Recently there’s been a wave of rumors indicating The Creator may pull his expansion bid if the league does not award him a franchise in time for the 2017-18 season.
There has been talk that a delay of that nature would make Foley walk away from the process. -Gary Lawless, TSN
We reached out directly to Mr. Foley asking if he had a response and if he would indeed consider pulling his bid.
Bad info. I’m focused on ’17.
The TSN story was directly linked in our email to him.
Every time we’ve questioned anything outside of the 2017-18 season, we’ve been met with the same answer, the focus remains on 17-18 and no season beyond has ever been discussed. That was once again confirmed here.
The Creator is well known, both by media as well as those inside his businesses, to be incredibly short and to the point in emails. This one is no different.
He completely shut down the rumors he’s considering pulling his bid, and refused to change the plans on the proposed start date here in Las Vegas.
Jeff
I could easily see this whole thing fall apart easily. Right now Id say there is more then a 75% chance the deal falls apart. I agree with the TSN columnist on most of his points. I could easily see the NHL go into a wait and see pattern over this NFL thing and I could see a very disappointed and smart business man pull his interest in the whole thing if it is delayed another year and the thought of competition for corporate dollars with the NFL in a small unproven market. And even if he doesn’t, I’d bet you’d lose at least 50% or more of the season ticket deposits delaying this thing until 2018. Theyd lose my 4 seats and I’m a hardcore hockey fan who travels to LA frequently to see games.
This is typical Gary Bettman. This is just very disappointing for the NHL to be delaying this. What could the possible reason be besides wanting to make an announcement at the awards to delay this announcement any longer? If that is the case why?? You have many potential season ticket holders and fans getting very frustrated in this process.
Dave Jonas
There’s no reason for the NHL to expand right now with all the problems in Carolina and Arizona. If anything, move the Yotes to Vegas and kill two birds with one stone. They should have never pushed for expansion until all current teams were financially stable. You can blame Bettman and the greedy owners for trying to get expansion money even though they knew they had teams that are in financial ruins. Even teams like Florida, Columbus and New Jersey have been bleeding money. You can’t run a successful league if you have 1/3 of the teams in the red. This is not the NBA where you can make up those losses from TV money (NBA = $2.66 billion, NHL = $200 million).