The Predators, Del Biaggio, and Bettman...

[timothy]

http://www.tennessean.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080730/SPORTS02/807300432

http://www.tennessean.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080730/SPORTS02/807300433/1028

[Sotnos]

Wish I hadn't seen this right before lunch, it's the most interesting topic in the NHL right now IMO. I want to see some comments from you, Tim, I'm sure you've been hearing about this for months.

This document is a must read. It's a .pdf (http://www.tennessean.com/assets/pdf/DN112667711.PDF) that DelBiaggio was passing out to potential investors. He was trying to get others on board with him, promising that they'd be able to seize the team in a few years.

Dude was building a house of cards & hoping to land majority ownership of an NHL team with it. Amazing.

[bolts37205]

that will develop and the KC intentions will be very clear. Hard to believe the NHL owners and committe could be fooled like the sadsacks they seem to be. Don't they hire folks who can look past the surface? Leiopold may not feel so good about getting out of Nashville now, cost him more than he knew. David Freeman is a venture capitalist big time but seems to be a really good guy to lots of folks in Franklin who think they known him well. So, who knows if he also has been hiding his financial strength (weakness?) and the Preds are gonna struggle to make the floor payroll?

[timothy]

I'll try to post my thoughts later tonight...

[Sotnos]

Didn't realize we had another TN resident on here, didn't mean to leave you out #37205!

I believe that the owners that are left were going to buy Woo's portion along with DelBiaggio's. I could be wrong but I think he's out of the picture.

Now, while I can understand that they didn't give Boots much scrutiny because he was already a minority owner (of the Sharks), I find the idea that the League doesn't look closely at these things overall to be doubtful. Approval for our sale took months, and from a recent article, it sounded like they even asked Koules about some fight he was in a hundred years ago. Maybe not everyone gets that much under the microscope, but it sounds like our guys sure did.

I'm going to sit & read that whole Tennessean article right now, but I do have a question for you TN residents. A lot of Preds fans claim that the newspaper is anti-Preds and prints more of the negative about them than the positive. Wonder what you think about that.

[ThorBolt]

Now, while I can understand that they didn't give Boots much scrutiny because he was already a minority owner (of the Sharks), I find the idea that the League doesn't look closely at these things overall to be doubtful.

I, to a point disagree, that it is doubtful the league looks closely at things. I think we had have had two owners here that should have raised red flags but were allowed in anyway. IMO, the mystery Japanese ownership and Art Williams just scream not looking too closely.

I think what happened is that Bettman and CO. have known about the NAS thing longer than what they are admitting to. And it was this final realization after so many questionable ownership groups, that a more through policy of investigating new ownership was introduced. The way I see it, OK/Len are the first new owners under a new ownership review process approved by the NHL.

As for the rest of the article, after doing a little research the NAS home attendance average for last year was 14,910. So it certainly looks like they are trying to get to a point where moving could be an option. In a more local connection, I wonder if such a document exists for the Bolts and if so what does it read. Do the owner's highlight out clauses and transfer cities?

Lastly, in a more global view, I wonder just how financially secure the NHL really is? Do they let in questionable ownership to prop up failing franchises. IMO, someday one of the big four leagues (NFL, MLB, NHL, NBA) is going to contract and the reason will be that the money train will have ended. I really believe that the first league to contract will have such a negative death pall placed over it that within a decade of contraction that league will either be a shell of what it once was or will be gone. IMO, Bettman may feel the same way and doesn't want to see the NHL test that theory.

[Avery86]

I kind of disagree with the point about contraction, Thor.

It seems that a lot of NHL fans are clamoring for contraction, not opposing it.

[Sotnos]

I think we had have had two owners here that should have raised red flags but were allowed in anyway. IMO, the mystery Japanese ownership and Art Williams just scream not looking too closely.
Apples and oranges. At the time the expansions to Tampa & Ottawa were granted, all they cared about were ownerships who didn't balk at paying the expansion fee. Every other group that applied tried to bargain.

I think what happened is that Bettman and CO. have known about the NAS thing longer than what they are admitting to. And it was this final realization after so many questionable ownership groups, that a more through policy of investigating new ownership was introduced. The way I see it, OK/Len are the first new owners under a new ownership review process approved by the NHL.
That's a lot of speculation on your part. They just didn't look at DelBiaggio because he was already a part owner with the Sharks, and now we hear that one of the guys on the committee giving him approval had given him the money to buy the team & didn't disclose it! Terrible.
So it certainly looks like they are trying to get to a point where moving could be an option.
That's not what the ownership that is left wants, they're locals. What they really need is someone with a lot more money than any of them to come in & take over, but I'm not sure there's someone out there willing to do that.

In a more local connection, I wonder if such a document exists for the Bolts and if so what does it read.
The Tennessean putting the contract in the paper was pretty rare, I don't think we'll get a look at any other team's contracts. The only attendance out clause I've ever heard of for the Bolts was being under 80% for so many years in a row, but I can't remember the # of years anymore since the last time we heard about it was probably '02.

Lastly, in a more global view, I wonder just how financially secure the NHL really is?The cap keeps going up because revenues are going up, so... To me the bigger issue now is revenue disparity but who knows what they're going to do about it. Here's a PDF showing team revenues per game (http://www3.thestar.com/static/PDF/080530_nhl_tickets_revenue.pdf), the gap is huge.

They'll let Balsillie buy and move TWO teams to Hamilton before they contract any. :D Contraction would be admitting failure, not to mention it'd cost the remaining owners a huge chunk of change to buy out franchises.

[Sotnos]

Part 2 of the article Tim linked above was published today.

http://www.tennessean.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080731/SPORTS02/807310374/1006/NEWS01

[timothy]

Luc Robitaille files complaint against del Biaggio in court:

http://www.hockeybuzz.com/blog.php?post_id=16772&blogger_id=51

[Sotnos]

It'd probably be easier to make a list of people NOT suing DelBiaggio at this point. What a scam artist.