s trajectory completely changed.
To cover those escalating salaries, owners needed new revenue. Since hockey was an arena-based gate-receipts business — as it always has been and continues to be — the owners found that they needed more seats, more amenities, more luxury boxes and, yes, even better parking revenue. Many owners got those things. Not all did.
Norman Green, the North Stars owner, issued the ultimatum and was the first to make good on it, in 1993. Unable to coerce a new deal out of the Twin Cities (and with his local mall business failing and facing a sexual harassment suit in the Minnesota courts), he packed up his team and headed to Dallas. Other teams followed, each with their own local twists, turns and absurdities.
In the case of the Jets/Coyotes, there was political wrangling galore and ever-shifting demands from the Jets owners, led by Winnipegger Barry Shenkarow. The public, some politicians and some in the business community exhausted all avenues to save the Jets. But the civic and commercial forces in Winnipeg could not make it work, and perhaps Shenkarow would never have relented anyway.
For those with dim or no memory of these events, we recommend Jim Silver’s excellent history of the Jets’ demise Thin Ice, which demonstrates that the money and will to responsibly fund a new arena just wasn’t there. “There were more pressing needs in Winnipeg to which public funds could be applied than building a new arena that differed from the old one primarily in having luxury suites which would be the exclusive and tax-deductible preserve of the corporate elite,” Silver writes
In the end, as Silver recounts, Shenkarow, who at one point was going to sell to local interests, had a better deal from Richard Burke and Steven Gluckstern — the very same Steven Gluckstern who later owned part of the Islanders — for $65 million. Yes, they moved the club to Phoenix (while Shenkarow turned a handsome tax-free profit on the sale), but not before Burke explored his first choice, moving them to Minnesota, where he lived. Hardly a Sun Belt destination.
All this gets forgotten amid the somewhat understandable clamor against the evil conspiracy of the Sun Belt. It’s hard to disagree with those who mourn the loss of clubs in traditional markets, and there’s a lot of sense in it when Brunt, a proud son of Hamilton, Ontario, writes, “It’s tough to thrive in the long run in the big-league hockey business in places where the game doesn’t run deep.”
Perhaps, although it’s also true that it can be tough to thrive where the game does run deep. But in any case, the real story of the current N.H.L. map and how it came to be, as we have seen, is not quite as simple as an American commissioner with little feel for the game’s roots manifesting his desires by forcibly transplanting teams to where he sees fit to grow U.S. TV ratings.