This Has Nothing To Do With Nashville As A Hockey Market

[JackStraw]

There is not gong to be a team in Hamilton. Ever.

Hamilton is half the size of Nashville with Big Brother just up the road and The Two New York Senators just over the Niagara...

Oh I know. But wouldn't it be fun to see them try, just to see the conniptions the Leafs would throw?

[jammer2]

@JackStraw As long as Toronno(tm rad) and Buffalo are within the required territorial zones of Hamilton, those teams will never ever allow Hamilton to get a team. The Leafs would lose a boat load of jersey and merchandise sales, and the Sabres count on a steady flow of Canadian fans to fill their seats on a nightly basis. No way do they put those ticket sales at risk (I've heard 20% of the gate is Canadian...not sure if that's accurate..rad?)

[radoran]

@JackStraw As long as Toronno(tm rad) and Buffalo are within the required territorial zones of Hamilton, those teams will never ever allow Hamilton to get a team. The Leafs would lose a boat load of jersey and merchandise sales, and the Sabres count on a steady flow of Canadian fans to fill their seats on a nightly basis. No way do they put those ticket sales at risk (I've heard 20% of the gate is Canadian...not sure if that's accurate..rad?)

Buffalo's just outside the exclusion zone, but Tronno isn't.

And Buffalo gets enough Canadians on a regular basis that they sing "O Canada" at every game. Every. Game. My first game was Thrashers/Sabres and I couldn't figure ot why they were signing "O Canada" nor why they all had these poppies on their lapels.

That's the New York Senators - Schumer was Quite Vocal about going to the NHL to prevent it when the issue came up with Ballsillie. Schumer notices there's a Western New York every time there's an opportunity to grandstand for votes.

[B21]

I was never implying that the fans themselves are lesser fans or that they don't love their hockey club.

But I think you simply chalk up the difference to be the size of the city (i.e. population from which to draw). I don't think that is the essential difference. (It is a factor, but not the only or even primary factor).

We can agree to disagree on market size as a factor but the primary source of revenue for NHL teams are tickets and TV. Assuming you draw close to capacity, market size is a big factor on the revenue you get from those. The size of ownership's wallet matters, too. I know Comcast has a big wallet. No idea about the conglomerate that owns the Predators.

Moot point now.

[B21]

Um... maybe... my brain has gone a little soft(er) in the last few days.

No harm no foul. It's easy to lose track in these long threads with multiple back and forths.

[Polaris922]

Easy... Preds pay an average of $37 per fan for their team. Flyers pay an average of $17 per fan. Clearly the Preds fans love their team more What? Pens fans average $42 per fan? Oh my.. we're the greatest! LOL

I'm with @B21 here... simply put a fan base of 1.6 million vs. a fan base of 6 million... market size IS population size. It controls tv revenue, merchandise sales, everything. It's only common sense that a larger population will mean more fans. So New York has two teams and Philly only has one... does that make New York fans better? No, it means there are more New Yorkers.

HIs point is 100% valid that the market size matters. It's not a question of the people in Nashville needing to be "better fans". They're doing as well as any Philly or Pittsburgh fans could so as well.

Yeah the Pens almost left Pittsburgh. Not because of season ticket sales or ticket revenues in general, but because of bad contracts, no control over the facilities played in, and poor management decisions. Just one more reason the average Pens fan w\orships Lemieux... he brought in the right ownership and made the right moves, with or without Crosby. NO doubt drafting Sid helped, but without great leadership that wouldn't have changed things anyway.