How to increase fandom in US
Dan Pereira
teams such as Winnipeg, Calgary, Edmonton, Ottawa, and Hartford. If these teams could be moved to such large cities as Phoenix, Atlanta, Houston, etc, it
would be a boon to the NHL. Just look how the NHL has been remarkably
successful in traditional non-hockey areas such as Tampa, Miami, Dallas,
San Jose and Anaheim. When new markets have seen the excitement of the
NHL, they have responded very well. With four or five franchise shifts
to other large markets, I don't see how the NHL's stature in the US could
not increase. Any criticisms?
Bri Farenell
: The problem with the NHL is the preponderance of who cares small market
Yeah. I wouldn't call Calgary or Edmonton a "who cares small market". If
you've ever been to or seen an Oilers-Flames game, I think you find that
a whole province cares. Also, Calgary draws pretty well. Edmonton used to
(when they actually cared about winning). Calgary outdraws Dallas. Granted,
it's mainly because teh Saddledome is a lot larger than Reunion Arena. Another
reason is fad-ness. Sure, the nHL has been successful in Tampa, Miami,
Dallas, SJ and Anaheim. But how long has hockey been there? I'd like
to wait 10-15 years, when the fad has worn off, and see if hockey is
still big in those cities.
________________________________________________________________________________
> Bri Farenell Go Bruins! | ADIRONDACK RED WINGS <
> fare...@craft.camp.clarkson.edu | 1993-94 AHL Northern Div. Champs <
> Glens Falls HS '91 Clarkson Univ. '95 | The Drive for 5 (Calder Cups) <
> AHL and NCAA contact for rec.sport.hockey| '81 '86 '89 '92 '94? <
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GO USA HOCKEY --- 1994 WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS
This act. will likely be only checked a few times weekly from 5/7 till late Aug.
Graham Hudson
playoff game. The market there is huge.
Especially with them playing the cross river rival Rangers.
LA was nothing until Gretzky came by.
Nobody in the city knew who Dionne, Taylor, Simmer were unless they owned
seasons' tickets. That is one of the bigger markets in the world.
The NHL should put teams in cities that a) want them
b) have a large pop base (250,000+)
c) are not loaded with other teams
Phoenix would be okay, but how many people really follow hockey there?
I still think a team should go to Minnesota (St.Paul-Minneapolis).
That is a travesty.
Seattle would be a great choice (tho Vancouver would hate it)
Denver wouldn't be bad (I know they tried before...)
I hope Calgary/Edmonton don't lose their teams.
Hartford...who cares. (Sorry Whaler fans.)
Ottawa...give them a few more years...IF they build the Palladium.
Hamilton deserves one...but politics will never let that happen.
--
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:: ::
:: Graham Hudson ::
:: University of Waterloo ::
:: ::
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:: ::
:: "It is not I who am CRAZY... ::
:: It is I who am MAD!" ::
:: -Ren ::
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Cameron Scott Penner
Spoken like a true hockey fan. Everyone knows that Canada is too small a
market to support more than one team. In fact, most Canadians would be
HAPPY to only have one team to cheer for. We could choose between the
Leafs and the Canadiens. Certainly would make the choice of what to show
on HNIC a lot easier. Let's add shootouts too, and play it in 4 quarters
too. Maybe a larger ice surface, and flourescent pucks would help increase
popularity too.
sheesh.
-Kam
Dan Pereira
>Dan Pereira (d...@fraser.sfu.ca) wrote:
>: The problem with the NHL is the preponderance of who cares small market
>: teams such as Winnipeg, Calgary, Edmonton, Ottawa, and Hartford. If
>: these teams could be moved to such large cities as Phoenix, Atlanta,
>: Houston, etc, it
>: would be a boon to the NHL. Just look how the NHL has been remarkably
>: successful in traditional non-hockey areas such as Tampa, Miami, Dallas,
>: San Jose and Anaheim. When new markets have seen the excitement of the
>: NHL, they have responded very well. With four or five franchise shifts
>: to other large markets, I don't see how the NHL's stature in the US could
>: not increase. Any criticisms?
>Yeah. I wouldn't call Calgary or Edmonton a "who cares small market". If
>you've ever been to or seen an Oilers-Flames game, I think you find that
>a whole province cares. Also, Calgary draws pretty well. Edmonton used to
>(when they actually cared about winning). Calgary outdraws Dallas. Granted,
>it's mainly because teh Saddledome is a lot larger than Reunion Arena. Another
>reason is fad-ness. Sure, the nHL has been successful in Tampa, Miami,
>Dallas, SJ and Anaheim. But how long has hockey been there? I'd like
>to wait 10-15 years, when the fad has worn off, and see if hockey is
>still big in those cities.
Sorry, I did not want to insult any teams. I'm just stating from a US
perspective that these are "who cares"teams. If the NHL wants to get
a national TV contract in the states, it will be difficult to do with
so many small market Canadian teams. It is a shame for Canada as it is
the cradle of hockey. However, to grow the NHL has to look southward.
Thomas Darling
> The problem with the NHL is the preponderance of who cares small market
> teams such as Winnipeg, Calgary, Edmonton, Ottawa, and Hartford.
Oh, please. Ottawa is the capital city of hockey's homeland, and although
the Civic Center is admittedly small, there hasn't been an unsold seat since
the team appeared last season (that is not an exagguration, either). If
you want to look to problem markets, check out Pittsburgh: their "fans"
bolted last year after they failed to win the Cup, and before their pitiful
exit this year they couldn't even sell out their playoff games.
> If these teams could be moved to such large cities as Phoenix, Atlanta,
> Houston, etc, it would be a boon to the NHL.
Expanding into such places is a great idea; it doesn't have to go hand-in-
hand with taking teams away from hockey towns. (I'm not sure about Atlanta,
though. Do they want a hockey team? Will they keep it this time? Will it
be owned by Ted Turner and Jane Fonda and shown with a colorized puck on
TNT?)
I think that at the root of this thread, you have to ask yourself: why do
you want to increase US hockey fandom? Will it make the game better? Do we
need another cartoonish team named after a mediocre kid's movie skating
around Maple Leaf Gardens?
I've got criticisms of the NHL right now, but they wouldn't be solved by an
influx of Americanizing money and pop culture.
-----------------\\\----------------------------------------------------
Thomas A. Darling \\\ Call The Cellar Electronic Community: 610.539.3043
dar...@cellar.org \\\ Digital SoundLab Studio: Truth Through Technology
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Gary L Dare
>> The problem with the NHL is the preponderance of who cares small market
>> teams such as Winnipeg, Calgary, Edmonton, Ottawa, and Hartford.
Spoken with the luxury of being in Vancouver, 1/7th the size of
Chicago but with just as many hockey fans ...
>> If these teams could be moved to such large cities as Phoenix,
>> Atlanta, Houston, etc, it would be a boon to the NHL.
>Expanding into such places is a great idea; it doesn't have to
>go hand-in-hand with taking teams away from hockey towns.
Agreed. Bad geography and insularity on the part of potential
fans is not a reason to gut the league on a gamble ... when
teams from towns people never heard of win big, like Edmonton
or Calgary, people will pay the bucks to see them. The way
that the Panthers and Mighty Ducks were seeded in the last
expansion was the way that expansion should always have been
done. And the Sharks get credit for having overcome not
having that advantage ...
gld
--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Je me souviens ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Gary L. Dare
> g...@columbia.EDU Support NAFTA
> uk...@freenet.victoria.bc.ca (soon) Eat Mexican (El Teddy's ad)
Denis R. Papp
>d...@fraser.sfu.ca (Dan Pereira) writes:
>>teams such as Winnipeg, Calgary,
> ^^^^^^^
>Perhaps teams like hartford and ottawa are who cares teams,
>because they are no good; if this is your definition of who
Definitely
>cares, then the Flames are not included, for I, as a Flames
The Flames I believe have had quite low attendance, though
not actually a who cares team. People care, they just
dont go to the games.
Edmonton: here there's a problem. The owner Peter Pocklington
cant afford upkeeping the team, so he just utterly mangled them
by trading away any players who were too expensive or woh
asked for more money (pretty much the entire 'awesome oilers of
4 cups'). So they just plummetted.
Because they suck, attendance drops, though thats not the whole
reason. myself I dont go because it costs so bloody much.
I'm not going to pay 22+$ to have to drive all the way to the
other side of the city (or whatever) and waste a lot of time
getting in and out of there. Maybe a couple of times during
the summer but otherwise I dont have the cash or time.
Though when I think of it, generally I'm not sure if its money
or the team itself which keeps the attendance low.
Through the last umpteen months there was all that talk of the
Oilers moving - just recently they supposedly worked out a deal.
I'm not sure if things will improve since I dont know if Pocklington
will be making more money. A salary cap would definitely help.
A big problem for failing teams is not really the low attendance,
but the fact that there is low attendance AND that the stadium
they play in just rips off all the profits. 'Successful' teams,
especially those in the states, have the teams getting a lot more
from the stadium profits. In the aforementioned 'who cares' markets,
I believe a lot of the teams dont get much money out of what the
stadium makes. So thats another problem.
Oh yeah, on that population note. Edmonton is not over 1 million,
but rather about 7-800000 including suburbs, maybe a bit more than
Calgary. Vancouver has over 1 million.
Looking at some of the 'successful' teams I'm not sure that
population is a problem. Most of the cities have populations of
~1 million (Boston for example has about the same as Edmonton
I think..?). Of coursewhen I think about it again, in the states
population is a lot more dense and there might be a lot of people
that come in from surrounding territory.
Kind of wierd when you think that 20 years ago there wouldnt even
be talk like this. Teams could survive without too much trouble
I think. Iwouldnt mind hearing some opinions on why this is so.
Players didnt expect to get payed as much? There was a lot more
cash and time so attendance was up?
Go New York 'New Oilers'!
--
Adam Glover
Hartford I agree about (they only get 8000 fans a game), maybe Ottawa too.
As for Calgary, Edmonton, Winnipeg, and Quebec City, it's not like those
teams don't have fan support. Their arenas often sell out, it's their
owners who have learned from Peter Puck that they can milk their ultimatums
for new taxpayer funded arenas for all it's worth. At least the good thing
about these small market Canadian cities is that the NHL doesn't have to
compete with anybody but the CFL (which is on the verge of extinction and
doesn't coincide much with the NHL schedule anyway), unlike most American
cities where Hockey tackes fourth place to Football, Baseball, and
Basketball. Not that I'm against having teams in places like Florida and
San Jose. I read an interesting quote from Igor Larionov yesterday
comparing Vancouver to San Jose. He basically said that in Vancouver
you have a bunch of so-called experts in the stands who tell you how you
ought to be playing, whereas in San Jose the fans just cheer and enjoy
the game.
--
"You are guests in my corn ..." -- Kevin Costner (Field of Dreams).
Adam Glover, kool...@io.org. Etobicoke, Ontario, Canada.
Scott Jeffrey
>From: kool...@io.org (Adam Glover)
>Subject: Re: How to increase fandom in US
>Date: 8 May 1994 10:16:43 -0000
>Hartford I agree about (they only get 8000 fans a game), maybe Ottawa too.
>As for Calgary, Edmonton, Winnipeg, and Quebec City, it's not like those
>teams don't have fan support. Their arenas often sell out, it's their
>owners who have learned from Peter Puck that they can milk their ultimatums
>for new taxpayer funded arenas for all it's worth.
That's the problem. These teams don't automatically sell out. I lived in
Winnipeg for five years, and in Edmonton for the last two, and have attended
numerous Jets and Oilers games. These teams hardly ever sell out. In fact,
Oiler attendance over the last two years (not surprisingly) was poor. Same
goes for Winnipeg. Now, not every team can expect to sell out every game.
However, given the arena capacities, and the salaries of today's players, 13,
000 or 14,000 fans is just not good enough, regardless of the owners.
>At least the good thing
>about these small market Canadian cities is that the NHL doesn't have to
>compete with anybody but the CFL (which is on the verge of extinction and
>doesn't coincide much with the NHL schedule anyway), unlike most American
>cities where Hockey tackes fourth place to Football, Baseball, and
>Basketball.
The CFL is not on the verge of extinction. It is on the verge of evolving
into something very different, but it is not about to go away. Hockey in "
small" market Canadian cities has to compete, however, with NFL football,
NBA basketball, college sports, etc., which reach sports fans through the
magic of television. Why pay a lot of money for the right to sit in
uncomfortable seats, get a bad view, and pay outrageous prices for bad food,
when you can sit at home for free (almost) and get instant replays, etc.?
There's one of the big problems facing small market hockey teams.
Scott Jeffrey
University of Alberta
sjef...@re.ualberta.ca
Go Leafs Go!!!!
27 years is long enough to wait!!
Marc Green
>Dan Pereira (d...@fraser.sfu.ca) writes:
>> The problem with the NHL is the preponderance of who cares small market
>> teams such as Winnipeg, Calgary, Edmonton, Ottawa, and Hartford.
>Oh, please. Ottawa is the capital city of hockey's homeland, and although
>the Civic Center is admittedly small, there hasn't been an unsold seat since
>the team appeared last season (that is not an exagguration, either). If
>you want to look to problem markets, check out Pittsburgh: their "fans"
>bolted last year after they failed to win the Cup, and before their pitiful
>exit this year they couldn't even sell out their playoff games.
You're either stupid or dense. The problem with the small Canadian villages
isn't what they draw at home, it's that they are lousy draws on the road.
Hartford has always been mismanaged.
As far as Pittsburgh not selling out is concerned, neither did Boston. And
no one complains about their fans. The problem is outrageous playoff
ticket prices, not fan interest.
Marc Green
Barry Pearce
> You're either stupid or dense. The problem with the small Canadian villages
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
I was going to flame this "person". But then I noticed where he is posting
from. Another arrogant ass from "Trawna" spouting off about what he presumes to be
his second-class neighbors. If it doesn't say Toronto on it, it isn't worthy!
Same shit, different asshole!
--BP
Gerald Olchowy
>
>That's the problem. These teams don't automatically sell out. I lived in
>Winnipeg for five years, and in Edmonton for the last two, and have attended
>numerous Jets and Oilers games. These teams hardly ever sell out. In fact,
>Oiler attendance over the last two years (not surprisingly) was poor. Same
>goes for Winnipeg. Now, not every team can expect to sell out every game.
>However, given the arena capacities, and the salaries of today's players, 13,
>000 or 14,000 fans is just not good enough, regardless of the owners.
>
In major pro sports today, the number of ordinary joe's who buy tickets
is becoming irrelevant...pro-sports is financed out of the entertainment
tax deduction, which allows teams to build arenas (usually with
public money) with private boxes, which are then
sold to corporations, subsidized by the taxpayer through the
entertainment deduction. Unless your city has enough head offices
of big enough companies to buy these taxpayer-subsidized boxes, it
basically is going to have an extremely difficult time supporting
a major sports franchice (unless there is significant revenue
sharing and a salary cap). Bill Wirtz has enough private boxes
in the new Chicago arena, that with no ordinary fan buying a ticket,
his revenue stream would be larger than that of Edmonton or
Winnipeg, and maybe even Calgary.
Gerald
Neal Lavon
MG> From: gr...@ie.utoronto.ca (Marc Green) Organization: University of
MG> Toronto, Department of Industrial Engineering Date: Tue, 10 May 1994
MG> 13:55:01 GMT
MG>
MG> dar...@cellar.org (Thomas Darling) writes:
MG>
> Dan Pereira (d...@fraser.sfu.ca) writes:
>
> The problem with the NHL is the preponderance of who cares small market
> teams such as Winnipeg, Calgary, Edmonton, Ottawa, and Hartford.
>
> Oh, please. Ottawa is the capital city of hockey's homeland, and
> although the Civic Center is admittedly small, there hasn't been an
> unsold seat since the team appeared last season (that is not an
> exagguration, either). If you want to look to problem markets, check
> out Pittsburgh: their "fans" bolted last year after they failed to win
> the Cup, and before their pitiful exit this year they couldn't even sell
> out their playoff games.
>
MG> As far as Pittsburgh not selling out is concerned, neither did Boston.
MG> And no one complains about their fans. The problem is outrageous
MG> playoff ticket prices, not fan
MG> interest.
This has been a problem this year for the NHL. Games were not sold out in
Boston, a hockey hotbed; in Pittsburgh, or here in Washington where the Caps
put on a spirited series against the Penguins.
The Boston Globe said the price of the tickets were very high and the baseball
Red Sox were playing in town at the same time. Pittsburgh fans may have
realized that their team was not going to make it back to the finals.
Here in Washington, fan attendance has been dropping off steadily due to the
perceived indifference of management in not getting good players. But with the
signing of Joe Juneau and the hiring of Jim Schoenfeld as coach, I look for
more fan interest next season. The final home game against the Rangers was a
sellout, BTW. I'm surprised Boston did not sell out against New Jersey
although if the Bruins had survived to play the Rangers, I bet all of those
games would have sold out quickly, the great old rivalry coming into play.
But I agree that gouging ticket prices for the playoffs is discouraging fans
from going. Plus there are so many games, fans may be waiting to go in later
rounds, if there are any, when the game are more important.
"No good deed goes unpunished"...
an old Washington political proverb
--Neal Lavon, neal....@f70.n109.z.1.fidonet.org
Stephen Hector (Bedford HS94)
Pittsburgh sort of baffled me..They had a highly favored team and an Arena
that boston fans would kill for (no obstructed view!)..but hey, thats what
pittsburgh management gets for jacking up the prices
>
>The Boston Globe said the price of the tickets were very high and the baseball
>Red Sox were playing in town at the same time. Pittsburgh fans may have
>realized that their team was not going to make it back to the finals.
Red Sox and Bruins fans are different. We do our stuff, they do their stuff.
The reasons boston fans didnt sell out a few games are these
#1-The Boston Garden is a pit, and is getting worse by the day. Since the
Shawmutt Center is being built the Jacob brothers havent bothered to
renovate..I dont know about you, but spending three hours in a place that
gets to be a 100 degrees on FEBRUARY nights let alone in the summer is not
my idea of a good time
#2-Prices. Why jack up the prices 10 dollars? I remember paying 80 bucks
from a "registered ticket agency" this year to see the B's get slaughtered
by the penguins. What's the point in spending probably a 100 to sit in some
dilapitated old barn panting and squished?
#3-Product. The product the B's were showing us before the playoffs was
almost disgraceful. What are fans supposed to think when they see their
team losing to such tough teams as the Whalers and Lightning? Not to
mention almost getting beaten by Ottawa. Local press had the B's getting
wasted by the Habs.
>
>Here in Washington, fan attendance has been dropping off steadily due to the
>perceived indifference of management in not getting good players. But with the
>signing of Joe Juneau and the hiring of Jim Schoenfeld as coach, I look for
>more fan interest next season. The final home game against the Rangers was a
>sellout, BTW. I'm surprised Boston did not sell out against New Jersey
>although if the Bruins had survived to play the Rangers, I bet all of those
>games would have sold out quickly, the great old rivalry coming into play.
>
>But I agree that gouging ticket prices for the playoffs is discouraging fans
>from going. Plus there are so many games, fans may be waiting to go in later
>rounds, if there are any, when the game are more important.
>
>"No good deed goes unpunished"...
>an old Washington political proverb
>--Neal Lavon, neal....@f70.n109.z.1.fidonet.org
>
>
The league has to address the playoff issue. Why are the prices higher?
Teams are supposedly booked in for 84 game schedules. You would figure that
any games over the limit would be a bonus as it is to the players,
management, and building. So why jack up the prices? are they just
admitting that the regular season mean BS? That the players dont give a damn
until the playoffs? If anything prices should be lowered during the
playoffs to reward the fans for dishing out crazy money during the regular
season!
well seeeya!
"No bad deed goes unrewarded"-Mafia proverb...heheheh
--
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