Friday, May 20, 2011
Sports Ben's Sports Take: A Dark Day for Atlanta Sports
Posted by Ben Bussard on Fri, May 20, 2011 at 12:10 PM
- Wikimedia Commons
- This pretty much sums up the past 12 years of Thrashers hockey
With the report surfacing late last night (or early this morning depending on your "stickler-for-detailness") that the sale of our once-beloved, often-neglected NHL franchise has been finalized, it's time for Atlantans to look themselves in the mirror and realize how pathetic they are.
For the second time in the last 31 years, the city of Atlanta stood by and watched as a group of syrup-breathed Canucks snuck across the border to steal an NHL team right from under our feet.
The aptly-named True North Sports & Entertainment Limited, a Canadian-based entertainment group that's been vulturing the Thrashers seemingly forever, finally made things official and will move the Thrashers to Winnipeg according to several reports.
But as much as I'd like to blame the loss of another Atlanta NHL franchise on league commissioner Gary Bettman's lack of action or the city's inability to step up financially a la the Glendale City Council, who put up $25 million to keep the Phoenix Coyotes in the desert, I simply cannot—this one's on us.
The Thrashers haven't ranked higher than 28th in home attendance since the 2007-08 season and besides their inaugural season in 1999-2000, when they averaged 17,206 fans, have never—NEVER—finished in the top-20 of average home attendance.
Although some of you voiced your opinion back in February that keeping the Thrashers in Atlanta was of paramount importance to you, the city's overall Thrasherapathy was too much to overcome.
As pathetic as the fan support has been over the past 12 years, we can't place 100 percent of the blame on the city's inability to keep the turnstiles rotating inside Philips Arena—the franchise didn't give us much reason to.
Sitting behind the NFL, NCAA football, NBA, NCAA basketball, MLB, NASCAR and even the PGA Tour in terms of popularity here in the southeastern U.S., the sport of hockey is a tough enough sell—one that's made even more difficult when a team struggles as mightily as the Thrashers.
In their 12-year history, the Thrashers made only one playoff appearance and never won a postseason game.
For all of the criticism I've handed to the Atlanta Hawks for their habitual ineptitude, going 12 years without a postseason victory and only one playoff appearance is downright indefensible.
Poor on-ice performance and minimal fan support are fairly justifiable reasons to relocate a professional sports franchise, I'd say. But despite all of the rationale, we as Atlanta sports fans should still take a moment to shed a proverbial tear for our lost franchise.
As an inaugural season ticket holder and a fervent Thrashers supporter, it will take more than a handkerchief for me to get over this latest Atlanta sports disappointment.
While we will likely never see another NHL franchise call Atlanta home, it's important that we understand what we did—and, more importantly, didn't do—to drive the Thrashers away.
And hopefully we'll never have to sit back and watch another team get taken away from us.
Comments (36)
Showing 1-36 of 36
What would be even sadder is if the deal gets delayed and the Thrashers spend a final in-limbo season here. While I'll miss the NHL, the Gwinnett Gladitors are still around and they actually make the playoffs and win.
like
dislike
This story is pure horsecrap Ben and you know it. The reason the Thrashers are moving is because ASG royally fucked things up, seemingly on purpose. They've been a red-headed step child ever since those incompetents purchased the club. But I guess the truth doesn't matter - you just need to get eyeballs on your so-called sports blog.
first of all, the deal hasn't been finalized. just because you see it on 11 alive news, doesn't mean that it's legit. when bettman actually gets the bollocks to step up & say 'it's official', then i'll believe it. if a 17 yr old girl can cause a stir via twitter saying 'it's confirmed the thrashers are leaving', then any rumor can be true, right?
second, the reason the attendence was so bad was because of the atlanta spirit. as an 'inaugural season ticket holder', you'd remember that they didn't know how to run a team, they lied to the fans for years about the sale of the team & they promoted don waddell to team president after running the franchise in the ground for years.
my hope is that the sale hits a snag (assuming there IS a sale, of course) & misses the deadline. and with the coyotes staying in phoenix for one more year (that's all the city of glendale can afford), the vultures from winnipeg can go get the team that USED to be the jets.
Atlantans don't care about hockey or the Thrashers. You can see that in the attendance at home games. So why should we have an NHL franchise here? Good riddance. Stop yelling at us because we don't want to go see something we never wanted in the first place.
atlpaddy:
You're right. ASG is to blame as well, but don't you think that they might've had an easier time selling the team to someone who wanted to keep the Thrashers in Atlanta if there was some sign of local fan support?
so you're the season ticket holder. maybe if they get another the team will stay. syrup breathed Canucks? try that one in their locker room and see how it works out.
My guess is that no one with any money and sense is going to buy the Thrashers and then have ASG be their landlord. This whole thing is screwed up and it's all ASG's fault. They've been driving the product into the ground since the playoff fiasco and lockout. It looks like ASG and NHL/Bettman now just want to wash their hands of the whole thing.
To blame the fans for this mess (or Atlantans in general) is completely wrong.
i can promise you that if new owners came in who actually had a passion for the game like the fans do, you'd see an overwhelming amount of support. THE SPIRIT are the reason there aren't a huge number of season ticket holders & why fans don't want to go to games. they don't want to support these terrible people in their relentless endeavours to get the hawks popular & let the thrashers get buried six feet in georgia clay without a care.
if you, ben, ever went to one of the town hall meetings, since you're a 'season ticket holder' and all, you'd know.
by the way, there IS a group interested in keeping the team in atlanta (according to the ajc).
Sorry, but all of the blame goes to ASG. There ARE hockey fans in Atlanta, but it's hard to support a team that's almost never competitive - especially when the ownership did almost nothing to actually MAKE the team competitive, never did anything to at least make seeing their terrible team more affordable, clearly never gave a damn as to the health of the franchise, and lied for years about their intentions. You (you Ben, and you the fuckwits behind ASG) can't whine about lack of fan support if there's nothing to support.
seriously though. ASG and the NHL had/have(?) a great chance to get the minority community interested in hockey. this team and the NHL are becoming more integrated year after year. with stars like Dustin and Evander on the team and so many empty seats I think they could have given away tickets to local schools and develop a new fan base in the African Atlantan community.
Well, I guess I was right about getting comments on this blog. All Ben's other posts generally garner nothing more than cricket chirps.
Blaming ASG is simply a cop out in my opinion. They're the obvious scapegoat in all of this, but we as fans shouldn't hold grudges that ultimately cost us franchises.
The Hawks are just as poorly run from a front office/ownership perspective. The only difference is that basketball is more popular (accepted) than hockey here in Atlanta.
There is a strong faction of hockey fans here, but with the preexisting stigma surrounding the lack of fan support for all other sports in Atlanta, we were fighting an uphill battle and we failed miserably.
There isn't one singular thing to blame for the move to Winnipeg, but I don't want those people who go to one Thrashers game a year blaming ASG and the NHL for the loss of the franchise.
Aren't the Thrashers on the low end of the salary scale and the Hawks (thanks Joe!) on the high end? That would make it seem like they are supporting one and not the other.
'The Hawks are just as poorly run from a front office/ownership perspective. The only difference is that basketball is more popular (accepted) than hockey here in Atlanta.'
Yeah, Ben and maybe you haven't noticed, but the Hawks have been in the playoffs for the past three years. Compare that to the Thrashers over that same time period and now let's hear you blame the ineptitude on the fans again.
Quit reinforcing the wrong, lazy-ass, conventional wisdom national take that this is the fault of the fans. Either you've got your head in your ass and don't know what you are talking about, or you are being disingenuous. Which is it?
Also, it's not like the Hawks are tearing up the NBA attendance records either, so your analogy kinda sucks.
sorry buddy, nothing personal.
just stating the facts as the readers see them.
not everyone is cut out to be a journalist.
I didn't realize we were required to support a sport that we don't care about. I always love when people are chastised for not spending their money to attend professional sporting events. This is not, and never will be, a hockey town. That team should never have been here in the first place. Hopefully the Hawks follow soon as nothing is more overpriced than NBA regular season tickets.
People in Atlanta just don't care about hockey. Why is that so hard to understand?
I guess I was wrong guys.
The fact that Atlanta has lost two NHL franchises isn't an indictment on the fan base...we just got really unlucky (twice) with bad ownership. Let's just pass the buck until we lose all of our professional sports franchises.
I will say that the adamant denial that this is somehow the fans' fault does provide a glimmer of hope that Atlanta sports fans are passionate...about justifying their sports apathy.
Bravo, guys, bravo.
ASG is trash, and I'm happy if anything is out of their hands. I do wish the Thrashers would stay here, but at the end of the day numbers do the talking.
We live in the south in a transplant city. People who grew up here never played hockey in their life, and the people who move here don't care about the Thrashers enough to break their loyalty with their hometown team.
If the Hawks don't get some big names and new ownership soon, I think they'll fall victim to the same issues (except most people played/play basketball at one time or another)
yeah, brussard, a team that makes the playoff once in 12 years is worthy of huge fan turnout on a nightly basis.
this ranks right up there with your brilliant take on soccer as some classic atlanta sports journalism.
does this guy not have an editor who can stop him from saying stupid things? at least confine him to baseball, where he seems less embarrassing to CL.
"Sports apathy"??? This isn't a team that had a few down years while the ownership was scrambling to rebuild; this was a team that had almost nothing BUT down years and an ownership that very readily demonstrated they didn't give a shit.
You want people to show up? Put together a good team, or at least try.
Failing that, lower the goddamn ticket prices. If they're already losing money, why would you NOT drop prices; more bodies in the building = more concession dollars.
Bottom line, ASG didn't care whether the team failed, and tried to unload them for years on end. Treating your customers with contempt is a great way to guarantee failure - ASG succeeded mightily.
I'm just glad we didn't give up on the Falcons so quickly. It took them 13 seasons before they made it to the playoffs and it wasn't until recently that they posted consecutive winning seasons.
I also don't recall anyone nominating Rankin Smith for any "Owner of the Year" awards. Not to mention the fact that he tried to move the team to Jacksonville in 1988. Thankfully, the city came to the rescue and approved the building of the Georgia Dome, which convinced Smith to stay in Atlanta.
Of course, the modern-day NFL is a revenue monster, but it was much less so back in the late 1960s/early 70s. Who knows what would've happened if we had this same sense of disinterest back then.
Was there a time when hockey out did football since the 70's in TV or fan base in the South? or nationally?
Hey if a team like the Whalers could die in the frozen northland of Hartford what chance did a hockey team have in Atlanta?
theboykin61d0:
Good point, but you're comparing apples to oranges.
Hartford's population in 2000 was 121,578. The Whalers left in 1997.
Atlanta had a population of 420,003 in 2010, which doesn't include the over 5,000,000 in the greater metro area.
Just based on numbers, there's really no comparison as to why the Whalers left Hartford in relation to the Thrashers.
If this gets all the Canucks to leave town with 'em, it's addition by subtraction.
The Thrashers were fun to watch in person from time to time. I only really went when they played the Buffalo. This town loves SEC football. Everything else is a side show unless they win. Braves attendence is down, Hawks were down when they were not making playoffs, Falcons pre-Blank down when they were lossing, WNBA come on, soccar....well we still have two pro teams at least. It was a combination of the city not really caring and crappy ownership.
By Bussard's calculus, both Pittsburgh and Chicago also had apathetic fans when their teams were in the toilet as well - hence they should have been relocation bait.
Just one question. How many companies survive that blame the consumer for not buying what they're selling? ASG and Bettman really need to answer that question before they start blaming the fans.
Aren't we just allowed to not give a shit about hockey? Why are we obligated to support a sport that absolutely nobody in this town (save for you and your hardcore few) cares whatsoever about hockey. Why is that bad? Why should hockey have ever been in this town? It belongs up north, especially in Canada where, you know, they actually play the sport.
I doubt Ben believes what he is writing. It's the job of writers these days to get as many clicks as possible on their blogs. So Ben trolls everyone and continues the argument while making everyone red in the face. The more people reply and read the messages, the more advertisements Creative Loafing sends to your browser. Who cares if Ben pretends to not get that one plus one equals two. The best thing you can do if you disagree with him is to ignore his column. Eventually he'll be replaced with someone else. Sadly, there is only a 10% chance that his replacement would be someone who would generate clicks through quality and more likely would be just another person skilled at trolling the audience. It's just the way the "news" is done in the modern world.
Sorry Ben, don't mean to mess up your gig. I actually enjoy performance art so I say "Bravo, sir! Well done!"
Fuck all of you, I was born and raised here and played hockey at 3am in the morning in east cobb because it was the only place you could play hockey in this mouth-breathing hellhole that is atlantaland. I thought it was cool after going to devils games where my family was from. Hockey's popularity has grown tremendously here since the thrashers have been around, there's the cooler, ice forum, and a couple of other places i can't think of. It's an expensive sport to play so i understand it's not going to reach every demographic but this is a big fuckin city, 5 million or so and there's no reason there isn't at least 15k at a hockey game, mouth-breathers or not. Hockey is one of the best sports and it'll be a mammoth shame when the thrashers are gone. So fuck metro atlanta and all the asshole otp-ers, this is your fault!
...and ASG's..and the NHL's. It's sad but there's a funeral to attend tomorrow.
The attendance when they first moved, and when they made the playoffs, were quite good. It's just been a long slow decline once people realized that there was no effort being made to actually improve the team. People stopped going not because they don't like hockey, but because they don't like being made out as suckers.
And the flames had quite good attendance as well, they were sold to pay for the owner's debts. Placing the blame for these teams leaving on the fans is the simple route, not what I'd expect from a sports journalist. Especially one who covers atlanta specifically.
Latest in Fresh Loaf
-
Time and Place: Read between the lines
To me this photo is about doing your own thing and following your own path in life.
-
Vernon Jones wants to return to the Gold Dome and other interesting qualification tidbits 1
Qualifying period ends, dust settles, campaigns begin
-
Suspects in Pittsburgh gay bashing slated to go to trial Tuesday
The men accused of beating Brandon White in Southwest Atlanta already headed to court
- More »
Author Archives
-
Ben's Sports Take: An Appropriate End for the Thrashers 10
790 the Zone hosted a "Thrashers Wake" on Friday afternoon for fans wanting to say their goodbyes
-
Ben's Sports Take: Here's a pretty cool story
- More »
