Wow really?! Is Cranbrook not supporting their team? First they lose their only international flight at the airport but yet keep "international" in their airport's name, and now this. Two big blows!

I wonder if Kootenay moving to Winnipeg would be coordinated with the Moose moving to Thunder Bay. That was always the rumour for a long time.

Unlikely. The Freep reported that TNSE was kicking the tires on the Ice at one point, probably when as you mention Thunder Bay was a possible destination for the Ice Caps. However, a Winnipeg entrepreneur ended up buying the team and he is unaligned with TNSE... Hence the need for their own venue.

I think it will be very difficult to compete with TN's marketing muscle. I don't think the market is big enough to support the AHL and the WHL alongside the Jets... One of those teams will be playing to small crowds. Much the same way that Air Canada and WestJet are good at crushing competition to maintain their stranglehold, TN can afford to operate the Moose at a loss until the WHL is run out of town. I can see there being lower ticket prices and tons of freebies just to keep people out of the WHL's rink. It could be an interesting battle...

And this new arena would have to be 100% privately financed wouldn't it? Didn't True North sign a long-term agreement with the province and the city to ensure that no enclosed facility housing a professional sports team would be funded by the public...in exchange for their 70% private financing of the MTS Centre.

I would guess a minimum of $50 million to build a 5,000 - 6,000 seat arena is required to build an arena that would house the junior team and host smaller concerts. I'm not sure the ROI would be worth it unless it was part of a big real estate play which is unlikely.

Winnipeg Jets
Winnipeg Blue Bombers
Manitoba Moose
Winnipeg Goldeyes
Winnipeg Valour (next year)
Winnipeg Ice

5 pro and 1 amateur team in Winnipeg - a city of a little over 800,000. I have a hard time believing all these teams would draw well enough to turn a profit or break even. Moose obviously don't matter in that regard but still...

^ Yeah, it's one thing to roll the dice on a junior team, but to throw in the capital costs of a new arena on top of that would be quite a gamble. If the WHL fails, what is the fall back to fill event nights? The MJHL? Minor league basketball? Craploads of wrestling and MMA?

And you're right, even without the WHL our sports market is getting pretty close to saturated. A major league team, a mid-major league team, a high level minor league team and two lower level minor league teams plus the university teams is a fair bit for a city of under one million to support.

I think if Winnipeg were the size of Edmonton/Calgary/Ottawa (1.3 - 1.5 million) they might be able to make a go of it - all teams breaking even or earning a profit. As it stands, I just can't see it.

After reading that article about the potential new arena being a potential add-on to the new multi-sheet iceplex, I would probably have to retract that $50 million estimate on a new arena. I'm sure there would be some cost efficiencies to be found by adding on to a multi-ice venue. It would still be an expensive and risky proposition though.

It's a tough spot they're in, because if you cut costs by building a cheap shed of an arena, it will be an atmosphere killer. But if you build something nice and comfortable, it drives up the price.

However, a new arena is a must if no deal can be worked out with TNSE. Max Bell Arena is simply not an option on anything other than a short-term temporary basis.

http://umanitoba.ca/faculties/kinrec...a/100_1708.jpg

I did read an article not long ago that the Red River Exhibition planned to build a 5000 seat arena on its exhibition grounds in the west end of the city, so maybe that's where the team might end up. No idea how far the idea was\has been taken.

^ RREX seems too inept to do anything like that. They've been using their current site for over 20 years and it still looks like they just moved in yesterday.

Selkirk Recreation Complex seats about 2,700 & it would be the smallest arena in the Western Hockey League but it's only 20 kilometres NorthEast of Winnipeg. I wonder if it could be the most likely first home for a relocated WHL team to Eastern Manitoba.

https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1906/...8240d624_b.jpg
https://myselkirk.ca/parks-recreatio...ation-complex/

It could probably still be called the Winnipeg Ice... Vancouver Giants team plays 40 km SouthEast of the city in Langley, BC, Seattle Thunderbirds play in Kent, Washington, 26 miles from the city… Or they could just pick a name that represents the area like Kootenay Ice has had been doing, Red River Ice maybe?

^ The venue is better than Max Bell hands down, but it's still pretty small. It could work over the short term, though, although it would be a little awkward given that Selkirk is a bit of a hike for most Winnipeggers, and Selkirk already has its own longstanding MJHL team.

I wish the WHL team operators the best of luck as I'd love to see the NHL, AHL and WHL all manage to make a go of it and thrive, but I think that it's going to be tough sledding for them.

Vancouver’s Home of Baseball: Sportsnet Acquires Exclusive Radio Rights to Vancouver Canadians

– Sportsnet 650 to broadcast Vancouver Canadians home games and select road games, beginning in 2019 season –
– Sportsnet to televise six Canadians games on Sportsnet Pacific –

http://media.sportsnet.ca/2018/10/va...ver-canadians/

It'll be nice to see them on TV! That stadium sells out all summer long!

I'll watch.

There's definitely a gap in how minor league baseball players ie prospects and teams are covered in the media - very patchy.

MLS scores in key metrics in 2018
Both TV viewership and social and digital media impact showed impressive gains for the league, while overall paid attendance reached a record high

...
For ESPN, viewership in the 25-54 demographic is up 5 percent, and ESPN Deportes saw its best-ever viewership for MLS. In Canada, viewership on TSN and TVA both saw increases as well, up 29 percent and 6 percent year-over-year, respectively.

https://www.sportsbusinessdaily.com/...odies/MLS.aspx

http://3downnation.com/2018/11/01/ar...ise-stability/

One positive for the double blue more fans taking interest in the team and all four wins did come in front of the home crowd at BMO Field.

“We were up this year, Argos paid tickets were up 1,875 tickets this year and it’s something we’re really, really pleased with. In the past, there was a lot of complimentary tickets and so in terms of the number of fans that came through the gates we’re only up slightly, maybe about 50 a game, but we cut down all these comps and our paid attendance actually went up fairly significantly,” Manning said.

Emphasis added mine.

This comes after the Argos slashed ticket prices in the leadup to the 2018 season.

Is that 1875 more paid tickets a game or for the entire season?

I'm assuming for the season.

So peanuts.

good news for the CFL. TV ratings for the regular season increased this year by over 4%.

http://3downnation.com/2018/11/10/cf...olid-increase/

With the exception of Winnipeg, every team saw an increase in ratings. The most pleasant surprise is Montreal, despite their awful record. This is probably partially attributable to the Manziel-effect.

Conversely, the league's average attendance continues to drop, this year by roughly 800 (~3%).

CFL regular season average attendance, by year:
2014: 25,285
2015: 24,713
2016: 24,690
2017: 24,644
2018: 23,856

Notably, Montreal went from 19,522 to 17,332, and Calgary moved from 27,381 to 26,340. Both are new decade-lows for the teams.

Although the CFL seems to have stopped its ratings bleed it still has an issue with diminishing crowds in most of its markets. I'm guessing two dates in Mexico next year will be used to offset Alouettes and Argonauts home dates.

TFC attendance has gone down by a thousand/game and ratings are still too low to be published with actual numbers (despite reports of a small increase). This coming after a championship season.

It's actually worse than that if you don't fall for the bullshit attendance numbers for Ticat games. They always manage to report no less than 23,000 in attendance even though they clearly have about 3,000-4,000 empty seats most games.

Not going to bite on this one. I shouldn't have to highlight this too often but there's more going on than simple TV viewers and raw attendance. For the sake of this conversation it's valid to point out that the CFL franchises rely on gates and TV more than the MLS franchises do.

Most sports teams fudge attendance numbers with different handout and distribution models.

The Tiger-Cats' season and advance ticket sales, and corporate market penetration are actually pretty good. It's not impossible that a lot of those empty seats are no-shows for tickets that have already been sold. It's rare that you see big sections at the edges of the stadium that are empty at THF, and empty seats tend to be scattered all over the place.

I actually thought the CFL had turned a corner a few years ago but while things are somewhat better that might have been a bit premature.

There is a bit of a decline or at least stagnation in interest in pro sports (especially attending in person) among the traditional demographic, that has hit even the NFL for example.

Of course for the CFL this is probably only part of the story, plus this type of thing is more problematic for them given the state of the league.

Yea, they may be sold and just not used - but at some point there'll have to be a decision made on whether to continue buying tickets if they're going to go unused. Plus it takes away from the atmosphere which can turn off people from attending future games.

What source of revenue pays for TFC’ huge payroll? I mean 1 player on TFC makes more than an entire CFL game, yet TV ratings aren’t good, I believe seeing as I hadn’t seen 1 post showing TFC ratings, which tells me they must be disappointing. They do get good hate revenue, as they did win the cup last season, but correct me if I am wrong, TFC didn’t have a single sellout this year. What is their average ticket price?

I believe they are valued at something like $200 million, but my question is, how?

MLS' TV contracts are worth a combined $90M USD/year. That works out to roughly $5M CAD/year for TFC if split evenly amongst franchises. TFC makes more than a CFL team per year on its TV contract with about a quarter of the viewers if they're shared equally. This doesn't take into account initiatives MLS has regarding streaming, mobile activation, and those sorts of things. I should note that TFC's inclusion/exclusion on American TV deals may be hazy given that Canada has a different rights agreement in place with TSN/TVA, and those rights fees aren't publicly disclosed.

Shirt sponsor (with upcoming sleeve sponsor) can be a decent amount, along with general league-wide sponsors (jersey outfitter, Adidas, pays MLS $117M a year).

As with other soccer leagues worldwide, TFC can make a profit (or loss) on player purchases and sales as well.

MLSE is also sinking costs into the team in order to be competitive on the field. They're far above the league average payroll.

According to the Montreal Gazette, it's $45 CAD.

https://montrealgazette.com/sports/s...nual-shortfall

As far as I can tell TFC reports actual tickets sold instead of tickets distributed as attendance for matches.

Franchise values are almost always speculative. They're based on a number of different factors including total revenues, total cash flow, and future projections of those figures therein. Owners are paying upwards of $150M for expansion MLS franchises, so that naturally increases the inherent value of currently-existing franchises.

There is no how, they're not. They're valued at whatever someone is willing to pay for them. And after MLSE, I can't imagine anyone paying those type of dollars for TFC. The TV ratings are beyond bad and have ranged from 38k a few years ago to 95k during their championship season. Just have to wonder if after this season the millennials will be moving on as reality starts to set in and the honeymoon ends.

Are you serious? Noone's moving on, the 1,000 drop in average attendance was in terms of regular season games. TFC played several Concacaf Champions League games in Toronto (and made it all the way to the finals, a franchise first), overall tickets sold and overall attendance is a franchise record this year.

The Mexico thing is ridiculous and I doubt it will find traction.

I actually think attendance will continue to decline next year as well. I can see Montreal dipping below 15,000 per game regardless of Manziel. Last I heard, their season ticket base was 10,000 last year. I can see that dropping be a few thousand at minimum for 2019. It certainly doesn't bold well when the franchise announced they would bring back inept managers like Kavis Reed and Joe Mack. I guess no one else wants to work for Andrew Wettenhall.

The seats are sold so it does not matter. Of course, no-shows could be a cause for concern in the future as the likely owner of those ticket (corporate) may give pause to purchasing the following season if they go unused.

Actually MLS Teams rely on gates far more then CFL teams. The TV contracts are very small and the team salaries are quite a bit higher than CFL teams. There are at least a few articles out there discussing this with some questioning whether MLS is nothing more than a Ponzi Scheme. Teams are relying on ever larger expansion fees to limit losses and break even.

As of right now, Montreal is losing 10 - 11 million per year thanks to one of the worst stadiums in the league, with limited high-end seating options while Vancouver is one of the lowest revenue teams in the league due to their existing relationship with BC Place. Decent alternative revenue sources would stem the tide but up to this point, MLS is very limited in that regard.

Bottom line is their regular season attendance declined from last year. Guess they won't be expanding the permanent capacity to 40,000 any time soon per your predictions.;)

They will, and in time for the 2026 World Cup. They're already on record that they will oh ye of so little vision. All my sports predictions have come to fruition regardless of the haranguing I was getting from the people in this thread, and they will continue to prove accurate. Just watch me.

Didn't you used to predict the 2028 Olympic Games would be in Toronto in your signature?

That wasn't a prediction, that was a desire, and a concept I promoted. Predicting Olympic cities is a crapshoot and has more to do with internal politics which I'm not privy to.

oh, yeah?!:haha:

Like the Summer Olympics being held in Toronto in 2024 and then 2028? I remember you had that in your signature. Or how about all that momentum being built for an NFL Stadium and team in Toronto? What happened there? Crickets...

I doubt permanent seating for the World Cup will be 40,000 but keep dreaming the dream I guess.

Desire = when my bold claims don't come to fruition.;)

Project all you want, whatever floats your boat ;)

I'd recommend going back and re-reading my previous post on this matter.

From their 2017 Annual Reports:

• Game Revenue, as its called by the Blue Bombers, accounts for 41% of their revenues.
• Gate receipts account for 42% of the Riders revenues.
• Gate receipts account for 39% of the Eskimos revenues.

This is in a league with declining attendance and for three of the stronger franchises in the league.

Do you think MLS teams rely on more than 40% of their revenue being gate receipts? I find that difficult to believe given the sponsorship and corporate heft that MLS has been working with.

Sounds like an issue with their stadiums and less to do with the product or business model. I believe Saputo cited they're spending effectively $2M+/year on property taxes on buildings they don't even own. There are plans for $50M+ upgrades to Stade Saputo for things like high-end seating options which won't be going ahead until that issue is sorted.

Vancouver sold Davies for millions upon millions, so that's decent revenue for a team with average ownership at best.

A decent alternative revenue source, sleeve sponsorships, are something i've mentioned previously in this thread, and are something MLS will be introducing in a few years time.

More than a few articles, that term seems to come up quite often.

Sportslogos.net has a decent scoop on the potential Alouettes logos for 2019:

http://news.sportslogos.net/2018/11/...ouettes-logos/

http://news.sportslogos.net/wp-conte...19-590x324.jpg

Saskatchewan Rush pre-season game cancelled due to NLL labour dispute

https://globalnews.ca/news/4656766/s...ame-cancelled/

The pre-season game between Saskatchewan and the Colorado Mammoth will no longer happen on Nov. 16 at SaskTel Centre.

Due to the cancellation, all ticket holders will receive a full refund for the game.

According to the Rush, all future home games remain scheduled to be played at this time.

The first Rush game of the regular season is scheduled for Dec. 1 against the Georgia Swarm in Atlanta, Ga.

Ticats make official presentation to host 2020 Grey Cup
Steve Milton 3downnation.ca November 13, 2018

For now, visit somebody else’s house; then throw open your own doors.

The Hamilton Tiger-Cats still have a chance to play in this year’s Grey Cup in Edmonton, but they also want to host the 2020 game and festival in Hamilton. This is first time they have been in a position to bid for the cup since the new stadium was completed in 2015.

Last Monday in Toronto, the Tiger-Cats made a presentation to the CFL’s Grey Cup subcommittee as part of a multi-step bid process to determine who will host 2020’s prestigious — and profitable — league championship.

“We presented a vision of what a Grey Cup in Hamilton would look like,” Ticats president of business Matt Afinec told The Spectator. “We spoke about the facts: that we just came through a municipal election; that we’re working with great spirit and co-operation with the city, but that we’re still establishing the exact details of that partnership in light of the fact that the municipal election has just concluded.”

Afinec confirmed that Mayor Fred Eisenberg had provided the Tiger-Cats with a letter of support.

Negotiations over a new stadium came with the expectation of two CFL championship games within a decade. But shortly after the new stadium opened, a series of construction-related problems — and eventually competing lawsuits — made it impossible for the city and football team to do business. Those issues have now largely been settled.

Neither Afinec nor team CEO Scott Mitchell would reveal any concrete details of the bid, but both talked of a downtown-based festival from Wednesday through Saturday of the November Grey Cup week centred around city-owned venues like the Hamilton Convention Centre and the Art Gallery of Hamilton. The festivities would move to the “stadium precinct” on game-day Sunday, and could involve events at Gage Park.

The Saskatchewan Roughriders, considered by many CFL observers to be the current front-runners, and the long-shot Montreal Alouettes also made bids for 2020.

Regina last had the Grey Cup in 2013, a wildly successful event which featured the home team beating the Tiger-Cats, but has built a new state-of-the-art stadium since then.

Unlike the former rotation system, Grey Cups are now awarded through a bid process that involves an undisclosed profit-sharing formula on Grey Cup income between the CFL and the host team.

So the ability to create maximum income is vitally important to a bid and Saskatchewan, with its wide fan base, new stadium and homecoming diaspora ranks high in profitability.

But the Ticats also have also shown a consistent capability to generate revenue at Tim Hortons Field, even without the roughly 12,000 temporary seats which would be installed for a Grey Cup Game, bringing stadium capacity to 35,000.

And what cannot be underestimated is the CFL’s desire and need to regularly profit from, and also seed, the lucrative southern Ontario marketplace. Hamilton is in the heart of the country’s corporate and population power base. The 2012 Grey Cup in Toronto succeeded in that regard but for various reasons, which don’t apply to Hamilton for 2020, the 2016 Cup in Toronto had no significant wider-market impact.

Mitchell said the Ticat bid is specific to 2020 and the team would “have to think about it” should the CFL suggest they settle for 2021 instead. It is extremely unlikely the Ticats would not be awarded one of those two dates.

Tourism Hamilton is handling the Grey Cup file for the city and will bring a report on the prospective bid to the new council on Dec. 12. But tourism manager Carrie Brooks-Joiner refused to say what recommendations, if any, are included in the report until it is made public ahead of the meeting.

The Edmonton Eskimos are receiving $1.5 million from the province of Alberta to help with its Grey Cup, as is Calgary for the 2019 Cup week.

City support, whether in cash or in kind, is estimated to be roughly equal to that of the province.

Hamilton put up $550,000 as part of its most recent bid for the Junos, which traditionally have a much lower economic impact than a Grey Cup.

“There hasn’t been an ask of the city other than a general discussion of what a Grey Cup here could look like and what kind of things we could do together,” Mitchell says. “But no team is going to ever get a Grey Cup without specific support from the city. It’s an aligned partnership with that city and the team.”

Mitchell said there is “no drop-dead date” for a formal commitment from the city because the CFL had not yet set a deadline for finalized bids. The team would work backward from that to establish a deadline for an agreement with the city.

Hamilton already meets the CFL’s requirement for number of hotel rooms, without going beyond the formal city limits, Mitchell said.

In the last 46 years there has only been one Grey Cup held in Hamilton: in 1996, a year in which the Ticats struggled for fan and sponsor support and the CFL itself came within weeks of bankruptcy. That event lost $1.2 million but did have an audited $23-million impact on Hamilton’s economy.

Both Ottawa, last year’s host, and this year’s host, Edmonton, estimate local economic impact at $100 million. Unlike most other events, Grey Cups tend to attract a large migration of fans who make the trip regardless of whether their home team is in the game or not.

The 2020 Grey Cup coincides with the 70th anniversary of the amalgamation of the Hamilton Tigers and Hamilton Wildcats to form the modern-day Tiger-Cats.

Yep, I think the majority if not all teams rely on 40% or more of their revenues from game day revenues. Game day revenues would include, general tickets, suites, club seats, concessions, game day merchandise purchases, parking, in-stadium advertising.

As for those sponsorships, I believe that includes in-game advertisement which would be directly effected by attendance. If no one is there to see it the price of those sponsorship packages would decrease. I think they are at least partially linked to game day revenues.

Even if Saputo is no longer charged 2 million in land taxes, he is still losing nearly $10 million a year. We shall see if he will actually invest $50 million in the stadium or come to the city/province to pitch a "partnership."

Agreed, the sale of Davies will help Vancouver in the short to medium term. Given their lack of revenue streams from BC Place the future is fuzzy.

The reported $1 million per team for ad spot on the jersey is a nice new revenue source.

Bottom line is, most teams are losing money and the current tv deal is merely OK. We will see in 2022 if the ratings increase are sufficient enough for a significant rise in tv/streaming rights to stem the bleeding.

You originally said they rely on gates, IE solely tickets to enter the stadium:

EDM/SSK are relying on 40% of their revenues just from gates. Winnipeg is tougher to discern since they change the categorization of their revenues every few years.

It would be affected by league-wide attendance, then, if they're league-wide sponsors. League-wide attendance has been increasing the past few years and is only stalling because the new stadiums they're building are effectively a drag on the current league average (LA/DC, and MIN when it comes online are all below or at league average attendance). It would also affect TV deals since you can still see sponsors when viewing on TV.

For 2019, Portland's stadium expansion moves that stadium from 21K to 25K and Cincinnati joining the league provides a 25K-30K bump to the average.

Shirt sponsor revenue by Canadian MLS team, per year:
Montreal (BMO): $4M
Toronto (BMO): $4M
Vancouver (Bell): $3.9M

http://www.totalfootballmag.com/feat...are-to-europe/

Either way it's a hefty amount of money to invest in a team. The thing with the investor-operator model for MLS franchise ownership is that profits and deficits are filtered through MLS as a whole. Saputo may lose $10M/year on the Impact but if the franchise valuation, revenues, and cash flows increase then that's fine in the short-term. It's if revenues level off where there is an issue with running in the red.

Again, MLS teams make more from revenues than simply what their stadium is able to provide them. VWFC's situation at BC Place isn't great, though.

That would be $1M each just for the sleeve.

The current TV deal will grow when it expires in 2021/2022. Average ratings in both the US and Canada have been increasing year over year, and MLS is the only NA sports league that has seen consistent year over year growth over the past half decade. The new jersey deal with Adidas is a sign that sponsors are willing to go in on the sport, and having a sponsor like Target bail on NASCAR before committing to MLS says a lot about the corporate atmosphere south of the border right now.

How does it make sense for BMO to spend $4 million to put their tiny logo on a jersey that only, maybe, 100k people including both tv viewers and those in attendance, will see?

I would expect then that CFL teams should be able to garner at least $8 million for jersey sponsors, seeing as they get at least 4-5 times the tv viewers... seems like real bad business either on the jersey sponsor for spending that much, or the CFL teams not raking in at least twice or three times what TFC, Van or Mtl get.

And $1 million each JUST for the sleeve?... seems crazy to think ad sponsors are willing to pay that much for such minimal eyes to see. CFL teams should get with it Andy start raking in multi millions worth, if TFC is setting that standard.