pagan696 Posted January 22, 2010 Share Posted January 22, 2010 not official, but http://www.charlotteobserver.com/checkers/story/1196447.htmlCheckers has always been a great team name for Charlotte, but River Rats could work too. the Catawba (river) outlines the western edge of the city/county. Carolina Dreamin' ΓΔΒ ΓΔΒ ΓΔΒ When a robotic Nixon is on the loose, we have a duty to take action. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Burmy Posted January 22, 2010 Share Posted January 22, 2010 This...could...work.Charlotte is a major market, plus they can keep the Checkers name (see Peoria Rivermen & Rockford IceHogs). Not to mention the Norfolk Admirals will finally have a closer-by rival! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BrianVlietDesign Posted January 22, 2010 Share Posted January 22, 2010 If only Richmond could have jump on this sort of thing about 10 years earlier when the Admirals and Renegades were approached to merge. NYCFC - MLS CUP CHAMPIONS - 2021 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GFB Posted January 22, 2010 Share Posted January 22, 2010 Any name change would mean changing that beautiful logo they have now... so I veto RIver Rats. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CDixonDesign Posted January 22, 2010 Share Posted January 22, 2010 Awesome news! I love Checker's games, keeping the name, and upping the talent would be fantastic! The Checkers have always been a smaller market here in the Queen City...this would be fanstics IMO! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
slapshot Posted January 22, 2010 Share Posted January 22, 2010 So...maybe the Adirondack Phantoms move to Albany, or split time between Glens Falls and Albany. Don't know if another brand new team moves into that area. Back-to-Back Fatal Forty Champion 2015 & 2016 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The_Admiral Posted January 22, 2010 Share Posted January 22, 2010 Charlotte being a major market is why the AHL wouldn't work. Minor-league teams in major-league towns often seem to struggle. The AHL should, for the most part, maintain its footprint of mid-sized cities in New England and the Mid-Atlantic, where enough people enjoy watching and playing hockey that the region can be saturated with these smaller clubs. The travel is easier, the overhead is lower, and you can just be what you are instead of over-aspiring and overextending yourselves. Expanding into an NBA town, and likely an NBA arena, doesn't seem like the best idea to me. Charlotte has its Panthers, its Bobcats, and numerous established college sports teams in the area. Do you really think this major metropolitan area is going to take to AHL hockey enough to justify the costs associated with putting a team there? ♫ oh yeah, board goes on, long after the thrill of postin' is gone ♫ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Burmy Posted January 22, 2010 Share Posted January 22, 2010 Charlotte being a major market is why the AHL wouldn't work. Minor-league teams in major-league towns often seem to struggle. The AHL should, for the most part, maintain its footprint of mid-sized cities in New England and the Mid-Atlantic, where enough people enjoy watching and playing hockey that the region can be saturated with these smaller clubs. The travel is easier, the overhead is lower, and you can just be what you are instead of over-aspiring and overextending yourselves. Expanding into an NBA town, and likely an NBA arena, doesn't seem like the best idea to me. Charlotte has its Panthers, its Bobcats, and numerous established college sports teams in the area. Do you really think this major metropolitan area is going to take to AHL hockey enough to justify the costs associated with putting a team there?If Milwaukee, Cleveland, Houston, and San Antonio see no problem with it, why should Charlotte? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OMMF Posted January 22, 2010 Share Posted January 22, 2010 Charlotte being a major market is why the AHL wouldn't work. Minor-league teams in major-league towns often seem to struggle. The AHL should, for the most part, maintain its footprint of mid-sized cities in New England and the Mid-Atlantic, where enough people enjoy watching and playing hockey that the region can be saturated with these smaller clubs. The travel is easier, the overhead is lower, and you can just be what you are instead of over-aspiring and overextending yourselves. Expanding into an NBA town, and likely an NBA arena, doesn't seem like the best idea to me. Charlotte has its Panthers, its Bobcats, and numerous established college sports teams in the area. Do you really think this major metropolitan area is going to take to AHL hockey enough to justify the costs associated with putting a team there?So Charlotte as an ECHL town, one level lower, works better? Assuming nothing changes (which we know won't be true) Charlotte would be the 10th-best attended team in the AHL. This season they have had 5 games with attendance of 6000+ and one game over 10000+. Also, as an apples to oranges comparison, Charlotte draws an average of 1600 more people than Albany does.As far as an AHL team in an NBA arena, see Houston, Cleveland or Milwaukee. They are doing alright. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The_Admiral Posted January 22, 2010 Share Posted January 22, 2010 But there kinda is a problem with it, that's the thing. The Admirals are an afterthought on the Milwaukee sports scene, and that's a scene that includes the Bucks, who are themselves generally kind of an afterthought. They have their fans, like every team does, but between PACKERS, college basketball, Badger football, Badger hockey, and the Bucks, there's not really a hunger for inferior but relatively affordable hockey-related entertainment. 3000some people scattered around the Bradley Center doesn't paint the picture of a flourishing team. Cleveland is in the midst of proving for a second time that they're not really an AHL town. ♫ oh yeah, board goes on, long after the thrill of postin' is gone ♫ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OMMF Posted January 22, 2010 Share Posted January 22, 2010 But there kinda is a problem with it, that's the thing. The Admirals are an afterthought on the Milwaukee sports scene, and that's a scene that includes the Bucks, who are themselves generally kind of an afterthought. They have their fans, like every team does, but between PACKERS, college basketball, Badger football, Badger hockey, and the Bucks, there's not really a hunger for inferior but relatively affordable hockey-related entertainment. 3000some people scattered around the Bradley Center doesn't paint the picture of a flourishing team. Cleveland is in the midst of proving for a second time that they're not really an AHL town.I don't really care about the AHL but I think you are short-changing the attendance numbers for these teams. Are they selling out NBA arenas? Of course not, but that doesn't mean they aren't doing well. Even if you throw out the 12000+ game Milwaukee just had, they are averaging almost 4300 a game and Cleveland is over 5000. If they operate the arena like KeyArena did when the Thunderbirds played there (upper deck closed off, not all concession stands or restrooms open, etc.) they probably aren't doing too bad. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The_Admiral Posted January 22, 2010 Share Posted January 22, 2010 I think Charlotte as an ECHL town does work better because there are several ECHL teams in the southeastern United States, which means they can keep travel costs relatively low, and if they're one of the league's better draws, hey, good for them. They're a big fish. If they're drawing that well, maybe Checkers fans are satisfied with "Double-A" hockey and don't really need to move up to Triple-A, since it's probably not a very prudent move. Lots of people probably don't care to make distinctions between various levels of minor-league sports. There's the expensive pro stuff with the really good players, and there's the cheap stuff where you take the family out for a fun little night where there's a game happening. The ramifications of the Carolina Hurricanes' developmental trajectory probably wouldn't be on a lot of ticketholders' minds. ♫ oh yeah, board goes on, long after the thrill of postin' is gone ♫ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dgnmrwrw Posted January 22, 2010 Share Posted January 22, 2010 Not sure if the AHL would work in Charlotte, but from the perspective of a Canes fan, I'd love to see this happen. Especially this year when we've been constantly rotating young guys in an out of Albany and Raleigh, it would be great to have them in Charlotte where the roster moves and transition to the area would be easier to execute. Also, we'd get much better coverage of how they were progressing, and I'd be able to see them play if I wanted to (not counting a few shifts in the NHL preseason). HURRICANES | PANTHERS | WHITE SOX | WOLFPACK Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rams80 Posted January 23, 2010 Share Posted January 23, 2010 That only applies when they are in town, though./Thank God Peoria's officially staying for another year. On 8/1/2010 at 4:01 PM, winters in buffalo said: You manage to balance agitation with just enough salient points to keep things interesting. Kind of a low-rent DG_Now. On 1/2/2011 at 9:07 PM, Sodboy13 said: Today, we are all otaku. "The city of Peoria was once the site of the largest distillery in the world and later became the site for mass production of penicillin. So it is safe to assume that present-day Peorians are descended from syphilitic boozehounds."-Stephen Colbert POTD: February 15, 2010, June 20, 2010 The Glorious Bloom State Penguins (NCFAF) 2014: 2-9, 2015: 7-5 (L Pineapple Bowl), 2016: 1-0 (NCFAB) 2014-15: 10-8, 2015-16: 14-5 (SMC Champs, L 1st Round February Frenzy) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rvrdgsfn Posted January 23, 2010 Share Posted January 23, 2010 If only Richmond could have jump on this sort of thing about 10 years earlier when the Admirals and Renegades were approached to merge.If only there was hockey in Richmond... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dcarnys Posted January 23, 2010 Share Posted January 23, 2010 Well It could work, Charlotte really needs to get behind it more and who knows, localizing your affiliates may help the Canes attendance as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The_Admiral Posted January 23, 2010 Share Posted January 23, 2010 If you live around Raleigh and still can't be arsed to go to a Hurricanes game (this applies to many), why would having their prospects play in Charlotte compel people to attend games?The Hornets notwithstanding, Charlotte would've been a better location for the Hurricanes than Greensboro and Raleigh, if you absolutely had to bring hockey to the Carolinas at the expense of southern New England, which more or less takes us back home to the River Rats. ♫ oh yeah, board goes on, long after the thrill of postin' is gone ♫ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Burmy Posted January 23, 2010 Share Posted January 23, 2010 If only Richmond could have jump on this sort of thing about 10 years earlier when the Admirals and Renegades were approached to merge.If only there was hockey in Richmond... I think there will be very soon...just not at the Coliseum (but at that SportsQuest arena they're building in Chesterfield, will also be home to the IFL's Richmond Revolution) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rvrdgsfn Posted January 23, 2010 Share Posted January 23, 2010 If only Richmond could have jump on this sort of thing about 10 years earlier when the Admirals and Renegades were approached to merge.If only there was hockey in Richmond... I think there will be very soon...just not at the Coliseum (but at that SportsQuest arena they're building in Chesterfield, will also be home to the IFL's Richmond Revolution)Yup, also helps that the Commissioner of the E mentioned Richmond as a potential city back in the summer...http://shorthandedbreakaway.com/2009/07/12/echl-commissioner-brian-mckenna/There are some other ones in places like Greenville, Richmond, VA, Greensboro, NC, San Diego, Fresno, some of those markets make sense. If there?s an interested ownership group, if there?s a good business plan and proper lead time, I think all those markets would be of interest to us in the future.Back to the subject matter, I heard that Albany did a press conference to do damage control. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BB61 Posted January 23, 2010 Share Posted January 23, 2010 Charlotte being a major market is why the AHL wouldn't work. Minor-league teams in major-league towns often seem to struggle.If Milwaukee, Cleveland, Houston, and San Antonio see no problem with it, why should Charlotte?And let's not forget that Philadelphia, even in a crowded minor-league landscape, was able to sustain a team for thirteen seasons, and the only reason that they moved was the closing of the Spectrum. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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