NHL Anti-Thread: Bad Business Decision Aggregator

[bosrs1]

Surely the new Seattle arena will be hockey compatible, right? They're not going to make the same Key Arena/Barclays Center type facility designed to squeeze hockey out?

No, they're making it hockey friendly. So they won't have another Key on their hands. You can kind of make out where the rink would sit by that image. One interesting aspect though is it appears sideline seats on the glass for hockey will all belong to those lower level mini suites. Definitely a new and somewhat disturbing direction for hockey to go in (not that it's not disturbing for basketball too).

[Sport]

Surely the new Seattle arena will be hockey compatible, right? They're not going to make the same Key Arena/Barclays Center type facility designed to squeeze hockey out?

No, they're making it hockey friendly. So they won't have another Key on their hands. You can kind of make out where the rink would sit by that image. One interesting aspect though is it appears sideline seats on the glass for hockey will all belong to those lower level mini suites. Definitely a new and somewhat disturbing direction for hockey to go in (not that it's not disturbing for basketball too).

That's good news.

Those lower level suites sort of look like what Quicken Loans arena has, though the plans for Seattle looks like they'll be even closer than they have them in Cleveland.

Here's a picture of the basketball and hockey setup.

That'll look weird in Seattle when the hockey glass is that close to those box seats.

[dfwabel]

It does not really matter what the footprint for hockey looks like, since the Hansen/Balmer group does not want to own the team.

As a result, whomever who decides to buy and relocate to Seattle will still be at the whim of the Sonics in terms of the majority of their revenue. They could sell out every game and yet would still have to get in line for revenue sharing.

On average...

52% of a teams revenue comes from ticket sales (but the NHL team would have to pay rent)

21% comes from "in arena revenue" such as premium seating and advertising (but the NHL team would have to give a cut to the Sonics)

22% comes from broadcast rights (but they would receive less money than the Sonics and would have much lower viewership)

[The_Admiral]

RIght, but they speak American, so this is clearly better deal than the one where a Quebec City team would be an anchor tenant and have none of these problems.

[IceCap]

RIght, but they speak American, so this is clearly better deal than the one where a Quebec City team would be an anchor tenant and have none of these problems.

Also Gary Bettman's head just might explode during the press conference if he had to confirm a second sunbelt team moving to Canada in under five years.

I really want Quebec City to get the Coyotes because it's an undeserved market full of knowledgeable, passionate hockey fans. That being said my main motivation for wanting to see them move to Quebec City at this point is just so I can see what that press conference would be like. He threatened to move the Jets at theirs, and he didn't even care about the Thrashers! I can only imagine what a "Coyotes to Quebec" press conference would be like at this point.

[bosrs1]

RIght, but they speak American, so this is clearly better deal than the one where a Quebec City team would be an anchor tenant and have none of these problems.

Also Gary Bettman's head just might explode during the press conference if he had to confirm a second sunbelt team moving to Canada in under five years.

I really want Quebec City to get the Coyotes because it's an undeserved market full of knowledgeable, passionate hockey fans. That being said my main motivation for wanting to see them move to Quebec City at this point is just so I can see what that press conference would be like. He threatened to move the Jets at theirs, and he didn't even care about the Thrashers! I can only imagine what a "Coyotes to Quebec" press conference would be like at this point.

Yeah that's why I think you'll see Seattle before you see Quebec if Seattle is an option. Bettman doesn't want to give up another American market if they can avoid it.

[The_Admiral]

RIght, but they speak American, so this is clearly better deal than the one where a Quebec City team would be an anchor tenant and have none of these problems.

Also Gary Bettman's head just might explode during the press conference if he had to confirm a second sunbelt team moving to Canada in under five years.

I really want Quebec City to get the Coyotes because it's an undeserved market full of knowledgeable, passionate hockey fans. That being said my main motivation for wanting to see them move to Quebec City at this point is just so I can see what that press conference would be like. He threatened to move the Jets at theirs, and he didn't even care about the Thrashers! I can only imagine what a "Coyotes to Quebec" press conference would be like at this point.

"I don't think there isn't not anything that doesn't have to go unsaid at this juncture," amidst a flurry of Parkinsonian twitching.

[Still MIGHTY]

From Hansen's website, SonicsArena.com. Aside from the "pocket suites", it looks very similar in seating bowl design to Jobing.com Arena for hockey:

[The_Admiral]

Fifth-row club seats is plumbing a new depth of crapulence.

[bosrs1]

Fifth-row club seats is plumbing a new depth of crapulence.

Yep but it's also the future. They don't want normal people on the glass, they want rich people who will pay through the nose for the privilege.

From Hansen's website, SonicsArena.com. Aside from the "pocket suites", it looks very similar in seating bowl design to Jobing.com Arena for hockey:

I can think of one big difference right now. People will actually go to games in an arena in downtown Seattle. Either way I think we're looking at the home after their next home of the Phoenix, soon to be Seattle, Coyotes barring a shocker move by the NBA in denying the Kings relocation.

Oh and just for reference this would be the Coyotes first next home if they moved after this season to Seattle.

[IceCap]

I can see how that would be preferable to Quebec City, which only has a state of the art hockey arena on the way and a serviceable hockey arena ready to use in the meantime.

[Magnus]

I really want Quebec City to get the Coyotes because it's an under-served market full of knowledgeable, passionate hockey fans. That being said my main motivation for wanting to see them move to Quebec City at this point is just so I can see what that press conference would be like. He threatened to move the Jets at theirs, and he didn't even care about the Thrashers! I can only imagine what a "Coyotes to Quebec" press conference would be like at this point.

Fixed that for you, Cap. Phoenix is the "undeserved" market.

[Gothamite]

Surely the new Seattle arena will be hockey compatible, right? They're not going to make the same Key Arena/Barclays Center type facility designed to squeeze hockey out?

I can't speak for Key, but that's not what happened with the Barclays Center. Rattner desperately wanted a hockey tenant, but the city approval process was brutal, and he had to keep chipping away at the design until he ended up with a footprint not suited for a rink. Not part of the "design" at all.

[IceCap]

I really want Quebec City to get the Coyotes because it's an under-served market full of knowledgeable, passionate hockey fans. That being said my main motivation for wanting to see them move to Quebec City at this point is just so I can see what that press conference would be like. He threatened to move the Jets at theirs, and he didn't even care about the Thrashers! I can only imagine what a "Coyotes to Quebec" press conference would be like at this point.

Fixed that for you, Cap. Phoenix is the "undeserved" market.

Haha, thanks.

[bosrs1]

Surely the new Seattle arena will be hockey compatible, right? They're not going to make the same Key Arena/Barclays Center type facility designed to squeeze hockey out?

I can't speak for Key, but that's not what happened with the Barclays Center. Rattner desperately wanted a hockey tenant, but the city approval process was brutal, and he had to keep chipping away at the design until he ended up with a footprint not suited for a rink. Not part of the "design" at all.

Ironically Ratner got his hockey team anyway despite the arena being anything but hockey friendly. But Seattle is apparently not only making their arena hockey friendly, Hansen has even pointed out it's somewhat better for hockey (than it is for basketball though he isn't publicly stating the last part).

[bosrs1]

I can see how that would be preferable to Quebec City, which only has a state of the art hockey arena on the way and a serviceable hockey arena ready to use in the meantime.

Seattle also has a larger, American, English speaking TV audience which is worth far more to the league than the second smallest market in North America behind Green Bay with an almost exclusively francaphone Canadian population. That said, you're right that Quebec has some great points in it's favor, not the least of which is a dedicated hockey loving fanbase which the team would have all to itself without having to share with the NBA, NFL, MLS, and MLB. Which is why they'll likely get Team 31 due in no small part because they'd pay the expansion fee far more readily than Levin would in Seattle or any other US market for that matter.

[IceCap]

I can see how that would be preferable to Quebec City, which only has a state of the art hockey arena on the way and a serviceable hockey arena ready to use in the meantime.

Seattle also has a larger, American, English speaking TV audience which is worth far more to the league than the second smallest market in North America behind Green Bay with an almost exclusively francaphone Canadian population. That said, you're right that Quebec has some great points in it's favor, not the least of which is a dedicated hockey loving fanbase which the team would have all to itself without having to share with the NBA, NFL, MLS, and MLB. Which is why they'll likely get Team 31 due in no small part because they'd pay the expansion fee far more readily than Levin would in Seattle or any other US market for that matter.

The thing is that tv isn't what makes the NHL the bulk of its money. It's ticket sales. Winnipeg proved that a small Canadian market with a dedicated fanbase was more then capable of succeeding economically in a league where a major American city failed.

As for tv, well even with their new deal with NBC the NHL's most profitable tv deals remain the ones with CBC and CTV (TSN). And having more Canadian teams could only help in that regard.

No doubt Quebec City's a shoe-in for team 31 if Seattle gets the Coyotes, but there shouldn't even be a team 31 in the first place.

[The_Admiral]

Isn't the Canadiens' RDS coverage considered a national television package, and distributed among all 30 teams? Wouldn't the Nordiques' TVA coverage, in turn, be national and divided among all teams?

[IceCap]

Isn't the Canadiens' RDS coverage considered a national television package, and distributed among all 30 teams?

I believe it is, yes.

No doubt Quebec City's a shoe-in for team 31 if Seattle gets the Coyotes, but there shouldn't even be a team 31 in the first place.

I should probably add that ideally a 30 team NHL would have franchises in Quebec City, Seattle, and Milwaukee, but we had to go chasing the housing bubble instead.

[The_Admiral]

No doubt Quebec City's a shoe-in for team 31 if Seattle gets the Coyotes, but there shouldn't even be a team 31 in the first place.

I should probably add that ideally a 30 team NHL would have franchises in Quebec City, Seattle, and Milwaukee, but we had to go chasing the housing bubble instead.

You know what really chaps my ass about those states? The whole economy is a house of lies. They undermine the entire industrial midwest/northeast where unions fought like hell to make sure workers could be treated like human beings, then the South, which never manufactured anything that wasn't distilled, comes in all "hey free tax breaks for everyone and we have air conditioning now," and so now you have all these non-union shops in Tennessee that they can afford to have because of all the tax money DC has given them for lagging so much behind the traditionally developed part of the country. I mean, they don't have a hockey team, thank God, but how much of Alabama's economy is based on the Pentagon giving them money to build warships to nowhere and generally play with expensive guns and stuff? Mr. Destructo said it better than I can in a rant about college football fans:

The southerner who mocks Detroit for being bombed-out post-industrial crap never notices that he lives in a place of never-industry, where productivity was never built because low-income workers fled north and west in WWII and in the first two post-war decades. The southerners who mock northern union wage-slaves by citing their larger salaries never note that they work service jobs where those salaries disappear paying for the benefits that union wage-slaves already get.

So yeah, it just breaks my heart to watch Detroit and Buffalo fall apart while these johnny-come-lately sprawlsvilles like Nashville and Raleigh pop up to gobble up everyone's blue-collar and white-collar work because they're able to pretend they're better off than they really are. But I mean, it can't go all the way downhill. We're all descended from Scandinavians and Germans and European Jews who spent the winters staying indoors and thinking, so we'll think our way out of this, too, right? The North will rise again.