Imagine if everything Mario Lemieux said or implied on Monday comes true:
That Research In Motion co-founder Jim Balsillie's bid for the Pittsburgh Penguins franchise is truly dead; and that depending upon how a state licence to operate slot machines is awarded today, his attractive National Hockey League team could be on the auction block, up for grabs to the highest bidder, who could then turn around and move it anywhere he darn well pleased.
Lemieux sounded like a man truly tired of the whole messy, convoluted process. He was a reluctant NHL owner to begin with, reorganizing the Penguins out of bankruptcy only because he was their single biggest creditor and it was the only way to protect the vast majority of the dollars that he earned as an NHL player.
He learned the ins and outs of being a suit -- attending meetings, dealing with politicians, negotiating with rich guys who turned out not to have as much money as advertised or, if they did, weren't prepared to part with it unless the terms were exactly to their specifications.
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Even though he carefully said nothing about it yesterday, Lemieux wants out. And he'll really want out if the slot-machine licence isn't awarded to the Penguins' partner of choice, a company called Isle of Capri, which long ago entered into an agreement with the team to invest $290-million (U.S.) in a new arena that would keep the franchise in Pittsburgh.
The scenario where the Penguins absolutely stay and survive in Pittsburgh requires that the Isle Of Capri -- and not one of the two other suitors -- end up with the slots licence.
If not, then all bets are off and the Penguins could be on the move -- and if they do go, they would most likely end up in that hockey hotbed of Kansas City, Miss.
As a scenario, it looks startlingly similar to the flight of the Quebec Nordiques to Denver after the 1994-95 season, when Marcel Aubut's ownership group couldn't figure out a way to get the government to pay for a new building in his city either. Denver had previously failed as an NHL town; the woeful Colorado Rockies left in the early 1980s to become the New Jersey Devils.
The second time around proved to be a charm for Denver, however, largely because the new team, rechristened the Colorado Avalanche, was an emerging NHL powerhouse, as opposed to the ridiculously mediocre expansion team they had in their first incarnation. (About the only thing more laughable than the Rockies of Don Cherry and Hardy Astrom were the Kansas City Scouts of Sid Abel and Simon Nolet, which is where the franchise played for the first two years of its existence.)
In 1993, under the direction of then general manager Pierre Pagé, the Nordiques had assembled a centre-ice corps that consisted of Joe Sakic, 24, Mats Sundin, 22, and a prospect named Peter Forsberg, 20, who was one year away from joining the NHL team. By the time they got to the Mile High City, Pagé had been replaced as general manager by Pierre Lacroix, who generously handed Sundin to the Toronto Maple Leafs in exchange for Wendel Clark.
Clark was eventually flipped for Claude Lemieux, but it didn't matter. Most of the pieces of the championship puzzle were already in place when the Nordiques landed in Colorado. The city and the team forged an instant love affair -- everybody loves a winner right? -- as the Avs brought home the Stanley Cup in 1996 and 2001. Only this year, after they started breaking up the old gang, is attendance finally starting to flag.
Now, examine the Penguins of 2006-07.
Their centre-ice corps consists of Sidney Crosby, 19, Evgeni Malkin, 20, and Jordan Staal, 18. Even if Buffalo and Anaheim and San Jose are the best teams in the NHL right now, the Penguins might be the most attractive franchise with so many good young players in the system, all of whom are still years away from their primes and, just as importantly from a business standpoint, years away from unrestricted free agency as well.
Depending upon how the slot-machine licence vote goes today, someone could get 'em all -- and plunk them down in Houston or Las Vegas or Winnipeg or even southwestern Ontario. But more than likely, it'll be the city with the new building and a potential ownership group with existing ties to the NHL that is ready and waiting, for the start of the 2007-08, to step in and snap up the Pens.
A few potential buyers are already nibbling around the edges, but it could turn into a full-fledged auction starting today. And wouldn't that be something, if all these talented kids ended up in a city with Kansas City's rich hockey tradition?
That, of course, would necessitate a shift into the league's Western Conference with the Detroit Red Wings probably moving to the East (which is where they belong, geographically, anyway).
It also means that if the schedule doesn't change, all those Eastern Conference teams banking on two visits a season from Crosby & Co. to spur interest in their franchise would suddenly only get to see him once every three seasons.
You wonder if that prospect -- of limited exposure for Crosby in New York, Toronto and Montreal for the next five years or so -- might just get the NHL decision makers thinking long and hard about the revised schedule they rejected earlier this month, where everybody plays everybody else at least once a season.
The irony of that would escape exactly no one.
Follow Eric Duhatschek's daily hockey blog at globeandmail.com
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