Thrashers, Atlanta were never given a chance
Thrashers fans tried hard to keep hope, season after season. But the deck was stacked against them. (Hyosub Shin/AJC)
(Updated: 12:30 p.m.)
This is how it ends: With the weasel of a commissioner not stepping foot in the city, with another season passing without a playoff game, with a lying ownership group maintaining it did all it could to save a franchise that in reality it spent most of seven years wrecking.
Atlanta has lost an NHL expansion team to a Canadian outpost for the second time. The Thrashers are going to Winnipeg just like the Flames went to Calgary in 1980. A press conference was held in Winnipeg, while the Thrashers sent out this warm-and-fuzzy news release: “The Atlanta Thrashers announced today that they have entered into an asset purchase agreement with True North Sports and Entertainment …”
This isn’t about the fans or the market or certainly Gary Bettman’s fictional “covenant” with fans, which I believe he left in the same sock drawer with his conscience. It’s about greed and abandonment, plain and simple. It’s about a disingenuous ownership group, which had long lost any semblance of credibility, serving up fans swill and gruel and then wondering why the turnstiles sleep at night.
They’ll tell you they care. They don’t. They’re walking away with a fat check. While you mourn the loss of a franchise, they’re waving goodbye with one middle finger.
The NHL is leaving a city that never really was given a chance. It’s going back to a city that it left 15 years ago and that has grown by about 60,000 people and a couple of doughnut shops since. They will be discussing this decision one day at business schools, right after the sections on Charles Ponzi and Enron.
Atlanta didn’t fail. The franchise failed. But the NHL doesn’t care about that. This is a league that survives on franchise fees and relocation fees. It collected $80 million from Ted Turner for an expansion fee in 1997. (He joked in the Board of Governors meeting that followed that he could’ve saved $70 million by purchasing the Flames from Tom Cousins for $10 million. Nobody laughed.) The league reportedly will collect another $60 million for permission to move the Thrashers to Manitoba.
In five years, when another failing franchise wants to move into Philips Arena, Bettman will be happy to collect another fat relocation fee, and he’ll deliver the same canned, phony speech about how he always believed in this market. The guy has told so many lies, it’s a wonder he’s not an Atlanta Spirit partner. (One postscript: Bettman referred to them as the “Atlantic” Spirit on Tuesday.)
Now living in Calgary.
There are hockey teams in Tampa and San Jose and Raleigh, and I could go on. There’s still one inexplicably in Phoenix, which the NHL is floating for another year, maybe because Bettman plans to retire and open up a pawn shop there one day. Is Atlanta an inferior market to any of those cities? Or does product have something to do with it?
There was no reason to do this now. When the Phoenix-to-Winnipeg deal fell apart, the NHL (which owns the Coyotes) was out $170 million. Bettman panicked. So he crossed out Phoenix and wrote in Atlanta. But why couldn’t he have waited a year to see if another owner for the team
Now living in Winnipeg.
emerged? Winnipeg wasn’t going anywhere. Was Bettman that desperate for the $60 million?
“I have absolutely no doubt that this market can support an NHL team,” said Bob Hartley, a native Canadian, a Stanley Cup winner in Colorado and the only coach to get the Thrashers to the playoffs. “It’s a huge disappointment to see the Atlanta franchise leave before so many other cities in the league. I loved it there. My last two years in Atlanta were as exciting as what I went through in Colorado. We had only two [home] playoffs games but it was a Stanley Cup atmosphere. But Hoss [Marian Hossa] left, Kovy [llya Kovalchuk] left, I was gone. It felt like the organization was drained of its energy.”
First player: Damian Rhodes. First draft pick: Patrik Stefan. First coach: Curt Fraser. First general manager: Don Waddell. That was only the beginning. Eleven seasons: one playoff berth, no wins.
Turner was followed by AOL/Time Warner, a bad marriage that was followed by an even worse one: Atlanta Spirit, LLC. Hossa saw no future here. Kovalchuk, given so many misdirections by part-owner Bruce Levenson in negotiations, wasn’t even sure the team would stay. Both wanted out.
There never was a commitment. There never was hope. There never was a plan — at least not one that worked.
A city just lost a franchise. While you mourn, they laugh. It’s nothing less than shameful.
By Jeff Schultz
♦
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1,115 comments Add your comment
TheAntiMe
May 31st, 2011
6:26 pm
Winnipeg and Calgary are “outposts”? What a jerk!
Calm down, you read that all wrong. Those places aren’t “outposts”. They obviously are “outhouses.” But don’t be silly, everyone in the galaxy knows that. See, feel better now?
fire don waddell
May 31st, 2011
6:27 pm
To RC, Mike Phelan and all the other Canadian trolls…if Winnipeg “deserves” a team and Atlanta doesn’t, why couldn’t the Jets outdraw the Thrashers?
Reality check
May 31st, 2011
6:32 pm
Hockey and the southern US are just a poor fit. Hockey is a cold weather sport, born of snowy days and iced-over ponds. Not exactly Georgia-like, is it?
I just wish Bettman and the NHL would stop forcing this league into places where it just doesn’t belong.
Cheer on your Hawks, Falcons and Braves, Atlanta. Those sports sense for you.
Thoroughbred
May 31st, 2011
6:34 pm
Weird… is this hockey that thing on versus were the figure skaters skate with sticks and wear helmets?
Seriously what a great day for Atlanta. Hockey sucks! Let Canada have the thrashers and the rest of the NHL. Canada by the way is almost as much of a waste as the stupid sport of hockey. All you thrashers fans upset move north losers.
Oh and by the way everybody calling people in Atlanta rednecks last time I checked Barry Melrose on ESPN who is the hockey guru has a mullet.
Bitter Grizz Fan
May 31st, 2011
6:35 pm
This situation is exactly the same as when the Grizzlies left Vancouver. The city did not fail the NBA, the franchise and league failed the city.
Swap, Bettman for Stern and Heisley for your owners and you could write the same story.
Atlanta, we feel your frustration!
Atl+NHL=Black Hole
May 31st, 2011
6:37 pm
@Winnipeg = Poverty
First, The Jets didn’t leave Winnipeg due to lack of support. Quite the contrary. They left because no one from the area was willing to buy the team and keep them there. Sound familiar? Second, your argument about market viability based on local population is ridiculous. 700,000+ living in Winnipeg and over 5mil in Atl. Winnipeg lives hockey, just ask the thousands of fans partying across the city tonight. Atlanta? not so much. Sorry you lost your team, it sucks, but they are coming to a burgeoning hockey crazed market where they will thrive and be loved. The same could never be said down there, ever.
John
May 31st, 2011
6:39 pm
Atlanta is a football city the majority of the people in the city are football fans the other sports teams come second.
Bruce Levenson
May 31st, 2011
6:42 pm
I cried for about 2 minutes this morning…but that’s only a minute longer than my normal morning cry.
OHL
May 31st, 2011
6:43 pm
Mr. Schultz,
I am having trouble finding your other articles on the Thrashers from years past. Can you please post the links here? Didn’t you write about them before? Didn’t you support the team and give journalistic coverage of them?
Fred
May 31st, 2011
6:44 pm
@Thoroughbred
Yeah, you’re one talk about losers. Oh, and nothing is a bigger waste than the life you live.
Adam12
May 31st, 2011
6:46 pm
Screw the Atlanta Spirit, screw the NHL, man it sucks being an Atlanta sports fan
I hate this, I hate that
May 31st, 2011
6:46 pm
What is with the people who have to always tell you about what they hate? I hate hockey, blah blah blah…I hate soccer…blah, blah, blah.
Do everybody a favor and shut your wordhole.
TheAntiMe
May 31st, 2011
6:47 pm
Weird… is this hockey that thing on versus were the figure skaters skate with sticks and wear helmets?
Seriously what a great day for Atlanta. Hockey sucks! Let Canada have the thrashers and the rest of the NHL. Canada by the way is almost as much of a waste as the stupid sport of hockey. All you thrashers fans upset move north losers.
Wow, Thoroughbred, I would have thought that you would have liked hockey. After all, many times hockey games end in a tie which is often times compared to kissing your sister. With a name like Thoroughbred, it’s obvious that you and yours take the sister kissing concept to a whole other level.
WTF?
May 31st, 2011
6:47 pm
The fools up in Winnipeg don’t really see what they are getting. They are just glad to have hockey back. Well that’s all they’ll get. With the current coach and lack of quality players the new Winnipeg team will be a huge disappointment and who knows they may ask us to take them back after the next season. Thrashers tickets were too high for the lack of wins, half the arena was empty from all the corporate seats that nobody hardly ever used, and if there isn’t racing engines or balls involved a sport will never make it in Atlanta. There’s always Nashville. Heck they can even win and make it to the playoffs!!!
canucklehead
May 31st, 2011
6:47 pm
Its to bad that your team moved to winterpeg,but dont be dissen them.if you had gone to the games then maybe
Roy Mabe Jr.
May 31st, 2011
6:49 pm
How can the Thrashers leave the great fans of Atlanta behind when they were already burned by the Flames(no pun intended.For some reason, the thinking is that Atlanta doesn’t want a hockey team.
so is Canada part of the UK or not?
May 31st, 2011
6:50 pm
This team will not be playing in Winnipeg in 10 years – guaranteed.
Mark
May 31st, 2011
6:51 pm
I moved to ATL from a very strong hockey town, Philadelphia,. and was thrilled when Atlanta got another hockey team in 1999. The franchise felt right at the outset, but ultimately this team was done in by bad ownership and even worse player management. With the talent that came through in the early years, they surely should have had more success on the ice. That alone would have kept the team in Atlanta.
Another factor is that let’s face it…a LOT of people in ATL do not even dream of driving downtown during rush hour to see sporting events. It’s a huge pain in the ass. That certainly has bearing on the attendance of the Hawks and Thrashers. As long as teams play in Philips Arena, it will be an issue. Especially factoring in at the ticket prices that hockey commands, or tries to command. Am I going to sit in traffic for an hour and a half to drive down from Alpharetta for an $80 lower level seat for a crappy team? NO WAY.
I thought the amount of northern transplants, like myself, would help provide a certain level of support for this team to keep in there initially while the southern contingent started to build a real fan base as they learned the game more. The fact of the matter is the product on the ice the past few years has been abysmal, and the ownership could not have cared less. Honestly, it is hard to blame the fans at all for this team leaving. They got jipped.
Gary Bettman is the worst commissioner by far in all of the major sports (although Goodell is gaining ground). He always has a hidden agenda, and one of them clearly was getting Canada another hockey team. With 4 teams in the southeast and one in Phoenix, it was only a matter of time before one was moved. I do think this is a good move for the NHL in that super small market Winnipeg will support the game more than Atlanta or Phoenix or Raleigh ever will. But the reality is the NHL should contract 2 teams altogether. Expansion into certain markets for a game that is not as widely recognized is not a smart move. Bettman knows this. Which is why Atlanta once again no longer has a hockey team.
sort of
May 31st, 2011
6:51 pm
Canada is England’s b*tch.
Dred
May 31st, 2011
6:52 pm
@Winnipeg = Poverty
Cry much? So, you think players won’t want to come and play in Winnipeg. Well that’s fine they’ll just fine players actually from the city, you know players like but not specifically, Duncan Keith, Patrick Sharp, Jonathan Toews, Travis Zajac, need i go on? You see Winnipeg actually churns out some pretty decent players and even some stars, unlike say, Atlanta?
Mark
May 31st, 2011
6:53 pm
someone else wrote “half the arena was empty from all the corporate seats that nobody hardly ever used”…another HUGE problem with Philips Arena in the terms of having a solid fan base supporting.
I forgot Nashville also…that team is a mirror of what the Thrashers could have been…they have built their fan base by being competitive.
Funny
May 31st, 2011
6:55 pm
@sort of
And you’re mine.
Funny
May 31st, 2011
6:56 pm
@wingo
Two words for ya from the great white north…..blow me
wingo
May 31st, 2011
6:57 pm
When you look at the population density of Canada, it looks like they are all trying to get into the US. What a joke of a country.
PureEvil
May 31st, 2011
6:59 pm
but dont be dissen them.if you had gone to the games then maybe
People would go to games and DID go to games when the team was winning. When the team in Gwinnett is a better watch than the NHL team in Atlanta then there’s a problem.
Ike
May 31st, 2011
7:00 pm
It would be very hard for me if I were the Mayor of a city that the NHL came to and wanted an new building built after seeing how the they fast tracked Atlanta into a sale. Right after the Phoenix owner said he no longer wanted to own a team the NHL and other major sports teams began panicing because they did not want cities to know how easily they could pick up and leave town. Several sports columnist wrote about it at the time. And does anyone recall the NHL also waged a long and costly legal battle to keep Phoenix out of the hands of a group that wanted to move them to Hamilton because they wanted it to be an exspantion team to generate another big pay check for the NHL.
So now the NHL jumped ship on Atlanta claiming that the team could not be sold to someone that would keep them here based on the fact that Atlanta spirits finacial numbers that I for one find highly suspect. (it is easy in such a large company to place all of the losses on one branch of the company to make a point or write off the loss) The NHL will talk for a long time about how NHL level hockey can not work in Atlanta and that will let them sleep at night but we have never seen NHL level hockey in Atlanta we have only seen bush leauge Don Waddell brand hockey.
So when the NHL goes looking for new buildings for their teams I hope other cities tell them that after what they did in Atlanta that they are not trust worthy enough to use tax payer money for a new building.
NHL fan
May 31st, 2011
7:03 pm
Gary Bettman tosses a mean salad. I like it though and continue to want more.
Billy Bob
May 31st, 2011
7:06 pm
Who cares we don’t do Hockey in the South I repeat WE DON’T DO HOCKEY IN THE SOUTH. Go Dawgs, Falcons, Braves, and Hawks whooooooooooo!
YeeHaw
May 31st, 2011
7:08 pm
@JasonBartlett
HeeHaw?? WTF is that? An you’d about incest wouldn’t ya, i mean you southerners are the ones who practically made it a sport. You doing your sister i bet attracts more ppl than all thrasher games combined
jerk store
May 31st, 2011
7:10 pm
Funny,
Great comebacks. Your wit is razor sharp, about as sharp as the knife that was used to cut the umbilical cord off between your country and the Queen of England. Didn’t quite cut all the way through.
The Truth
May 31st, 2011
7:10 pm
Hey Wingo
Your right, the population is a lot more DENSE in the US, especially where you reside
Rutherford Seydel
May 31st, 2011
7:14 pm
If anybody sees Ed Peskowitz walking the streets looking for change, tell him I have his $20 waiting…stuck in my butt crack.
Bring it old man.
Knight Survivor
May 31st, 2011
7:16 pm
Bring back the Knights and Berkman! They did this city right and were kicked out for a half ass run NHL team.
We need a team that relies on fans and not the corporations as much!!
Ron K
May 31st, 2011
7:16 pm
How can this idiot comment about someplace he knows nothing about ?
Beau Turner
May 31st, 2011
7:18 pm
My daddy told me that something happened today that involved my money. I don’t have reliable internet here in my luxury lagoon hut in Bora Bora, so I had my driver take me into town where I could check things out. I’m just as upset as many of you. My daddy says good. I say bad.
TheAntiMe
May 31st, 2011
7:24 pm
I hope that you have another blog ready, Jeff, because something tells me that things are going to get uuuuggggly before this night is over.
Joe
May 31st, 2011
7:26 pm
@Ron K
He’s bitter. They just lost their team and he’s lashing out because of it. It’s ok he’ll wake up tomorrow and realize no one other than himself actually cares about hockey there and he will move on.
FactsFromWpg
May 31st, 2011
7:27 pm
Sorry you folks had to lose for us to gain. I feel for the hockey fans of your fine city.
As for the author’s jibes at Winnipeg… hahaha. We Canadians like to laugh, even at ourselves, and that “60,000 people and a couple of doughnut shops” one was pretty good.
If you really want to know why you lost your team to a “remote Canadian outpost”… We had thousands of people celebrating in the streets today and you had a couple of doughnut shop’s worth show up to save your team. Case closed.
Ed Peskowitz
May 31st, 2011
7:27 pm
Rutherford, lucky for me I no longer have a sense of smell in my Rudolph nose due to the years and years of alcohol abuse. I’ll call a truce and take that 20 from your backside.
Winnipeg = Poverty
May 31st, 2011
7:28 pm
@Dred I know Winnipeggers are dumb and they have a problem with how everybody in Canada pokes fun at Winnipeg and this makes those from Winnipeg very sensitive. Those players from Winnipeg you mentioned aren’t going to settle for one less penny to play in Winnipeg and players from everywhere else will avoid Winnipeg,so if you believe that Winnipeg will fare any better than they did the last time( no playoff wins) the NHL was in town think again.
Parker
May 31st, 2011
7:30 pm
Greed and abandonment are the reasons Winnipeg lost their team in the first place. Also, that’s a solid comparison with the Flames, seeing as how badly Calgary’s NHL franchise is failing. The only NHL team more difficult to find tickets to a game is the Leafs.
builderdawg
May 31st, 2011
7:30 pm
burn in hell ASG and don waddell
Michael Gearon, Jr.
May 31st, 2011
7:30 pm
Beau,
This may be a bad time to ask but you never gave me back the change from the last time we went through the 400 toll. You owe me 50 cents.
tmc
May 31st, 2011
7:33 pm
I wish the Hawks were sold, the spirit left town and Thrashers stayed.
But there wasn’t a chance in _ell that was going to happen.
Good luck ASG with that Hawks ownership next year!
Jim
May 31st, 2011
7:34 pm
Gee – how will I be able to see my beloved Caps now? Drive to Raleigh? I don’t think so! LET’S GO CAPS!
Larry
May 31st, 2011
7:35 pm
Personally, I would feel a lot better if they had shipped the Hawks to Winnipeg also.
Wpg/Pvrty = Yokel
May 31st, 2011
7:35 pm
You are a loser. You are such a loser and you know it. The proof you know it is that you know who this post is directed at. I guess all your posts were wrong. A big wrong was righted today.
Now that this is over, how about trying to find a job. Good luck with your depressed economy.
WPG LOGIC
May 31st, 2011
7:44 pm
If WPG is the “OUTHOUSE” why did ATLANTA get $*!T on
foolio
May 31st, 2011
7:45 pm
Please take the hawks or falcons instead….the thrashers were the only ATL team that had REAL fans and not just fairweather. U suck ASG. Enjoy your fatcat lifestyle while u can….like us all…u will be judged
south
May 31st, 2011
7:46 pm
THANK GOD….can we now move on to other news