Faceoff Factor

Balsillie back again?

Mike Wilson | National Hockey League

Jun 23, 08:32 PM | Hype this story!

The Balsillie/Nashville controversies seem to never end. So, in case you missed anything about the history of this situation, here’s the whole story.

The History

Jim Balsillie was raised in Peterborough, Ontario. He was athlete of the year at both Trinity College and the University of Toronto, playing golf, hockey, and participating in triathlons. He is well known for his position as former chairman of Research In Motion (RIM), the makers of the Blackberry, and their current co-chief executive and director.

So what does that have to with hockey? Well, nothing. So here’s more…

Balsillie has obtained the rights to Copps Coliseum, an NHL-sized arena in Hamilton, Ontario. Also included in his possessions in Hamilton are Hamilton Place, The Hamilton Convention Center, and parking rights to each of the three venues.

Before the 2006-07 season, the Pittsburgh Penguins were looking for someone to buy the team who would keep it in Pittsburgh. And, on October 5, 2006, the Penguins appeared to have gotten just the man they were looking for when Balsillie made a $180 million (US) bid to purchase the team.

During the home opener when Paul Steigerwald and Bob Errey were interviewing him on FSN Pittsburgh, Balsillie learned that Bob Errey was also from the Peterborough area and was so amazed he let out an expletive on live television. Strike one.

Then, later in the season, when the Penguins were expressing concern over the lease termination of Mellon Arena, Balsillie, who already put a down payment on the team, said that the only way the Penguins were going to stay in Pittsburgh was if Isle of Capri was the approved casino for Pittsburgh by the state of Pennsylvania, ignoring Governor Ed Rendell’s alternative plan.

It was around this time that Pittsburghers began learning of this vacant arena in Balsillie’s name in Hamilton. Now, Penguins fans are even more uncertain of their teams’ future. Strike two.

I don’t have a strike three because, well frankly, this is hockey and there aren’t any strikes (except something I recall during the 2004-05 season…but that doesn’t count). So I don’t need a third one.

The offer made was withdrawn on December 15, 2006. Balsillie fled Pittsburgh with his $10 million deposit and the crushed dreams of Penguin fans clenched in his hands.

Luckily, it all worked out in the end.

But why is this important? Keep reading.

Episode II – Attack of the Clowns

On May 23, 2007, Balsillie and Craig Leipold come to a tentative agreement for Balsillie to purchase Leipold’s Nashville Predators. Fans in Nashville began expressing the same concern as Penguin fans did six months prior. And with good reason.

The fans knew Balsillie’s intentions, and they got the help of a friend in a high place. This help came from NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman, who didn’t want the team to move to Hamilton, Ontario, mainly because of marketing reasons.

The owners of the Predators were assuring their fans they were doing everything in their power to keep the team in Nashville. The part that wasn’t so convincing was that future supposed owner, Balsillie, had already begun accepting season ticket down payments for the Hamilton Predators.

During that offseason, he had collected more season ticket and luxury box down payments than the team had collected in prior years in Nashville. The point Balsillie was making was that Hamilton was, indeed, a well marketed city.

On a side note, the largest shopping plaza in Tennessee is Hamilton Place, located in Chattanooga. Talk about ironic!

The Problem

The National Hockey League doesn’t want a team in Hamilton, which is located in southern Ontario. Any mapquester can tell you Hamilton is 41 miles (47 minutes) from Toronto, 71 miles (1 hour and 20 minutes) from Buffalo, and 190 miles (3 hours) from Detroit. And those are three large market cities for the NHL.

Whether or not Hamilton can draw a big crowd for an inaugural season isn’t at question. The NHL doesn’t want to invade the markets of previously existing, and in the case of Toronto and Detroit – two of the original six, teams.

Instead, they want to create markets in cities far from other team’s markets (cough cough Kansas City cough Sprint Center cough cough).

But again you might be wondering why these events might be important now. So…

Why Now?

The Predators are still looking for a buyer and one of their minority owners, key investors, and possible future owners, William “Boots” Del Biaggio III, is facing federal fraud charges and possibly bankruptcy. According to WKRN Nashville, Del Biaggio was responsible for 27% of the Predators’ stock, which equals about $9.8 million.

So the team’s owners either have to, through a combined effort, make up for Del Biaggio’s money or find a new investor. If neither of those things occurs, the Metro Sports Authority can declare the team’s ownership in default, in which case a sale is likely to follow. They would need to sell the team to someone with the money and desire, and one of the names at the top of that list would be Jim Balsillie.

The situation gets much more complicated, but that is the general overview. And to top it all off, these events all unfolded a short time after the successful sales both the Tampa Bay Lightning and the Edmonton Oilers.

It takes two

And no, this isn’t in reference to the 1995 movie starring the Olsen twins and Kirstie Alley.

Instead, this is about the on-going battle between the two heavy weights – Balsillie and Bettman. Both have a lot of power, but only one can prevail. The fact that no one, except maybe the good people of Hamilton, Ontario, wants an NHL team there is certainly weighing in on Bettman’s side.

No one can say for sure if Bettman is blocking a buy, but it seems like every time Balsillie’s name is mentioned with a possible purchase of the Predators, it dies off suddenly, but quietly. So, one could speculate that he is blocking Balsillie’s purchase, but can’t say how for sure.

Publically, Bettman was only accused once by Balsillie and friends of tampering with the deal between he and the Predators, and that was in July 2007.

So now, with the Del Biaggio deal falling through (which many are referring to as “Boots-gate”), will Balsillie try to get his foot back in the door in Nashville? Or will a possible relocation to that big, empty Sprint Center in Kansas City, MO occur? Or will the Predators’ ownership group be able to come up with the money to keep the team in their hands long enough to find a suitable buyer? It’s hard to say for sure.

Another question is how long can Bettman legally hold off Balsillie before he goes too far?

The NHL is able to do background checks on potential owners and has the power to deny sales. Right now, all the NHL has, legally, in the event of relocation to either Hamilton or Kansas City will be a hefty relocation fee and a tangled situation with the city of Nashville, which was alluded to above.

Legally, Bettman can’t use intrusion on other markets as a reason for preventing the sale to a buyer looking to relocate.

But whatever power Bettman does have over the potential buyers, it’s obviously enough to keep Balsillie from testing the system too much. The league has such a strangle hold over the situation that the only way Balsillie can purchase the team is by providing proof that he won’t relocate.

And, as you can imagine, owning a vacant NHL-sized arena in Hamilton isn’t helping. And it’s hard to hide an arena that seats 17,383 people under your suit jacket.

NHL fans and supporters are sitting back and racking their brains over who to support in this situation. Who’s the bad guy? Is it Bettman for choking the deals off, even though he has the power to do so? Or is it Balsillie who wants to rob a city of its team and move it to an inconvenient location for the NHL even though he has a legal and legitimate claim to do so?

You’re welcome to be your own judge, but, to be honest, it won’t help decide the situation. Whoever wins this game won’t be wearing jerseys, hats, or foam fingers, but suits instead.