Bettman expresses NHL’s frustration with Canadian COVID-19 restrictions
LAS VEGAS — NHL commissioner Gary Bettman acknowledged that the league’s seven Canadian franchises have been devastated economically and competitively by recent government COVID-19 restrictions that have limited attendance in Canadian NHL cities in recent weeks.
So great has the damage been that Bettman admitted teams have floated the idea that if the restrictions continue into the second half of the NHL season, they would entertain playing in American locations where fans would be in attendance and they might be able to recoup revenue lost as a result of the restrictions.
Addressing the media before Friday’s All Star Skills Competition, Bettman estimated the average revenue lost by all franchises was around $50 million per team through the past two COVID-impacted seasons. Now to add further restrictions for the Canadian clubs is really putting the squeeze on those teams.
“That’s how troublesome and devastating it is for the clubs,” Bettman said at his annual State of the League press conference to kick off All-Star Weekend. “It’s not something anybody wants to do and it’s not something we’re actively encouraging, but it’s something that if this continues much longer we may have to look at and consider.”
Bettman did provide the caveat that such a dramatic move – having Canadian teams pull up stakes and move to some U.S.-based city – was not imminent but his comments were definitely meant to be heard loud and clear by Canadian officials.
In a similar vein, Bettman said if the restrictions in Quebec, which currently prevent fans from watching the Canadiens at Bell Centre, continued into the summer, the NHL Draft set for July 7 and 8 would be in jeopardy.
Deputy commissioner Bill Daly suggested if restrictions were in place they might consider another virtual draft which has been the case the last two seasons. But Bettman interjected and said the league would probably look at moving the event. No deadline was given when that decision would have to be made but Bettman noted you can’t just plan a new draft in a new location with just a couple of weeks’ notice.
Bettman reacts to Wirtz’s eruption
Among the other significant topics covered by the media briefing was the contentious town hall meeting held earlier this week in Chicago to address the future of the scandal-plagued franchise. During that meeting, chairman and owner Rocky Wirtz snapped at a couple of questions regarding Kyle Beach – who was sexually assaulted while a member of the team in 2010 an assault that was initially ignored by management and coaches.
Wirtz immediately issued a written apology for his behavior and Bettman confirmed that Wirtz would not face any further sanctions from the league.
Bettman described it as nothing more than “a moment.” He pointed out that many of the staff involved are no longer with the Blackhawks and they are being proactive about responding to the incident.
“They’re doing all the things to move forward. They’re doing the work,” Bettman said. “New people have been brought in. There’s training. They’re doing things above and beyond what we’re doing at the league level. They’re putting in a wellness department. They have answers for everything. I think this was just, you know, all of us at one time or another have a moment and this was a moment.”
Slap Shots
Here are some of the other noteworthy topics covered during Friday’s 50-minute briefing:
> Sheldon Kennedy’s Respect Group, which earlier had announced a partnership with the league in the aftermath of the report into the handling of the Kyle Beach assault, will begin training with all 32 NHL teams in March.
> The Respect Hockey Summit which was announced by the league’s head of diversity and inclusion, Kim Davis, will have its first planning meeting on Feb. 10.
> Daly confirmed that the NHL and NHLPA met this week to discuss having a best-on-best tournament between now and the 2026 Winter Olympics in Milan, Italy. It’s believed 2024 is the preferred spot on the calendar as it would be mid-point between the Olympic Games four-year cycle and there has been talk of having a World Cup of Hockey in-season as opposed to before the start of the regular season when previous World Cup of Hockey tournaments and prior to that Canada Cup tournaments were held.
“We have some ideas on what that can look like and it might look a lot different than the 2016 (World Cup of Hockey) with different elements, more exciting, compelling elements to it,” Daly said. “Not prepared to say beyond that what they might look like. But we’re going to follow up with each other and we’re going to follow up with our partners within the IIHF on that.”
Both Daly and Bettman spoke with guarded optimism about the NHL returning to the Olympics in four years’ time
“I think if the world is in a different place we’ll be thrilled to have our players go,” Bettman said.
> Speaking of international hockey and special events Bettman announced that the Winter Classic will return to Fenway Park in Boston next year. It will be the second Winter Classic held in the iconic ballpark. The first was held in 2010 between Boston and Philadelphia.
> Carolina will host a Stadium Series game in 2023 at Carter-Finley Stadium home of the North Carolina Wolfpack. It will be the first outdoor game hosted by the Hurricanes who have never appeared in an outdoor game even as a visiting team.
> The 2023 All-Star Weekend will be hosted by the Florida Panthers, who were originally promised the festivities for 2021 before they were canceled due to the pandemic.
> The NHL will also return to Europe for its Global Series of games with teams traveling to Germany, Switzerland, Finland and the Czech Republic.
“Internationally, for us, it’s a no-brainer,” Daly said. “We had established momentum in terms of having a greater or regular presence of games in Europe. I think with pandemic waning and hopefully a return to normalcy it only makes sense to restart those efforts and to further them. It’s important.”
> Bettman also painted a positive picture of the possibility that the beleaguered Arizona Coyotes might end up playing at least three years in Arizona State University’s new multi-use facility starting next fall.
“Let’s all take a deep breath on Arizona and focus on the circumstances in which they find themselves,” the commissioner said.
He insisted there would be no impact for other owners vis a vis revenue sharing, “because they already get the maximum. So that’s not an issue,” Bettman said.
He said the league has done model looking at revenues if the team moves into the ASU location where they would have to spend money to create their own areas and insisted there would be no real different in net revenue to the team than what they saw playing Glendale their current home.
“In fact under one projection that we’ve done we think they may do better,” Bettman said.
> Through Wednesday’s games – the last before the All Star break – 41.2 of all games had been won by a team that trailed at some point in the game and that offense being provided on a game by game basis is at levels not seen in the NHL since the mid-1990s.
> In spite of the rescheduling of 105 games almost all due to COVID outbreaks, Bettman said the projection on hockey-related revenues would still be “in the $5 billion range.” That’s less than the $5.2 billion projection provided by the league in December, just days before the omicron variant ravaged the league, but Bettman claimed “it’s not going to damage HRR as a whole.”
Bettman also noted that attendance is down about 5% to 6% league-wide.
He said that number was “better than the other leagues are seeing and under the circumstances I find it pretty encouraging.”