Quote:
Originally Posted by dissentowner
I'm not buying that at all. If that were the case there would already be another team in SW Ontario. Unless he is absolutely forced into a move like the Jets, Bettman has no interest in growing the game any more in Canada.
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I don't disagree because I think a team in Quebec is more likely via re-location, the same way Utah and Winnipeg got teams, but I'm not sure it's about growing the game, it's about financial viability.
IIRC one of the things they were worried about with both Winnipeg and Quebec around that 2011-2015 time frame when each of those teams were pushing hard to come back was the volatility of the Canadian dollar and the potential impact it has overall due to the lack of corporate support in those communities.
In 2011 when the Jets came back the dollar was at par or even favourable to the US dollar, and that continued to about the middle of 2014.
Since then it's cratered and sits today at 74 cents to the dollar, and based on some stuff out of Winnipeg attendance pressure, economic factors, and the dollar has actually hurt them a lot. And they don't have a big corporate base to draw from.
Quebec likely would have been similarly impacted - and TBH even Quebecor has not been nearly as loud about it in the more recent years as they were in that 2011-2015 timeframe. I think even they probably know it's not necessarily the right time for them.