Thrashers headed to Winnipeg

Problem is that there are simply more franchises based in the eastern part of North America than the west. Sure, it's closer to travel Detroit to New York than Detroit to Los Angeles, but not sure what the league could do about it other than eliminate conferences altogether and just have six divisions and a balanced schedule.

Of all the teams, I think Dallas and Nashville are most disadvantaged under the current alignment. Dallas has huge travel within the division and the late starts don't help for TV. Nashville could form good rivalries with the other southern teams, so I am guessing that might be the way to go.

 

Nashville is in the Central time zone, so I doubt they're that interested in moving to the East. Columbus makes by far the most sense.

And if Dallas can deal with no divisional team within two time zones or a three hour flight, so can Vancouver.

 

If Minnesota gets Winnipeg in its division, it will help, but otherwise the NHL has to get the Wild out of the Northwest. It's a shame that nearly all of their road games are in Mountain and Pacific timezones. Terrible for fans.

 

The ESPN boys have a chat about realignment up, and Burnside make a solid point that the league is waiting on realignment until the whole Phoenix thing shakes out by the end of next year. Getting rid of conferences seems like a good idea at the surface, but I'm not sure they want to do away with the Wales and Campbell trophies for winning your respective conference. I'd really like to see them go back to four divisions and have the playoffs start in division the way it used to be. You could have:

EAST
Atlantic -- PIT, PHI, NJ, WSH, CAR, TB, FLA
Northeast -- OTT, BOS, NYR, NYI, MTL, BUF, DET, TOR

WEST
Central -- STL, WIN, CHI, DAL, NSH, MIN, CLB
Pacific -- SJ, VAN, LA, ANA, PHX, CAL, EDM, COL

Of course, I'm not sure how the scheduling would work with two eight-team divisions and two seven-team divisions. I'm sure there's a computer that handles that anyway.

 

tell me which team flies more miles each year and then tell me if it's close.

 

Stoked about this:

 

Now for the important question: What will they be called?

I believe the league said they would be the Winnipeg Jets only if it was the Coyotes who moved there. (Why that was determined I have no idea). There was also speculation the team would take on the AHL franchise's identity, the Manitoba Moose.

To that end, for you hardcore minor-league hockey fans, where would the AHL Moose move to now that there's an NHL team in town? Got to admit it would be amusing if that team moved to Atlanta (or Gwinnett, even).

 

Gwinnett still has a team. Announced their fall schedule yesterday, I'm sure a complete coincidence on timing.

 

If your moving to what's considered a minor league market I'm thinking the last thing you want to do is brand yourself with a minor league name.

I seem to recall somebody mentioning in the Yotes thread that the NHL held the rights to the Jets name & marks. If that's the case I'd think the league would allow Atlanta Flames 2.0 to use it.

 

Deal already in place to move the Moose to St. John's.

And Nashville already has solid rivalries with Detroit, Chicago and St. Louis. Preds fans don't give a shit about the SE teams.

 

To be fair, neither does anyone else.

Thrashers would have drawn a lot more fans with more games against the teams people actually give a shit about, rather than having half their home schedule against Carolina, Washington, Florida and Tampa Bay. Of course, much like the Devil Rays/Rays, it doesn't say much for the team that their success at the box office is based on the opposition.

 

The Quebec Panthers ... not a very good ring to it.