By Garth McLennan

HL hockey has returned

to Manitoba, and since the

announcement became
official last week, the vast majority of
Canadian fans have been ecstatic with
the news that the Atlanta Thrashers
are moving north.

However, lost in the elation are
the very real questions about just
whether or not an NHL outfit can
work long-term and be financially
viable in Winnipeg. Let’s not forget
that Winnipeg has had the NHL there
before, and there were a lot of strikes
naturally against the franchise that
eventually proved too difficult to
overcome. Right off the bat, the new
Winnipeg organization plays out of
the smallest market in the NHL and
out of the smallest arena in the NHL.
Major corporate support isn’t exactly
a hallmark in Manitoba and with the
salary cap rising once again for next
season; it will be a challenge for
Winnipeg to keep up with the bigger
markets, no matter how passionate
their fans are.

The new Winnipeg franchise
will play out of the MTS Centre,
the current home of the AHL’s
Manitoba Moose and a building with
a maximum capacity of just 15,015.
As Gary Bettman noted when he
announced the sale of the Thrashers,
the new Winnipeg team will have to
sell out virtually all of their home
games to turn a profit.

Now, a return to Winnipeg isn’t
all bad. Certainly, the fortunes of
the franchise look much brighter
in any Canadian city then they do
in Atlanta. The NHL gave Georgia
multiple shots to make professional
hockey work, but it was never able
to gain a significant foothold in

the city. Not all of that should be
attributed to Atlanta. After all, it’s
very difficult to make the NHL work
in a non-traditional hockey market
when the franchise is riddled with
chronic incompetence from the
front office, relentlessly unstable
ownership and ceaseless poor play on
the ice which saw the Thrashers play
just four playoff games in 11 years.
With that consistent level of awful
performances, making hockey work
in any market would be difficult.
But even if you count the fact
that the Thrashers never really
gave hockey much of a real shot in
Atlanta, the city just never seemed
to care about the team, even when
superstars like Dany Heatley and
Ilya Kovalchuk were the faces of
the franchise. Atlanta has proven
to be a fickle sports town for every

* professional league. The NBA’s

Hawks, NFL’s Falcons and MLB’s
Braves have all had their own
challenges in engaging the city in
what they have to offer.

Regardless of the suitability
of Atlanta as a major league sports
market though, the Thrashers will
certainly go down as a stain on the
NHL’s American Sunbelt expansion
initiative. At Bettman’s directive,
the NHL has repeatedly sailed off
on exotic voyages into southern
American cities that have shown
little interest in the game, while at
the same time passing over a number
of smaller Canadian and northern
American cities that have a proven
passion for hockey.

Upon reflection, the Atlanta
Thrashers’ demise is a sad reflection
of Bettman’s leadership and just how
little he has accomplished during his
time at the top of the NHL.

 

 

 

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