1
– Seattle – for me this is the most obvious venue, The Pacific
Northwest has long been crying out for an NHL team of their own. It
seems ideal when you think of it. Most US based NHL teams are located
in the Northern, cold climate areas close to the Canadian Border,
think Detroit, Chicago, Buffalo, Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, New York,
New Jersey, Boston and Minnesota. They are all located in the North
East or Central lakes area, not a single team in PacWest. Seattle
just sounds like it would be a
hockey town, I mean imagine a team called something like the
‘Seattle Storm’,
decked out in Green, White and Blue and forming an intense rivalry
with the Vancouver Canucks. A Seattle/Vancouver city rivalry
in as has been the case
in the MLS
(Sounders/Whitecaps) and in the past
the NBA
(SuperSonics/ Grizzlies). The problem, at present
is they do not have a suitable venue for playing hockey. The
Supersonics old building, the Key Arena is dated and was one of the
reasons why they were relocated to Oklahoma City in
the first place. But, if the lack of an arena is a
negative point, it is also a positive one
too. Ever since the much-loved Sonics were forced
out of town the good folk of Seattle have obsessed about getting
their team back. I am reliably informed that things are at an
advanced staged to relocate the Sacramento Kings from Northern
California to Washington, but the NBA will only rubber stamp the move
if the new owners build a brand new multi-purpose arena. Once again,
I am reliably informed that, to get a new arena built, it has to
include an NHL team sharing the facility along with the re-born
SuperSonics. It seems so agonisingly close that we will see an NBA
and NHL team playing in Seattle soon enough. There are that many
people involved in the project for it to fail at this late stage, and
seeing how much passion exists to get their NBA team back, why
wouldn’t they agree to get a hockey team too. Around the Seattle
area are 2 WHL teams, the Seattle Thunderbirds, based just south of
the city in Kent and the Everett Silvertips juts to the North. No one
can say there is not enough passion or people interested in the sport
in the area. Seattle could also join a list along
with Chicago, New York, Detroit, Dallas,
Minnesota, Philadlephia, Miami, Denver & Washington in being a
city/metro area with a franchise from all 4 of the major North
American sports leagues (NFL/NBA/NHL/MLB).
2
– Portland – Seattle’s Pacific Northwest Neighbour and Rival is
Portland. Despite being a much smaller media market, the City from
Oregon can lay claim to having an arena already in place, the Rose
Gardens, and could have an NHL team playing out of it tomorrow. Their
NBA team, the Portland Trailblazers,
already share the facility with a hockey team, the Portland
Winterhawks of the WHL, who are a Chicago
Blackhawks farm team. Again like Seattle, Hockey is popular in the
city as they have minor league teams in the area, so the potential
for an NHL team to thrive here is great. However, can I realistically
see a team playing here, the simple answer is no. If a team were to
relocate to the Northwest region, surely it would be to Seattle first
before Portland? I could be wrong, but even though Seattle has more
work to do to get all their pieces of the jigsaw in place, it seems
much more likely to happen than it does in the City of Roses.
3
– Kansas City – For some reason I always get surprised to see
this mid-western town’s name on any list of would-be relocations.
Why? I hear you ask, well for one it doesn’t strike me as
being an obvious hockey market. Yes, yes it is in
the Mid-west along with St Louis, Chicago, Detroit etc and would form
some great rivalries with any of those teams, but it is in a warmer
climate than any of the other cities on the short list (apart from
Las Vegas) and having failed in one hot climate, would it not be best
to play it safe by going to a colder city?
Kansas of course have had an NHL team before,
back in the 1970s when the Scouts played there
very breifly for 2 seasons before moving on. They then came close to
getting a second chance at hosting a hockey team around the turn of
the millennium when it looked certain another financially struggling
team, the Pittsburgh Penguins looked like they might relocate there.
Thankfully common sense and Mario Lemieux prevailed to keep the team
in its rightful home, but it seems KC have not given up on the idea
of one day getting a team of their own. They
also have a brand new arena in the City with no tenants
there to use it, so another incentive to get a
team to play there.
4
– Las Vegas – Now this was a surprise addition in many
ways, A city that has never before hosted a
pro-sports team, and one at that in the same desert climate and just
across the border in Nevada from Phoenix and Arizona. If it failed in
one dessert town, it is just as likely to struggle in another too,
right? Also there have been several gambling
scandals coming out of the Party Capital, which has put a block on
having a pro-team there in the past. Despite all this, rumors
persist that Hollywood movie mogul Jerry Bruckheimer is to be
involved in any bid to get the team playing there.
5
– Milwaukee – This was another surprise name on the list. On the
face of it Milwaukee would be a good fit, it is a Northern ‘cold’
city, is in the State of Wisconsin where
Hockey is popular and could share any arena with the NBA
Bucks. However the downsides are the current
arena, the Bradley Center is not good enough for the Bucks anymore,
never mind moving a hockey team in too. Any bid to get a team there
would have to involve the building of a brand new facility, and that
may just reduce the chances of seeing it happen. The fact that
Milwaukee has a
close proximity to Chicago, and the mighty
Blackhawks, could also work against them.
6
– Quebec City – Ah, yes Quebec. I can hear all those Hockey
Romantics sighing, let’s get the deal done, but if only it was that
simple. The chance to get one of the biggest names back in hockey,
the Quebec Nordiques, would be a hard thing for the NHL to pass up.
Ever since they relocated to Denver, to become the Colorado
Avalanche, there have been murmurings about getting a team back in
the area, much like how Winnipeg wanted their Jets back. Well
Winnipeg did get their team back, less than 2 years ago, and you
could feel the momentum building across the whole of Canada about
getting another famous name back. By all accounts there is a very
strong claim that the Coyotes could be
re-located to Quebec, however, I really can’t
see how the NHL can possibly allow this to happen, not this time,
anyway, and that is down to one reason. The Division re-alignment. At
present we have 30 teams, that will be split over 4 divisions instead
of 6. This means instead of having a very even spread of 6 divisions
of 5 teams we will now have 2 divisions of 8 teams and 2 divisions of
7. With Winnipeg rightly moving from what was the Southeast division
into the old Central one with teams from Chicago and Minnesota, it
meant to balance things up, Columbus and
Detroit have now moved to the east. This means the 2 divisions of 8
teams will be in the east. Phoenix, believed to be staying where they
are were in one of the 2 divisions with 7 teams. If the Coyotes were
to move to Quebec, they couldn’t possibly stay in the ‘Pacific’
Division. They would have to move to the old Northeast division, for
geographical reasons and to re-awaken old
rivalries with Montreal, Boston & Buffalo. If that were to happen
suddenly the 4 divisions would look very unbalanced, having 1
division of 6 teams, 1 of 7, 1 of 8 and of course 1 of 9. That would
never work, and would mean then going back on their word to either
the Blue Jackets or the Red Wings. When the current Divisional set up
came into effect in 1998, Detroit were asked to play in the west as a
favour to the league, while also keeping strong rivalries with
Chicago and St Louis. For a while now Detroit have
wanted to call in that favor by being placed in a
more friendly division. At present they
travel more miles than any other team, and most of their regular
rivals are in different time zones to them. Moving to the Northeast
means ET or CT as opposed to 2 time zones difference playing teams in
PT. Columbus too have a similar problem, and having been a franchise
that has struggled on the ice more than most, meant a
changeup is what they needed. Going back on their original plan and
asking either team to move back would not sit well. However I have a
solution, so please read on.
Summary
– Any move by the Coyotes would have to be to a Western Market, and
given the aspirations of getting an NBA team back there, it
is almost certain to be Seattle. However, I
can still see a team playing out of Quebec again. It might not be
this year, or next year, or even the one after, but within say the
next 5-10 years I can see a team like the Florida Panthers, moving.
Given The new Division set up, both the Panthers and near neighbours
the Tampa Bay Lightning will find themselves in a division with teams
in the Northeast, travelling a lot further than say, Atlanta, Raleigh
& Washington, like they have been used too. I believe this will
not be good for the long term future of the team, and may force their
hand in relocating, which is where Quebec come in. Florida are
already in the division that Quebec would need to be in, it is all
starting to make sense now, right? And what about the Lightning? Well
I believe they are in better shape than Florida and having won
a Stanley cup in the last decade, will
buy them some time, but with their closest rivals
gone, would Tampa want to have to make the trek up to the Northeast
for every game? Maybe it would be convenient for them to relocate to
bring back another famous old name, that of Hartford and the Whalers.
Just a thought. I could be completely wrong, which I really hope I
am. I like the current teams/location set up, but at the same time
would also love to see names like Hartford & Quebec return and
have new teams in Seattle and Houston. The only way for that to
happen is for an expansion. Now that would be great wouldn’t
it? We would have
32 teams spread over 4 divisions so 8 teams in each, everything would
be nicely balanced. With the 2 Divisions in the West needing 2 extra
teams, how about Seattle for the Pacific Division and Houston for the
Central. It sure would be a perfect fit wouldn’t it? The NHL has
denied here will be any future expansions, but then they also denied
the Coyotes would move from Phoenix. If we have the same line ups in
5 seasons time I will be amazed.
Other
Locations – A number of other locations have been mentioned over
the years. As previously mentioned Houston. They along with Seattle
and Atlanta are the biggest metro areas without a
hockey team. Now Atlanta are not likely to get a third team are they?
They have already failed twice spawning 2 Canadian teams. The Calgary
Flames in the early 1980s and the Winnipeg
Jets in 2011. When we last had a bidding process
for expansion teams in 1991-93 (San Jose, Ottawa. Tampa Bay, Anaheim
& Florida) & 1998-00 (Nashville, Atlanta, Columbus &
Minnesota) Houston were always a name that wanted a piece of the
action. Amazingly they have been overlooked every time yet, as has
been proved by the success of the Dallas Stars, the Lone Star state
has embraced hockey despite it being in the
middle of Football country. A second team
from Texas would certainly add some intense rivalry with the Dallas
Stars.
Also
mentioned before was the somewhat unlikely scenario of getting the
Hartford Whalers back. Being located in-between 2 huge cities like
New York and Boston, was not easy for the Connecticut based-team the
last time around, so how
it would be any different now? However that
said, there was some thought that the Islanders might not be moving
to the new NBA arena in Brooklyn after all and that maybe they will
move out to Hartford. I don’t think it will happen, but it would be
great if it did.
If
those locations were obvious the next 3 are less so. When the
Nashville Predators submitted their bid for a team to start playing
in 1998, they were up against a bid from Little Rock, Arkansas. It is
not somewhere you could ever imagine having an NHL team located, nor
places like Norfolk Virginia who have also been casually mentioned.
Cleveland’s name was another once in the frame, but despite having
a team there in the past, being located to another Ohio based-team,
like the Columbus Blue
Jackets, and one that is struggling at that, is not likely at all to
ever come into fruition. Salt Lake City is somewhere I have always
thought should be in the frame, ever since they hosted the Winter
Olympics in 2002. The Arena is already in place and would be a good
location to rival teams like the Colorado Avalanche in the Mountain
area.
North
of the Border in Canada there are 4 possible locations, not counting
Quebec City of course. Halifax, NS has been talked about lately. It
is somewhat surprising given that it is such a small area, but there
has been talk of growth in the area, and also a need to have a
team based in
the Atlantic Canada area. One outside bet was having a team in either
Saskatoon or Regina. It is thought though that being not the largest
of areas and with the Winnipeg Jets already in place, the central
prairie area has already been taken. The biggest name that
is forever linked with a franchise, keeps
being that of Hamilton, but
it has failed so many times in
the past. Hamilton used to have a team, the Tigers, in the early days
of the NHL and a series of bids have been launched to
try and resurrect that once famous name.
The problem they have is Hamilton’s proximity to 2 existing NHL
teams, the Buffalo Sabres and the Toronto Maple Leafs. The Sabres
have blocked moves for Hamilton to have an NHL team there
in the past, due to worries it will impact on
their supporter numbers, and you could hardly imagine the Maple Leafs
would be happy at the thought, as Hamilton is even closer to them,
this despite having a massive fan base. I think any proposed bid to
get a team playing in Hamilton is dead in the water, although maybe
in the future we may see the Sabres playing some games in the city.
Much like when we saw teams playing in neutral venues in the
mid-1990s, why not have a Sabres/Leafs game there? It would be a
guaranteed sell out. The final location was a Southern
Ontario/Greater Toronto area team maybe in a place like Vaughan or
Markham. This has been mentioned a lot and again, although people are
hockey mad in Toronto, would anyone connected to the Leafs
really be that happy about such a proposal? I doubt it.
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