The Cincinnati Myth

For years, I have heard the story about how the WHA likely could have sent five or six teams to the NHL when it came to the 1979 absorption of the WHA into the NHL. The four teams that were incorporated into the NHL - the Edmonton Oilers, the Hartford Whalers, the Quebec Nordiques, and the Winnipeg Jets - had varying levels of success in their histories after joining the NHL, but I was always told that both the Houston Aeros and the Cincinnati Stingers could have made the jump to the NHL as well. Knowing how the NHL has never been the league to turn down free money or opportunities to make money, it has always struck me that having two more teams join the circuit in 1979 wouldn't have hurt the league in any way. So why did it not happen?

The 1978-79 Cincinnati Stingers had a collection of talent that would have put them in a good place in the NHL had they been able to retain that talent. Robbie Ftorek was the scoring leader at 116 points while Peter Marsh had 43 goals that season. The Stingers boasted five guys with more than 25 goals including an 18 year-old from Ottawa named Mike Gartner who scored 27 times that season. Add in the goaltending duo of Mike Liut and Michel Dion, and the Stingers appeared to have a roster as solid as any NHL team at the time.

Despite repeated attempts between the NHL and WHA to come to an agreement on a merger between 1977 and 1979, the NHL would finally agree to the merger in March of 1979. Terms still needed to be set when it came to which teams were going to be absorbed in the merger, but there was a framework that was proposed by NHL President John Ziegler in June of 1977 that would have seen six teams join the NHL if various conditions were met. This proposal was voted down by the NHL, and four WHA teams folded after that vote failed, leaving the WHA with eight teams for the 1977-78 season.

Negotiations resumed in 1978, but Ziegler presented a new proposal to the NHL Board of Governors where only four teams would be accepted instead of the six originally proposed. While the WHA wanted all three Canadian teams added, the American teams being considered came down to both Houston and Hartford. The Aeros tried to get Boston owner Jeremy Jacobs to support their inclusion, but Jacobs was against expansion entirely as he declined to support either team. With the NHL owners still being ice-cold to the merger, these negotiations went nowhere as the merger was voted down.

For the 1978-79 WHA season, Aeros owner Kenneth Schnitzer ceased operations for his team as he applied directly to the NHL for an expansion franchise. The NHL balked at that application with a number of teams in financial dire straits, so Schnitzer proposed that the NHL relocate a team to Houston with the Cleveland Barons being the most likely choice. Instead, the NHL sold the franchise rights to the Gund brothers who merged the franchise with the Minnesota North Stars. As a result, Schnitzer folded the Aeros on July 8, 1978.

As the WHA season began with seven teams instead of the eight that was expected, another franchise pulled the plug midway through the season as the Indianapolis Racers shut their doors after 25 games. Down to six teams, it was clear the WHA was on the shakiest of ground it had ever been in its existence, and the NHL seized upon that as they now saw expansion as a business idea to boost the NHL.

In March of 1979, the two leagues agreed that four teams would be merged into the NHL despite the owners only wanting three - the New England Whalers, Winnipeg Jets, and Edmonton Oilers. The Nordiques and the WHA insisted on all three Canadian teams being included, and the NHL finally agreed on March 22, 1979 in a second vote to bring the four teams into the NHL, leaving Birmingham and Cincinnati on the outside despite Cincinnati having a decent team.

It's seems ridiculous that the league wouldn't include Houston and one additional team as part of the agreement in 1978 considering how strong the Aeros franchise was in Houston, and Cincinnati historically had been one of the strongest teams in the WHA to that point. As stated, the story of Cincinnati being considered by the NHL has been a story told a few times, so what happened to the Stingers?

I was actually looking for something else in the newspaper archives when I came across a Febraury 5, 1979 article that literally explains why the Stingers never jumped to the NHL. Here's that article!

Despite the story being about the Stingers selling Rick Dudley to the Buffalo Sabres so they "can buy some rowboats", reporter Reyn Davis included a solid reason as to why the Stingers wouldn't be going to the NHL for the 1979-80 season as an expansion franchise.

As Davis wrote,

"The Stingers' owners have indicated to their WHA partners that they are more interested in collecting an indemnity to fold rather than acquire an expansion franchise in the National Hockey League."

In short, it sounds like the Stingers' owners wanted to recoup as much money as they could from the WHA venture rather than potentially lose more money supporting an NHL franchise in Cincinnati. If they were selling players like Dudley midway through the WHA season to bring in less expensive players, that's suggests money troubles. Getting paid to abandon the franchise would be an easy out.

I think this admission by the Stingers' owners can put the myth to rest that the Stingers were poised to join the NHL. While they certainly had a roster of future NHL stars, the ownership group clearly had no intention of spending more money to keep the franchise afloat, and their selling of star players for less expensive options is evidence that there were money troubles in Cincinnati. There was no honeypot.

The Stingers were never going to the NHL, so this myth is busted.

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!