Category: Sports

Jeff Jacobs Apologizes for Believing in Baldwin

Jeff Jacobs writing in the Courant about Don Quixote’s demise and apologizing for his small rule in it:

Where I erred so badly in 2010 was underestimating how much major-league damage he could do in a minor-league market. He burned through money and goodwill like nobody’s business. He raised plenty of cash for the outdoor WinterFest and the AHL team, but he spent plenty more. I’d ask him early on if he had the connections to pull this off. Every time, the answer was yes.

I hate to tell someone as good as Jeff I told you so, but here’s me two years ago after the Whale debuted:

We can debate why the Whalers left and if they should have all day but the one thing that’s not up for debate is the NHL returning to Hartford. It’s not happening and Baldwin’s campaign only strings along fans who’ve been promised the NHL for 14 years now. I applaud Baldwin for wanting to return the hockey culture to Hartford but we need to rally around our AHL team, whether they be named the Wolfpack or the Whale(rs), because that’s the best we’re going to get. If we continue to hold out for the NHL we could very well wake up one morning and find the AHL gone as well.

The Whale’s lease at the XL Center expires after this season and their future at the venue is murky to say the least. That’s not wholly Howard’s fault, but he deserves some blame for the current issues in Hartford’s hockey market, and Jacobs is right to ask him to “quietly go away.”

I’d add that at this point it’s hard not to feel sympathy for Baldwin. He has roughly $2.7 million in debt and 15 court cases against him. In addition he still feels he has some role to play in the future of Hartford hockey telling Jacobs, “I have no intention of getting out of hockey or abandoning this market. We have to find another way, create another plan over the next six months.”

08/07/2012

Whalers
Baldwin Out of Hartford Hockey. Again.
So much for all those plans for a new XL Center and Don Quixote triumphally returning the NHL to Hartford. The Hartford Courant reports the Rangers have taken back management of the Connecticut Whale from Baldwin’s Whalers Sports & Entertainment:

Sources have told The Courant the team will play in Hartford next season, but the Rangers have told WSE officials they will not be involved in the day-to-day operation and marketing of the franchise. The structure of the front office for the upcoming season is not known, but an announcement could come Tuesday or Wednesday.…The company’s financial problems have long been a concern for the Rangers.WSE has also been trying to negotiate a new lease with the AEG, which manages the XL Center. The team’s lease expires in 2013 and WSE has been seeking more favorable terms. Company officials have said rent for the past season was $25,000 per game.After a bump in attendance during the 2010–11 season, the team averaged 4,573 (23rd in the 30-team AHL) last season.
- After all the talk about increased attendance, Howard could only manage 23rd in the league. The team made the playoffs, but they also lost all of January.
- Who knows where the AHL in Hartford goes from here. The XL Center needs serious work or a complete teardown, but who thinks anything is going to be worked out in the next few years? Remember Howard’s plan for a fancy remodeled XL Center? Neither does anyone else and that was only seven months ago. Hartford does have something going for it however, it’s still probably the closest place to New York City after the Devils moved their AHL team to Albany last year.
- Need it be said? Everyone who pulled out Whalers apparel hoping the NHL will come back can safely stow the stuff away until the next Don Quixote comes along in five or ten years.
06/26/2012

Whalers
Baldwin Did Not Kill Hockey in Hartford, He Just Made It’s Death Messy

Great column by Jeff Jacobs on Howard’s exit and the future of hockey in Hartford. Spoiler: Professional hockey is probably done.

Even though I’ve been hard on Howard it’s important to note his failure won’t lead to the death of the AHL in Hartford (if it comes to that of course). Hockey in Hartford was dying before he got involved, as evidenced by the Wolfpack’s declining attendance even though the team remained successful on the ice. Hartford isn’t a hockey town, it’s a Whalers town.

06/26/2012

Whalers
Malloy: “Don’t Hold Your Breath”

Sensibility from Dannel:

…Malloy added, Connecticut is not close to landing an NHL franchise. “I don’t lie awake at night wondering how that’s going to happen,” Malloy said. “Because, it’s not going to happen in the short run.”

I attended a game over Christmas break and the crowd was a decent size, but the team is averaging less than 4,500 fans a game. Hartford needs a new arena, but the NHL isn’t going to be part of it.

01/11/2012

Whalers
Former Whaler Bobby Crawford Says Return Improbable

Someone alert Don Quixote! Crawford in an interview with the Canadian paper The Intelligencer:

“Toronto could handle another NHL team — probably two more,” said Crawford. “But there are three NHL teams within 90 minutes of Hartford, plus basketball, football and baseball. Winnipeg proved they were a viable market with quite a few sellouts for their AHL team.

“Here, it would be a tough call. The AHL team (the Connecticut Whale) is averaging about 4,000 and their tickets are 10 bucks. For the NHL to come back, you’d need 15,000 people playing 80 to 100 bucks.

The kicker? Crawford manages rinks in the area and helped organize last year’s outdoor Whalers Hockey Fest. Something tells me Crawford’s off the Christmas card list this year.

11/24/2011

Whalers
Hartford’s Don Quixote Continues Chasing Giants

Howard Baldwin, not satisfied with an average of 4,700 per home game this year, is back chasing rainbows and attempting to implant delusions of grander and sugar plum fairies into the minds of Connecticut hockey fans. Want a new arena complex and the NHL by 2017? Howard will do it! If you believe that I still haven’t been unable to unload my ocean front property in Arizona. Call me, it’s heavily reduced.

So what are the issues this time? The biggest is the price tag: []$105 million in public dollars](https://twitter.com/VTConfidential/status/136437450703765504). I’m a hockey fan but even I won’t endorse spending money on a new stadium given the record of publicly-financed stadiums. Next? Baldwin wants the NHL to return in six years. Winnipeg opened the MTS Centre in 2004 and saw the NHL return this year–a seven year time span. Howard wants the NHL back in six years and we only have nice pictures of what the new XL Center will look like. With fifteen years of failed attempts at a new arena, do you really think we’ll do it in six?

11/15/2011

Whalers
The Yankees Did Not Play the Cubs in July 1934

I’ve long gotten over bickering about factual errors in historical movies, yet Public Enemies just got on my nerves. The IMDB issues page should shed some light if you’ve never seen the movie. Oddly it wasn’t that the movie has Pretty Boy Floyd die before Dillinger (the movie uses Melvin Purvis shooting Floyd as basis for him leading the hunt for Dillinger), rather it was that the Yankees played the Cubs in July during one point in the film.

Late in the film Johnny Depp’s Dillinger wanders through a police station examining evidence while a baseball game can be heard in the background. It’s the Cubs beating the Yanks 3–2 with the announcer talking about the Babe’s bad leg. The Yankees were actually playing in Chicago that day, and Babe Ruth certainly had a bum leg. But given that Interleague wasn’t invented for another 63 years, the Yanks were at Comiskey not Wrigley. They also played a doubleheader, blowing out the Sox both games.

Of course Dillinger was a Cubs fan.

07/29/2011

Baseball, Movies
Lies, Damned Lies, and Statistics

Here’s a helpful reminder should you stumble across any of the previous articles about attendance, either the Connecticut Whale or otherwise: attendance numbers are easily fudged through a variety of means.

Also a humorous Twitter exchange between TSN’s Bob McKenzie and whoever runs the Whale’s Twitter page:

@JeffMarek And killed Pucky the Whale as well.
— Bob McKenzie (@TSNBobMcKenzie) May 26, 2011

@CTWhale Sorry, I don't think that is Pucky. Burkie personally killed Pucky with his bare hands. I think that's Pucky's kid. Pucky II.
— Bob McKenzie (@TSNBobMcKenzie) May 26, 2011

05/26/2011

Whalers
Baldwin Continues the Quest

Howard Baldwin, for better or worse, refuses to acknowledge the long shot (an understatement frankly) chances Hartford has of ever landing another NHL franchise. Hartford Courant columnist Jeff Jacobs has a column today in which Baldwin says this of next year:

“I’m absolutely adamant next year that our average attendance is closer to 10,000,” Baldwin said. “We should lead the league. We’ve got a good building. We’ve got a good market. I’d be pissed off if we didn’t lead the AHL in attendance. I’m sorry, but that’s the way I feel.”

Jacobs says he skeptical, I personally burst out laughing when I read the predictions. After all, the Whale only managed to attract 4.514 fans to their must-win Saturday night game 6 against the Portland Pirates (coached by former Whaler Kevin Dineen). Furthermore;

We can tell you Baldwin returned to Hartford with a bang last year. He had a plan to rebuild hockey in the market with a long-term view of bringing back the NHL. He scored some substantive gains, absorbed some pocket losses and, all in all, pushed the puck down the rink in a positive direction. The Whale improved from an average attendance of 4,188 in 2009–2010 — 18th in the league — to 5,695 and 12th.

What those numbers do not show is that if you remove the announced outdoor game crowd of 21,673, the average of the remaining 39 is 5,285. Then again, the Wolf Pack averaged 3,466 the first 11 games and the Whale averaged 6,540 in the final 29 after rebranding. So take your pick.

It should also be noted that the outdoor game’s actual attendance was far lower than what was announced. While the attendance numbers are nice, I’m still not convinced they’re anything more than curiosity/hopes for an NHL return. I’ll call Baldwin’s quest a success if he keeps the numbers up after a few more years when the novelty of Pucky wears off.

And lastly;

To say Baldwin is unhappy with last season’s schedule is an understatement. He also had the misfortune of a number of games on nights with the Fiesta Bowl, Super Bowl, Big East tournament, NCAA Tournament…

I actually attended the Whale’s game that was pushed up to five from seven to allow fans to watch the Fiesta Bowl on New Year’s day. Unfortunately the fact that the Whale are forced to compete with–and lose to–these other sporting events says something. Namely, the market will come out only if there’s nothing else to do. I am however curious about this bit:

Baldwin said he expects “really good” announcements on both radio and TV broadcasts in the next 30–45 days. This could open eyes. Baldwin isn’t thinking small. Asked what AHL team has the best blueprint to copy, for instance, he responded, “The NHL Whalers from the Eighties.”

05/01/2011

Whalers
The Dream That Never Was Is Dead

The Whale Bowl was played yesterday and wind and cold are being blamed for poor attendance. The failure to turn out a decent crowd for the whole game sent columnists and reporters scrambling hoping to salvage whatever they could from the failed stunt cooked up by Howard Baldwin to convince the NHL to come back to Hartford.

This was a one and done thing. Something of this nature isn’t going to happen again. You’re not going to stage 40 plus games over thirteen days again. Baldwin probably won’t risk staging another game and having another miserable turnout and empty seats.

The Courant says Baldwin came away not wanting to send a message to the NHL, instead insisting “his group will build from the event and increase attendance for Whale games at the XL Center.” The dream Baldwin hoped was real has proven to be just that, a dream. Now one has to wonder how long Baldwin is willing to run an AHL team before he skips town and returns back to the sunny shores of Los Angeles.

Those who took part in the festival will have memories that will stay with them for the rest of their lives, right next to their Whalers memories.

02/20/2011

Whalers