Confirmed: Flames to relocate AHL affilate for 2022-23 season

[btimbit]

Saskatchewan would be a great place, but if it was here I'd buy season tickets 100%. That'd be awesome

[Northendzone]

i have to admit that i am stunned by some of the attendance figures some folks in this thread have projected.

my personal thought is that i'd spend my money on the flames first, then the hitmen then the heat (for me would be a distant third). Even if my son was still playing minor hockey my order would still in that way.

[D as in David]

Originally Posted by Enoch Root

Sparks?
Matches?
Pilot lights?
Gasoline?

Ignition. Iggy-nition?

[PeteMoss]

Originally Posted by Northendzone

i have to admit that i am stunned by some of the attendance figures some folks in this thread have projected.

my personal thought is that i'd spend my money on the flames first, then the hitmen then the heat (for me would be a distant third). Even if my son was still playing minor hockey my order would still in that way.

I assume Stockton is losing money. So might just be a simple as they'd rather lose money and have the team close to Calgary vs losing money and having the players a thousand miles away.

Guess it depends on the AHL travel arrangements - would a Calgary team have to pay travel for other teams?

[Reggie Dunlop]

Boise is a bit of an outpost as far as the ECHL goes... the league is trending back eastward. Decent attendance, though not the biggest barn.

I imagine the Flames looked at Idaho, Colorado Springs and Salt Lake as options and feel they're better off with a backyard farm.

[CMPunk]

Originally Posted by PeteMoss

I assume Stockton is losing money. So might just be a simple as they'd rather lose money and have the team close to Calgary vs losing money and having the players a thousand miles away.

Guess it depends on the AHL travel arrangements - would a Calgary team have to pay travel for other teams?

Not sure about paying for visiting travel, but team travel costs will skyrocket since the Heat will have to fly everywhere

[Strange Brew]

I might be in the minority but IMO AHL teams in the same city as their parent club is a bad idea.

I disagree with the poster who said AHL hockey is bad hockey. That's not true at all, the level of skill is very high with plenty of high talent players and coaches looking to improve their game.

That's a product the NHL should want to see sprinkled around secondary markets.

[Ducay]

Sask or Red Deer might make sense.

Calgary proper would be market saturation I think - you'd just cannibalize Hitmen attendance.

[Reggie Dunlop]

Originally Posted by CMPunk

Not sure about paying for visiting travel, but team travel costs will skyrocket since the Heat will have to fly everywhere

Flames will also have to subsidize other teams for their travel costs.

[dobbles]

Originally Posted by FormerPresJamesTaylor

Some fans might be, I wouldn't. I've seen various AHL games over the last 20+ years and by and large it's not a cohesive team hockey game. Most players are playing "their" game trying to stand out. It can be sloppy ugly hockey. Junior can be the same but it's more due to young an inexperience which I don't mind.

If the Heat land in Calgary it'll be four a handful of years before they find another solution. It won't make a blip.

As someone that is still here over a decade later based on 2 seasons of fantastic AHL hockey, I vehemently disagree. The amount of future nhl'ers we saw come through the QC was amazing. Even Bobby Ryan spent time in Iowa and we got to see him a couple times when he was first getting established. I disagree that you see young guys playing their own game. What I think you see is young guys getting opportunities to grow their ame in roles they wouldn't be able to play in the nhl. You see guys on the PP and PK getting to learn and round out their game. You do often see prospects get more leash from coaches as they are trying to develop them. But overall its a high quality of hockey IMO. I have never seen major junior to know what sot of alternative that is to minor hockey, but having been to a couple hundred minor league games from AHL, ECHL, CHL, IHL, IHL2, etc, I have very fond memories of AHL hockey.

[FlamesAddiction]

I wonder if the Flames would consider Anchorage. I believe they had an affiliation with a team there before (I seem to recall both Ortio and Broisoit playing there). Sullivan Arena doesn't have a major hockey tenant there anymore and the ECHL/WCHL teams that played there used to get decent attendance (typically around 4,000 to 5,000 per game, arena can hold more than 8,000). I suppose travel is always an issue with Alaska, but I believe they have a lot of airline options.

[Hack&Lube]

I want to cheer on my Balzac Hot and Sweaty

In all seriousness, are there any professional rinks that will work in the surrounding Airdrie, Cochrane, Okotoks, etc. areas?

[Kipper_3434]

Move em to Kamloops and call em "The Blaze"

[MacDaddy77]

Put the Heat at Tsuu Tina arena. I'd get season tickets for that but not likely with the flames holding lease on saddledome.

edit, NVM just saw that the Tsuu Tina arena is only 2000. seems much larger than that when I'm in it.

[corporatejay]

Originally Posted by MacDaddy77

Put the Heat at Tsuu Tina arena. I'd get season tickets for that but not likely with the flames holding lease on saddledome.

edit, NVM just saw that the Tsuu Tina arena is only 2000. seems much larger than that when I'm in it.

I think Winsport or Seven Chiefs seem like the obvious solutions. I don't know if they could manage the roughnecks, flames, hitmen, concerts in the saddledome and I would be shocked if the Heat draw over 5k.

Seems like the price point is inline with Roughnecks/Stampeders, not so much Hitmen.

[PeteMoss]

Originally Posted by Ducay

Sask or Red Deer might make sense.

Calgary proper would be market saturation I think - you'd just cannibalize Hitmen attendance.

Not particularly close to Calgary but if you are going to subsidize everyone's travel - I always thought Thunder Bay would be a slam dunk AHL market. No junior team will ever play there because of the distance from everywhere else in Canada. They draw like 1500 fans for university hockey which is probably 3 times what anyone else draws just because the market is dying for hockey.

[playmaker]

As someone who lives in Europe I may be of course wrong, but looking at the map wouldn't Spokane be an ideal destination for the Heat? Not sure about direct flights to Calgary though.

[rage2]

Originally Posted by Northendzone

i have to admit that i am stunned by some of the attendance figures some folks in this thread have projected.

my personal thought is that i'd spend my money on the flames first, then the hitmen then the heat (for me would be a distant third). Even if my son was still playing minor hockey my order would still in that way.

Anecdotal, live in Calgary, fly to Bay Area a few times a year for work, and I’ve watched more Heat games than Hitmen games aside from Covid no travel years. It’s great to watch flames prospects play and see what they bring to the table in the future.

[dino7c]

Originally Posted by corporatejay

I think Winsport or Seven Chiefs seem like the obvious solutions. I don't know if they could manage the roughnecks, flames, hitmen, concerts in the saddledome and I would be shocked if the Heat draw over 5k.

Seems like the price point is inline with Roughnecks/Stampeders, not so much Hitmen.

Winsport A is international ice size...the other rinks have like 200 people capacity

[Ducay]

Originally Posted by FlamesAddiction

I wonder if the Flames would consider Anchorage. I believe they had an affiliation with a team there before (I seem to recall both Ortio and Broisoit playing there). Sullivan Arena doesn't have a major hockey tenant there anymore and the ECHL/WCHL teams that played there used to get decent attendance (typically around 4,000 to 5,000 per game, arena can hold more than 8,000). I suppose travel is always an issue with Alaska, but I believe they have a lot of airline options.

Travel is one thing, but imagine COVID highlighted a lot of the issues with having an international border between your team and your farm players. Alaska is further than Stockton and has more complexities to deal with, so imagine it would be 2 steps back from the stated goals, not forward.