Top Stories this week:

1. Coyote numbers by Goldie
2. Wendy Davis
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9. Jinx
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87. NHL Champs Chicago

The Key isn't 15 miles from downtown.

Their main problem was that they built the arena in an area that they predicted would grow. Then the housing bubble burst and the growth stopped. Then they passed that horrible immigration bill and the population of the west side dropped.

Or, in short, they're in Arizona.

Thanks again for the obstructed hockey seats, Barry Ackerley.

I think the Coyotes should go back to CA - they care more. We're fine without more pro sports.

It's patently false to say that there's no hockey fan base in Seattle. There are two minor league hockey teams within a 30 mile radius of Seattle. The Everett Silvertips drew an average of 5,062 a game last season. The Seattle Thunderbirds, playing at the ShoWare Center in Kent, drew an average of 4,036 a game. That's over 9,000 people right there attending hockey games regularly. You add in all the Canadian transplants and the allure of watching hockey at the highest level, and that base is even greater.

Goldy, assuming the 2012 Forbes numbers are remotely correct the Coyotes lost $20m in Operating Rev on Op Income of $83m while controlling all the arena revenues. Looking at the other NHL team's Op Income to looks like it costs around $100m per year to run a franchise, so the franchise is not really out of line with respect to how they had been conducting business.

While it would be nice to have hockey, they are going to make $20m loss in Op Income per year look like peanuts when in a 10-11,000 seat facility. While there may be a lot of upside in terms of the franchise value they are going to take a fucking bath here. Their average attendance last year was ~13,900 per game @ average ticket price of ~$40. They would need to up average ticket cost to $50 and sell out every game just to lose $20m per year. And to get back to even on EBITDA they'd need to tack on an additional $75 per ticket.

Wow. Will be interesting to see what an interim lease at Key Arena would look like.

@6 Yes. They're going to lose a lot of money at KeyArena. Don't see any way around that. I presume if they move the team here, the new owners are prepared for that.

People are dumb as fuck... A business that has no business, bleeds cash like a stuck ;pig and has to be subsidized to support the whims of 15,000 troglodyte goober head hockey fans can actually have the power to get print space blows what little mind I have left after the Bassaball debacle. Ahhh, well, at least it is some employment for the otherwise unemployable dribblers and skaters... More circuses, feed them cake and make merry...

Plus Seattle can be to Vancouver what buffalo is to Toronto

Seattle's the 12th-largest media market in the U.S. The NHL has wanted a Seattle team for a very long time. It will happen, sooner or later.

@4, at the very least we need an NHL franchise

@5, add the visitors from Portland too and we potentially have a good critical mass fan base

@6, presumably if the two guys buy the team for Seattle, I suspect they have intentions of putting equity into the new arena to facilitate its construction and have the deep pockets to tolerate losses in the short term for the purpose of building a fan base.

And now, an RSE spokesman has stated that the Glendale counter-offer (with the 5yr out clause) is a non-starter. We may just have a team.

I used to go to Thunderbirds hockey in Key Arena before the team moved to Kent Events Center.

In both venues they packed a regular sized crowd of hockey fans.

Hockey, according to my son who knows sports, has the highest per capita earning audience of any sport.

Another example is our mirror city of Vancouver, BC. There they pack Rogers Arena day in and day out and fans regularly grab items like $240 jerseys.

Will a high paying educated audience of sports fans pack a stadium to see pro hockey in Seattle...the examples above say yet.

But Balio, you live in Kent! What don't you go to games now?!?

#14

Try parsing the sentence again.

@9 as Buffalo is demonstratably the greatest hockey market in the US, I will gladly take that analogy!

Geez, Goldy, does Chris Hansen have you on a fucking retainer?

Hockey will not come to Seattle. Hockey will come to Bellevue. Bellevue is where all the money is, and where the majority of the fan base resides that skews towards hockey fans. Now that basketball is a pipe dream, SODO is not nearly as relevent a priority location for an arena. Bellevue/Redmond represents a MUCH deeper pocketed fan base compared to the fan base of south Seattle.

@19 If Bellevue were 50 miles away, you might have a point. But it's not. So you don't.

That said, if somebody wants to build an arena in Bellevue with private money, that's up to them. But I wouldn't give up on Hansen's Sonics dream yet. The guy really wants his toy, and he's got the money to make it happen.

Seattle doesn't need another team extorting money for themselves in the guise of providing entertainment to the public. All such teams making demands of the cities they are in, or proposing to move to, should be met with an offer to carry their luggage to the bus depot. Either they're solvent, or they're not. We don't need a taxpayer-funded money pit in Glendale, Seattle or anywhere else.

Gezz, Goldy, you fat, reeking bag of pus, does Chris Hansen have you on a fucking retainer, or do you give blowjobs for free?

Can we please not call them the "Metropolitans"?

Seattle posters are charming to say the least.

Lol... yes, attendance is good for the small-time hockey teams that give free parking, have reasonable concessions charges, and routinely have tickets for $11-20 .

Now change that to somewhere that will charge $20 for parking and sells tickets for $40+ a piece and you've got the same game and 3 hours of entertainment, but are shelling out 5x as much.