NHL Expansion to 36 Teams Has Its Merits

Why would you not have Atlanta in the league?

Atlanta has had the highest MLS attendance for six years running, by far. It isn’t even close.
Atlanta had the fourth highest MLB attendance in 2022.
The Falcons are in the top half of NFL attendance.
The Hawks are near the middle of the pack in NBA attendance.

Thus, where is this irrationality of Atlanta coming from? Atlanta lost its teams having to do with certain circumstances that COULD HAVE HAPPENED ANYWHERE. It is not a reflection of the city.

The Flames left because owner Tom Cousins was a real estate developer and during the Jimmy Carter administration, interest rates were increased dramatically. This increase in interest rates about tanked his business. To keep it afloat, he sold off his profitable asset, the Flames, TO THE HIGHEST BIDDER, which just so happened to be someone who TOOK THEM TO CALGARY, DESPITE MULTIPLE LOCAL BIDDERS. If he had chosen any other, the Flames would probably still be in Atlanta, and Calgary would have gotten an expansion team later.

The Thrashers left do to some unfortunate circumstances. The Thrashers, originally owned by Ted Turner, was acquired by Time Warner in an acquisition of Turner Sports. This included the Atlanta Hawks of the NBA, the rights to Philips Arena, and the NHL’s Atlanta Thrashers.

Time Warner had the hair brained idea to merge with AOL, having no foresight that dial-up internet wasn’t long standing. A few years later, AOL-Time Warner, the company as it was called, started facing financial hardships as the transition away from dial up internet took place. In order to stabilize the company, they sold their sports franchises, the Hawks, and Thrashers, and the rights to Philips Arena AS A PACKAGE DEAL. It is the package deal that was the root of what led to the Thrashers’ demise. You see, it allowed a group of investors from various cities who WANTED A BASKETBALL TEAM, named ATLANTA SPIRIT GROUP, LLC, who acquired the Thrashers as a way of also getting the Hawks. Most had no interest in hockey, and most wanted to sell the Thrashers right after acquisition. There was a lone investor who did want the Thrashers, and in order to prevent the sale, he took the other investors to court. They lost a tremendous amount of money in LITIGATION COSTS, while simultaneously used most of their revenue to acquire Hawks players for exorbitant salaries, namely Joe Johnson. This left little for the Thrashers and is responsible for their continued dismal performance on the ice, having only one playoff year in which they were swept. Litigation costs forced the Thrashers to sell off most of their good players, and shortly after, the court ruled that Atlanta Spirit Group, LLC, could sell the Thrashers.

Atlanta Spirit Group sabotaged any potential buyers keeping the Thrashers in Atlanta. For one, they would not allow any new owner to receive any revenue from concessions or parking, as since Atlanta Spirit Group would still own Philips Arena (THE RESULT OF THE PACKAGE DEAL), Atlanta Spirit Group would get that revenue, not the new Thrashers owners. Secondly, it has been stated multiple times that Atlanta Spirit Group was looking to get the relocation fee from the NHL. They also apparently did not want to have to compete with the Thrashers for fans, and wanted to have Atlanta all to themselves in winter sports with the Hawks. Atlanta Spirit Group also wanted a fee from any potential buyers to USE THEIR ARENA. The loss of revenue coupled with fees to Atlanta Spirit, as well as Atlanta Spirit not taking considerably any strong contenders for sale to keep the team in Atlanta, resulted in people unwilling to take a risk, since this setup would have bankrupted any city’s sports franchise.

The league was also not flexible in 2011. They would not allow the Thrashers to play at the Gwinnett Arena, an arena that holds about 9,000 fans. Years later, they went off this and now are allowing the Coyotes to play in an arena of about 4,000-5,000 fans.

The recession was in full swing during the Thrashers’ departure, so this didn’t exactly help things either.

All this said, it is easy to see that Atlanta’s movements had nothing to do with attendance, and all with ownership. Atlanta never was last in attendance, and outsold the Bruins, Blackhawks, and Penguins some years.

Atlanta is also a huge city that makes some of these other cities that people list as possible expansion sites look like little cities. Atlanta has the third largest urbanized, built-up area in the USA, and fourth largest in the world.

Kansas City? Really? They have less than one third the population of metropolitan Atlanta, and it will become even less than that as Atlanta has robust growth, while Kansas City is kind of stagnant. Atlanta metro has about 6.2 million, while Kansas City has just over 2 million.

Lastly, Atlanta and Kansas City both play in the ECHL, and Atlanta’s attendance is FAR LARGER. Atlanta’s attendance is about sixty percent greater than Kansas City’s in 2023. Plus, Atlanta’s arena is situated in the far northeast corner of the metro, not downtown, and is difficult for two thirds of the metro area population to even get there, given the distance and traffic. By contrast, while Kansas City does not play in a downtown arena, the suburb they play in is far closer to downtown and is far more accessible to most of the metropolitan area population.