It's Abundantly Clear that Canada Needs an 8th Team

[WordsOfWisdom]

Looking at the NHL standings, there's only ONE division with 7 teams. All the other divisions have 8.  Can you guess which one it is?  The Canadian division of course.

 

Isn't it enough that there are THREE fully stocked divisions of US-based teams, and ANOTHER US team on the way in Seattle?  Can we not have ONE stocked division of Canadian teams?  

 

Where are the Quebec Nordiques?  Hockey's most obvious revenue generating brand continues to sit on the shelf.  

 

Canada used to have 8 NHL teams back when the league had 24 teams. That's 1/3 of the teams. Today it's 7/31 and about to be 7/32... less than 1/4. 

 

Every expansion team added to the NHL since 1993 has been a US-based team. The Jets are the only team added to Canada since, and they were a relocation of a franchise that got relocated out of Canada in 1996. So it's still a net loss of teams for Canada since Gary Bettman took over as commissioner. 

 

If Bettman wants to be remembered for "growing the game" then his resume still shows negative growth in Canada. He did not "grow the game" at all north of the border.

 

[Podein25]

6 minutes ago, WordsOfWisdom said:

Looking at the NHL standings, there's only ONE division with 7 teams. All the other divisions have 8.  Can you guess which one it is?  The Canadian division of course.

 

Isn't it enough that there are THREE fully stocked divisions of US-based teams, and ANOTHER US team on the way in Seattle?  Can we not have ONE stocked division of Canadian teams?  

 

Where are the Quebec Nordiques?  Hockey's most obvious revenue generating brand continues to sit on the shelf.  

 

Canada used to have 8 NHL teams back when the league had 24 teams. That's 1/3 of the teams. Today it's 7/31 and about to be 7/32... less than 1/4. 

 

Every expansion team added to the NHL since 1993 has been a US-based team. The Jets are the only team added to Canada since, and they were a relocation of a franchise that got relocated out of Canada in 1996. So it's still a net loss of teams for Canada since Gary Bettman took over as commissioner. 

 

If Bettman wants to be remembered for "growing the game" then his resume still shows negative growth in Canada. He did not "grow the game" at all north of the border.

 

 

There's this thing called economics.

 

It's missing from your analysis.

[flyercanuck]

The new team could be the Toronto Matthews 50 Goal Scorers.

[Podein25]

7 minutes ago, flyercanuck said:

The new team could be the Toronto Matthews 50 Goal Scorers.

 

Or the Mississauga Spreadsheets

[ruxpin]

22 minutes ago, Podein25 said:

 

There's this thing called economics.

 

It's missing from your analysis.

It's not missing it you prorate it.

[Podein25]

Just now, ruxpin said:

It's not missing it you prorate it.

 

I know you mean this to be funny, which it is, but wait for WoW to post this as is serious response. "It was implied stoopid..."

[WordsOfWisdom]

10 hours ago, Podein25 said:

 

There's this thing called economics.

 

It's missing from your analysis.

 

You don't think an NHL franchise would be a success in Quebec City?  

 

The legit (profitable) places in Canada that could have a team right now are:

• Toronto/Mississauga/Markham/Vaughn/....  (the Greater Toronto Area basically)
• Quebec City/Montreal
• Vancouver/Burnaby/Richmond/Surrey BC

 

[WordsOfWisdom]

11 hours ago, flyercanuck said:

The new team could be the Toronto Matthews 50 Goal Scorers.

 

 

He's got one "Proj." 50-goal season in the bank and I'll be watching his numbers this season too.

 

Since it's a 56-game schedule this year, the magic number for Matthews to hit (for a projected 50) is:  CEILING(56 / 82 x 50) = 35 goals

 

If he hits 35 or more goals then it's back-to-back.  Let's go Matthews!   

 

Edited January 17, 2021 by WordsOfWisdom

[WordsOfWisdom]

11 hours ago, ruxpin said:

It's not missing it you prorate it.

 

You know what? I think I've finally hit on something (statistically).  I keep trying to invent new stats (with no big success) but I think this is the one!

 

The "Proj50" stat will take every season in NHL history, set it to 82 games, and fill any remaining player data for them to have played an 82-game season..... assuming their current INJURY pace and their current PRODUCTION. "Proj50" will be the number of projected 50-goal seasons that the player has as a result. (And we can extend it to 60, 70, or whatever.)

 

It WON'T grant a player games for time spent injured. So if a player plays 41 of his team's 82 games, then his stats finish exactly as they are. He doesn't get 41 games of statistical padding. However, if a player plays 41 games in a league where there are ONLY 41 games, then the player gets his stats doubled to get to 82.

 

Thoughts?  

 

[WordsOfWisdom]

11 hours ago, Podein25 said:

 

Or the Mississauga Spreadsheets

 

Spreadsheets are my life. Been using them since the days of Lotus 1-2-3 lol.

[flyercanuck]

5 hours ago, WordsOfWisdom said:

 

 

He's got one "Proj." 50-goal season in the bank and I'll be watching his numbers this season too.

 

Since it's a 56-game schedule this year, the magic number for Matthews to hit (for a projected 50) is:  CEILING(56 / 82 x 50) = 35 goals

 

If he hits 35 or more goals then it's back-to-back.  Let's go Matthews!   

 

 

The Flyers have the first undefeated season in the history of the NHL.

[OccamsRazor]

1 hour ago, flyercanuck said:

 

The Flyers have the first undefeated season in the history of the NHL.

 

56-0-0 let's get it dude!

[Puck_Pun]

I would love there to be a Quebec team. There are two things holding it back

 

1- is there someone with the money to pay for a license? The cost has gone up exponentially (Seattle was what,  $600m?). This is exacerbated by the lower Canadian dollar

 

2- expanding the game basically means finding untapped markets, and how many new hockey fans will you get with a Quebec team? It's more likely they'll get most of their supporters by eating Montreal's support base. It's the same reason why over here the AFL put two teams in rugby heartland instead of putting one in football obsessed Tasmania

[WordsOfWisdom]

3 hours ago, flyercanuck said:

Let's go Matthews!!!

 

That's the spirit!  

[WordsOfWisdom]

1 hour ago, Puck_Pun said:

I would love there to be a Quebec team. There are two things holding it back

 

1- is there someone with the money to pay for a license? The cost has gone up exponentially (Seattle was what,  $600m?). This is exacerbated by the lower Canadian dollar

 

2- expanding the game basically means finding untapped markets, and how many new hockey fans will you get with a Quebec team? It's more likely they'll get most of their supporters by eating Montreal's support base. It's the same reason why over here the AFL put two teams in rugby heartland instead of putting one in football obsessed Tasmania

 

Well to me, "expanding the game" means more teams. It doesn't matter what market they're in. Eventually you fill them all. If there's more of them (and they're all profitable) then you have successfully expanded the game. 

 

The NHL has placed a LOT of franchises in areas with no fan interest, and these franchises act as a drain on revenue sharing resources. They exist only because wealthier franchises are funding them. 

 

Balancing out differences in currency is important, because a franchise has no control over the value of the Canadian dollar. Pouring money into a franchise that routinely loses money in the southern US (like the Coyotes, Hurricanes, Panthers, etc...) is foolish. That's a strong American dollar and those franchises aren't getting it, so they have no excuses. 

 

At 32 teams, the NHL is already watered down enough that most of the players in the league are no longer recognizable as "stars". That means an existing team should relocate from the US to Quebec City. There are plenty of candidates, the easiest being the Panthers. That way you have Montreal, Toronto, Ottawa, and Quebec City all in the same division (I'm talking about the normal divisions of course).

 

For this season, it would have made a HUGE difference, since the Cdn teams can only play other Cdn teams. It was important to have another opponent.  Playing only 6 other teams over 56 games is going to get VERY BORING. The NHL blew an opportunity here, as it always has, in my opinion.

 

[Podein25]

3 hours ago, WordsOfWisdom said:

Well to me, "expanding the game" means more teams. It doesn't matter what market they're in.

 

Your OP says you want them in the Canadian market.

[Math]

On 1/16/2021 at 11:00 PM, WordsOfWisdom said:

You don't think an NHL franchise would be a success in Quebec City? 

 

I live in Québec City, french in my mother tongue, but honestly and coldy: no, I don't think it will be a success. I've never been a Nordiques fan, I had been quite indifferent to this team, thus I don't have the typical quebecer bias when it comes to this. Trying to be short and sweet, Nordiques won't be back for the following reasons:

• Small market: with Québec in the NHL, this will be the smallest market, even smaller than Arizona and Florida.
• French market: I know I'll piss my frenchie fellas, but this is a major drawback in terms of revenue generation, marketing and stuff. Besides that, attracting UFAs here will be a nightmare.
• Politics: Quebecor boss Pierre-Karl Péladeau, the guy who's behind the new arena and potential owner of a franchise, is a die-hard pro-sovereignty and a concurrent of Rogers. The last thing the league wants is to go into politics. With Québec in the league, Bettman & co. will be deep into it and I fully understand they don't want to go that route.
• Fanbase versatility: most of former Nordiques fans already turned into Habs or Bruins ones. If there's a team back in Québec, it would need to be successful immediately. 2 or 3 sucking seasons and everybody will go back buying Habs and Bruins merchandise. People here have no patience. I truly admire Leafs, Oilers and Jets fans because they are loyal even with a long history of sucking. Here, no playoffs for consecutive years will mean nobody in the arena.
• Economics: an expansion fee of more than $650M (it was $500M back when they were in contention with Vegas) and a weak CAD that should climb up in a foreseeable future.

Bettman and his folks never had the intention to consider Québec City as a potential expansion market. They said once that it could be an eventual possibility and the politics here took that for granted and build a brand new arena right away. An epic mistake. Everybody's blaming the League while victimizing themselves but it was obvious that Québec would always be the runner-up. The NHL has nothing to win in integrating Québec in the league. BTW, the NHL will have 32 teams, all spots are filled with all divisions in equilibrium.

 

The only way for Québec City to have a team would be through relocation, but unless exceptional circumstances this avenues is dead. Having the NHL back here is pure fan fantasy. I've spoken some years ago with Jean Gagnon, the former right-arm of Patrick Roy (owner/coach of the Québec Remparts) and some other folks that are deeply involved in ice hockey in the Province, no one sees the return of the NHL in the league.

 

[WordsOfWisdom]

21 hours ago, Podein25 said:

Your OP says you want them in the Canadian market.

 

I think given the fan interest, Canada absolutely deserves an 8th team yes.

 

This is why Canadians hate that little midgit Gary Bettman so much. If Bettman had grown the game in Canada as aggressively as he did in the US, we would have a second team in Toronto, a second team in Montreal, a team in Hamilton or London, and another team in BC.  Canada would be up to 12 teams if he did for us what he did for American hockey fans. Instead, you can tell how much Bettman hates Canada. Teams like Calgary, Vancouver, and Edmonton are only in the NHL on a technicality (being former WHA teams or relocated failed US franchises).  The NHL would have never put teams there (and would have never had players such as Wayne Gretzky as a result).

 

Has the NHL ever made a specific effort to expand into Canada?  I think the Ottawa Senators in 1992 are the ONLY Canadian expansion franchise. Every other Canadian team has been here from the league's inception or got brought in from the WHA.

 

One of the first moves Bettman made as commissioner was to pull the Jets out of Winnipeg and the Nordiques out of Quebec City. Yet he fought tirelessly to keep the Coyotes in Phoenix, with or without an owner!  

 

Did I mention that I hate Gary Bettman?   

[WordsOfWisdom]

1 hour ago, Villette/Lavaux said:

I live in Québec City, french in my mother tongue, but honestly and coldy: no, I don't think it will be a success. I've never been a Nordiques fan, I had been quite indifferent to this team, thus I don't have the typical quebecer bias when it comes to this. Trying to be short and sweet, Nordiques won't be back for the following reasons:

 

I've never been a Nordiques fan either, and I hate the province of Quebec.   

 

1 hour ago, Villette/Lavaux said:

Small market: with Québec in the NHL, this will be the smallest market, even smaller than Arizona and Florida.

 

It's half a million people in Quebec City with more that can come from surrounding areas. Plus you have no other sports teams to compete with. The NHL would be the only game in town.  In terms of fan base, the Ottawa Senators have more fans than the LA Kings for example. Population size doesn't mean anything. It's how many NHL fans you have that counts. It's why the Toronto hockey market is 10x larger than New York, despite the population difference. The New York Rangers are a niche sports team in New York. The Leafs are the "Yankees of Toronto". HUGE difference. Something Gary Bettman has never understood in all his years as commish. 

 

1 hour ago, Villette/Lavaux said:

French market: I know I'll piss my frenchie fellas, but this is a major drawback in terms of revenue generation, marketing and stuff. Besides that, attracting UFAs here will be a nightmare.

 

But you get that from Montreal already, and quite frankly UFAs piss and moan about playing in Canada period, so what difference would it make to play in Quebec City? It's no worse than Winnipeg, Edmonton, or Ottawa. If UFAs would rather learn another sport than play in Canada, fine by me.  

 

1 hour ago, Villette/Lavaux said:

Politics: Quebecor boss Pierre-Karl Péladeau, the guy who's behind the new arena and potential owner of a franchise, is a die-hard pro-sovereignty and a concurrent of Rogers. The last thing the league wants is to go into politics. With Québec in the league, Bettman & co. will be deep into it and I fully understand they don't want to go that route.

 

The politics of the owner has nothing to do with the team.  If Quebec were to separate from Canada (can't happen anyway) that would affect Montreal as it is. 

 

1 hour ago, Villette/Lavaux said:

Fanbase versatility: most of former Nordiques fans already turned into Habs or Bruins ones. If there's a team back in Québec, it would need to be successful immediately. 2 or 3 sucking seasons and everybody will go back buying Habs and Bruins merchandise. People here have no patience. I truly admire Leafs, Oilers and Jets fans because they are loyal even with a long history of sucking. Here, no playoffs for consecutive years will mean nobody in the arena.

 

I understand why they would have no patience. They've never had any success.  The Expos were snatched away in 1994 when they were on their way to a World Series championship thanks to the strike, and the Nordiques were taken away to Colorado just when they got good.  I'd be pissed off too!   

 

1 hour ago, Villette/Lavaux said:

Bettman and his folks never had the intention to consider Québec City as a potential expansion market.

 

I agree. That's why we hate Bettman so much. He's not trying to grow the game in Canada. He is trying to KILL the game in Canada. 

 

[Math]

21 minutes ago, WordsOfWisdom said:

I hate the province of Quebec

 

 

25 minutes ago, WordsOfWisdom said:

It's half a million people in Quebec City with more that can come from surrounding areas. Plus you have no other sports teams to compete with. The NHL would be the only game in town.  In terms of fan base, the Ottawa Senators have more fans than the LA Kings for example. Population size doesn't mean anything. It's how many NHL fans you have that counts.

 

In fact it's almost 800k if you include the south shore, but north it's only trees, rocks and ice, west is already the MGA, east there's nothing and south is some random redneck territory. I was more speaking about TV Market and how many people you can get from it. 

 

28 minutes ago, WordsOfWisdom said:

But you get that from Montreal already, and quite frankly UFAs piss and moan about playing in Canada period, so what difference would it make to play in Quebec City?

 

But Montréal is bilingual . The difference is, again, a french-speaking area far away from anything. I think there's a lot of players (US and some Canadians as well) that don't want to live in a fully french-speaking area (Lindros was one of those who publicly made it clear) and sometimes anglos are openly insulted in the streets here if they dare to speak english. That's terribly sad, but true.

 

34 minutes ago, WordsOfWisdom said:

The politics of the owner has nothing to do with the team.

 True, but this still may lead to some uncertainties. And that's exactly what markets hate the most. Bettman was already in charge when the Nordiques left (unavoidable IMO) at the time of the referendum.

 

38 minutes ago, WordsOfWisdom said:

I agree. That's why we hate Bettman so much. He's not trying to grow the game in Canada. He is trying to KILL the game in Canada.

I'm not a fan of Buttman either and the Coyotes telenovela was pathetic, but he goes where the money and potential growth is. When he was hired, his mandate was to develop hockey in the south. With some success if you see the economical health of the league (out of pandemic context, so to speak) but some failures as well. He didn't do anything to prevent teams from moving from Winnipeg, Hartford, Québec and Minnesota and for this one, I was pissed when the North Stars left back at the time, but if you looked at it later on with a step back and some perspective (and as heart-breaking as it was for fans) the move made sense, the circumstances were quite exceptional and all the stars were aligned (ahem...) to make that happen.

[OccamsRazor]

2 hours ago, Villette/Lavaux said:

Small market: with Québec in the NHL, this will be the smallest market, even smaller than Arizona and Florida.

 

You make a lot of it seems good points many i am not aware of and can't even dispute so i will have to take your opinion on it since you live there and seem to be in the know.

 

But even smaller than Arizona and Florida i find shocking and amazed at...wasn't aware but if it is the case then the NHL certainly needs to do their homework before they make a mistake.

 

And if not Quebec would you have another suggestion for another location in Canada for a team??

 

Because i really think one of if not both teams like Yotes and Panthers need to be moved and rescued.

[flyercanuck]

1 hour ago, WordsOfWisdom said:

 

I've never been a Nordiques fan either, and I hate the province of Quebec.   

 

 

 

 

 

 Let me guess....you've never spent any time there. One of the most beautiful provinces in this beautiful country. 

[Podein25]

2 minutes ago, flyercanuck said:

 

 Let me guess....you've never spent any time there. One of the most beautiful provinces in this beautiful country. 

 

In fairness, he'd have to leave his mom's basement first. 

[radoran]

On 1/16/2021 at 11:00 PM, WordsOfWisdom said:

• Toronto/Mississauga/Markham/Vaughn/....  (the Greater Toronto Area basically)
• Quebec City/Montreal
• Vancouver/Burnaby/Richmond/Surrey BC

 

The Leafs won't allow another Tronno-based team. The NHL has concerns about the effect on the Sabres as well if that team was in the Hamilton area.

 

Quebec City has already failed as a market.

 

Greater Vancouver has a population of about 2.4M. How are they supporting two teams?

[Podein25]

1 minute ago, radoran said:

 

The Leafs won't allow another Tronno-based team. The NHL has concerns about the effect on the Sabres as well if that team was in the Hamilton area.

 

Quebec City has already failed as a market.

 

Greater Vancouver has a population of about 2.4M. How are they supporting two teams?

 

Yabbut, what about Saskatoon?!