The Kingdom Grows

All of the points on the map above are hockey teams owned by the same group. It doesn't include their other sports business ventures in baseball, women's basketball, and soccer, but you can see by the colours of the pins on the map that they own several teams or are operating teams within the same league. I'm not sure how conflict-of-interest rules apply here, but owning and/or operating five ECHL teams seems like it would cause headaches. For Zawyer Sports and Entertainment Group, though, those rules don't seem to apply.

Yesterday, the Zawyer Group sunk themselves a little deeper into the SPHL after the Huntsville Havoc announced that Zawyer had acquired a controlling interest in the team. If you notice the green pins on the map, those represent Huntsville and the soon-to-be-real Mobile Mysticks hockey team that will join the SPHL in 2027, both of whom are now owned and operated by the Zawyer Group. I'm no economist or financial guru, but owning and/or operating nine hockey teams - half of whom are in the ECHL - seems like a disaster waiting to happen if anything were to happen to the Zawyer Group financially.

According to the release, the SPHL Board of Governors approved the transaction at their annual meetings last month, and I'm very curious about the conversations that went on with regards to the Zawyer Group's financial situation, the potential conflict-of-interest that owning two teams will cause with the Mysticks, and if there were any other interested parties. The SPHL often has teams operating with tiny profit margins, so one has to wonder what sold the SPHL's Governors on the Zawyer Group taking over as owners of the Havoc.

I'm not here to rain on the Zawyer Group's parade of takeovers in minor pro sports. They seems to understand that fans matter by emphasizing local gate revenues and sponsor revenues, and they treat media deals and merchandise revenue as bonus money. Tickets remain affordable for fans by having more and more sponsors pick up bigger gameday costs, and they replicate this model over all the hockey teams they own and/or operate. The end result is that they have solid attendance figures which gives them a ballpark revenue figure to plan for future seasons. Clearly, as the Zawyer Kingdom grows, this team ownership model appears to be successful.

Again, this isn't a warning that one should be wary of Zawyer Sports and Entertainment. As they continue to add teams and leagues to their portfolio, they are proving that their model works. It becomes a little more worrisome, however, when you consider that they're being asked to use the model above in places where hockey isn't a top-three sport or in places where hockey has failed once before.

The Tahoe Knight Monsters, for example, have never exceeded 3700 fans per game in their three years of existence yet the Savannah Ghost Pirates have sold out their arena at 7485 fans for the past three seasons. Why does the model work in Savannah, but not in Stateline? Jacksonville 's attendance climbed to above 9000 fans per game since Zawyer took over, but Greensboro only saw 6050 fans per game in their inaugural season. How does an expansion team not see more fans than an Icemen team that hasn't even won a division title?

Obviously, there are a pile of other factors that get thrown into the recipe as well, but Huntsville wasn't having problems drawing fans to their games as they've averaged more than 6000 fans over the past three seasons. They played to 98.4% capacity last season - second-best in the SPHL - and averaged more than 1500 fans per game in the playoffs than second-best Pensacola. In terms of ticket sales, the Havoc might be the SPHL's best team from a revenue perspective.

So why did Keith and Becky Jeffries made the decision to sell to Zawyer Sports and Entertainment when they were already doing well?

Well, age might be one reason as Keith Jeffries is 68 years-old. In the release yesterday, Jeffries stated, “The time is right to bring in a managing partner that can help take the Huntsville Havoc into its next chapter," making it sound like he and his wife may want to enjoy the game more rather than running the show. He's certainly earned that right after founding the team in 2004 and guiding it through, at times, some murky waters in the SPHL. However, he stuck to his one guiding principle over 22 years of founding and running the Havoc.

"It goes back to when I went into business early in life, when I was in my early 20s," Jeffries told Mike Easterling of the Huntsville Business Journal in 2019. "My dad told me the key has always been good customer service. The name we had was Golden Rule and it came from the idea of how to treat people, whether they were customers or employees, to try to treat people the way you'd want to be treated as a customer or employee.

"We try to do the same thing here. We're not perfect, but we're getting better. If I was a fan or season ticket holder — how would I want to be treated? Some things are out of our control, but we still do the best with what we have."

It seems pretty clear that his principle has led the Havoc to success both on and off the ice, and one hopes that the Zawyer Group will continue to hold that principle as the guiding light in Huntsville. The Jeffries will still be a fixture at games as a minority owner, but this transition to the Zawyer Group should allow the Jeffries to enjoy a day off every once in a while as they approach retirement ages. After all, I'd say that Keith and Becky absolutely deserve that.

It's funny that in the cutthroat world of professional sports that one simple principle we're taught in elementary school helped to make an SPHL team successful in its community. Make no mistake that the Jeffries guided the Havoc through some tough times and they likely made istakes as well, but the idea of treating fans and sponsors well was the driving force behind the Havoc's tenure in the volatile SPHL. Perhaps the "Golden Rule" should be the first rule for all teams?

That now falls to the Zawyer Group to embrace that mentality as the Havoc move forward. If they follow the plan laid out by the Jeffries, they shouldn't have any issues in Huntsville when it comes to finding success. And if they do find that success, that will only make their sports portfolio that much stronger. Seems easy, doesn't it?

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

The Hockey Show - Episode 728

The Hockey Show, Canada's only campus-produced radio show that strictly talks hockey, has escaped! Our hosts will be out in the community tonight as they make a trip down to the Hockey For All Centre in west Winnipeg to check out an intriguing matchup between the ACHA's University of Jamestown Jimmies and the MFHL's Winnipeg Ice! As far as we can tell, this will be the Ice's first dance with a university team, so this could be fun as the hosts will look for interviews post-game in between talking about hockey! It's the first show out of the studios in a while, so join us down at the Hockey For All Centre for the game and the The Hockey Show at 5:30pm CT!

Some will say the image to the left is an accurate description of our two hosts, but Teebz and Jason will make their way down to the Hockey For All Centre where they'll set up the remote gear and chat about the ongoing insanity at Rogers Communications with respect to Elliotte Friedman and Kevin Bieksa potentially being gone from their broadcasts. They'll also talk about the recent shutdown of Victory+ and how the broadcasting landscape has changed in hockey. They'll also update everyone on the score in the game between the Jimmies and Ice, and they'll see if they can flag down a few players and/or coaches for an interview on the show tonight. It's always fun heading out to a rink for a live show where we can meet talented people, so make sure you're tuned into The Hockey Show at 5:30pm CT on one of 101.5 FM, Channel 718 on MTS TV, or via UMFM.com!

If you live outside Winnipeg and want to listen, we have options! The UMFM website's streaming player works well if you want to listen online. We also recommend Radio Garden if you need an easy-to-use online stream. If you're more of an app person, we recommend you use the TuneIn app found on the App Store or Google Play Store.

If you have questions, you can email all show queries and comments to hockeyshow@umfm.com! Tweet me anytime with questions you may have by hitting me up at @TeebzHBIC on Twitter! I'm here to listen to you, so make your voice heard! And because both Teebz and Jason are on the butterfly app where things are less noisy, you can find Teebz here and Jason here on Bluesky!

Tonight, Teebz and Jason talk insane decisions and bad business, they'll chat with some of Manitoba's best players, and anything else they can squeeze in during their first on-location show exclusively on 101.5 UMFM and on the UMFM.com web stream!

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

Heading Home

The road trip officially comes to an end today, and I would say that I got a lot done in my visit to Thunder Bay. There's always work to be done no matter where I go, but there were some good laughs, some great lunches, and a number of people who made the visit far more than just "work visit". However, that also means that I'll have to plan a trip to be out here again next year, so I'm sure I'll be visiting the shores of Lake Superior once again in 2027 and I'm already looking forward to the trip!

I will say that if you do happen to be in Thunder Bay, you want to hit an amazing restaurant named The Sal. A couple of co-workers hyped it up by talking about the great food they have, and I am here to tell you that they were spot-on with their reviews. I wasn't all that hungry when we visited, but I ended up getting the "Loaded Grill Cheese" - bacon, cheddar, swiss, crushed mozza sticks, garlic aioli on rye - and it was the kind of comfort food that I needed on a road trip!

The burgers were huge, the crispy fries were served in solid portions, and the clubhouse sandwich ordered by my colleague looked like it needed a forklift to pick up. I don't usually give restaurant reviews for the simple reason is that my palete isn't your palete, but there were enough good offerings at The Sal that everyone can find something they like. Make no mistake that there will be a regular visit to this great restaurant whenever I'm in town! It was so good!

Before I get out of town and hit the highway, I did want to make mention of a new battle that long-time hockey host and interviewer Christine Simpson is facing as she revealed that she has breast cancer today. Christine was formerly with Rogers Sportsnet, but did not have her contract renewed in 2024 after establishing herself as one of the premiere interviewers in the game. Today's announcement sucks to see, but she stated that doctors caught it early and that "they’re very optimistic about my outcome". Obviously, I'm in Christine's corner.

I never met Christine, but she always seemed so positive in her professional work. I've never heard anyone say anything negative about her either, so this leads me to believe that she's a genuinely upbeat and fun person to be around. I'm hoping Christine kicks cancer's butt and it's too afraid to ever return. She should be working in hockey still, so maybe we'll see that after she wins this fight!

I'm already late getting on the road with some last-minute work I needed to complete, so I'm off now. It should be a quick jaunt heading west back to Winnipeg, and I'm already looking forward to getting home and seeing Meg, the furball, and getting back into the routine of life. It's been fun in Thunder Bay on this road trip over the last few days, but there's always something to bring me home!

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

This Is Anything But Victory

I've never been an executive for a television or streaming company, but making one's offerings available to as many people as possible without charging exorbitant fees seems like a good place to start. Of course, those offerings would also need to be entertaining to keep people coming back, but that would be the challenge in filling a television lineup on a day-to-day basis. Sports networks seem less demanding as they seem to broadcast old games, talk shows, radio shows, highlight shows, and anything else they can before sports are played live in the evening. Apparently, though, that's not the case as Victory+ has officially closed its doors for broadcasts.

For those that aren't aware, Victory+ was an American streaming service owned by Calgary-based A Parent Media Company. It officially launched in September 2024, ahead of the 2024–25 NHL season, with the Dallas Stars as its first partner. From there, they'd add the Anaheim Ducks to their roster and select St. Louis Blues games before branching out to broadcast MLB's Texas Rangers, the NWSL, Major Arena Soccer League, and the Western Hockey League in Canada.

It seems like they had enough options to keep people watching, but their announcement today has thrown a number of teams' broadcasting schedules into disarray. The Dallas Stars announced on Monday that they were moving their broadcasts to Amazon Prime which made things look bleak for Victory+, and this comes on the heels of the Ducks telling Victory+ in June that they were dissolving their agreement after Victory+ missed payments to its partners.

Again, I fail to understand how that was possible when Victory+ was supposed to be making money off advertising. A net negative cashflow would have been evident as they added more and more teams to their roster, so why would they allow that negative revenue stream to grow and continue? I'm baffled by the lack of simple accounting knowledge shown here by people with business degrees.

These upstart streaming services are proving to suffer from the same problem that a lot of other broadcasting businesses are showing, and that problem is that the sports they're broadcasting simply don't bring in the promised return that people forecast. With Rogers Communications bleeding money and selling off national rights to anyone who shows mild interest and, now, with Victory+ disappearing as quickly as Bally Sports did, the NHL is running out of places where their product will be seen. With both cable and streaming subscriptions down in US households, justifying the cost of overpaying for hockey will be impossible. That should worry everyone.

It's hard to understand how the NHL can justify its outrageous broadcasting fees when a single rating point represents exactly 1% of the total target population in a specific geographic market. If the NHL boasts about having "the most-watched on record in the U.S." last season "with an average of 1.8 million viewers," they're not being seen by a lot of people. A network calculates its potential advertising income by using two calculations: Cost Per Point (CPP) that looks at the cost for each rating point, and Estimated Ad Rate which takes the CPP and multiplies it by the ratings scores delivered by Nielsen.

For example, if Rogers charges $2000 for a 30-second spot during hockey broadcasts, Rogers would be looking for a massive audience to help drive their advertising revenue up. Game One of last year's Stanley Cup Final drew 1.3 million viewers, that's not a huge chunk of Canada watching Vegas and Carolina. For calculations sake, though, let's say that it's 5% of Canada that watched, and that means that Rogers can charge $10,000 for a 30-second spot on its broadcast.

If Rogers shows 25 different commericals on its broadcasts, they make $250,000 per broadcast. Knowing that they broadcast "more than 500 national NHL games per season," let's grab the midpoint and say it's 550 games per year. That means that they only make $137,500,000 in advertising revenue per year, falling massively short of the nearly-billion dollars it needs to cover the NHL's broadcast fees alone. Add in all the staffing, travel, and other costs that come with having hockey on TV, and you're well over a billion dollars of revenue needed to cover Rogers' costs annually. That's a lot of red ink.

At the end of the day, Rogers will not make money on this deal despite being the sole Canadian broadcaster with NHL rights, and their new twevle-year agreement with the NHL doesn't start until October. With Victory+ having much smaller access to games, their advertising revenue stream wouldn't come close to covering their costs either. And with the NHL entering the picture for four teams, I'd expect that one will see very few advertisers signing on to have their ads on this new service outside of oline gambling sites and NHL-produced advertisements. If Victory+ couldn't get the ratings with their roster of teams, the NHL certainly won't achieve them either.

Expect your cable bills, subscription fees, and ticket prices for Toronto pro sports teams to continue to climb as Rogers looks to curb the flow of red ink, but it's too late for anyone on a Victory+ subscription. That money is likely gone with creditors now needing to be paid, and Victory+ will now just be another footnote in the NHL's broadcasting history. And until the NHL realizes that it doesn't have the pull that the NFL or NBA does on television in the US market, more and more broadcasters will lose money until they go broke.

Now you know why the NHL is expanding into Houston and Atlanta, and not Quebec City and Hartford. Those two television markets will artificially boost the NHL's numbers again so they can continue to try and force the spreadsheet arrows upward rather than moving into hockey markets where the passion for the game is real. Of course, they may already be priced out of Quebec City and Hartford with the outrageous ticket prices that fans are foced to pay, so it almost points to the NHL's financial model being broken entirely.

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

Winning In Kazan?

Consider me surprised when I read the news of Kevin Hayes signing in the KHL with Ak Bars Kazan. I would have never guessed that Hayes, who has represented the United States on the ice, would look to Russia for his next contract, but the 34 year-old forward will make the hump after signing a one-year deal. Of course, the image to the left isn't what you'd expect to see on a hockey blog, but that would be Kevin Hayes on July 16, 2023 when he married his wife, Katya Vasilyev, while a member of the St. Louis Blues, and she reportedly played a key role in convincing Hayes to take the contract from the Russian club after offers from NHL teams weren't forthcoming.

According to multiple websites, Hayes said in the Ak Bars Kazan announcement, "My wife is from Russia, and she has always wanted me to play here. An exciting new chapter is beginning for our whole family, and we're all very happy about it." Good for him. Nobody should sneer at a guy chasing something his family wants."

Far be it from me to call out a player's wife for helping her husband choose where he plays, but I'm not quite convinced the "my wife is from Russia" part is true considering that her Boston College athlete biography lists her hometown as Foster City, California. She was born in Moscow according to a YouTube interview, but her being from Russia seems like a bit of a stretch. However, I'm not here to throw shade on a family's decision to play in Russia, so I wish them well.

Hayes joins an Ak Bars Kazan team that lost in the Gagarin Cup Final last season to Lokomotiv, but they were the third-best team in the KHL's Eastern Conference with a 38-17-5-8 record. He joins a team that boasts noted bully Mitchell Miller, playmaking defender Nikita Lyamkin, and skilled forwards Kirill Semyonov and Grigory Denisenko. Head coach Anvar Gatiyatulin was named the KHL Coach of the Year last season, so it seems like Hayes will be in a good spot.

For a guy who has had one NHL season where he scored more than 50 points and just two where he scored more than 20 goals over his twelve years in the show, there was zero chance that he would see a big day in the NHL as a 34 year-old free agent. He might have found work in the NHL this season if he accepted a PTO or took a bonus-filled contract that paid a low base salary, but Hayes chose the guaranteed money that the KHL's Ak Bars Kazan was offering.

We've seen players head over to the KHL and find a home where they can thrive. 33 year-old Josh Leivo has had two solid seasons in the KHL with Salavat Yulaev Ufa and Traktor Chelyabinsk where he scored 80 and 65 points, respectively, which was better than any total he put up as a professional hockey player in North America. Hayes obviosuly needs to find his game alongside his teammates, but he scored 27 goals and 65 points in 40 games for Boston College.

Clearly, this is an adventure that Kevin and Katya want as they move from the east coast to 850kms east of Moscow. No one is promising that anything will be easy, but he's joining a solid team that needs a replacement for Nathan Todd who moved to Metallurg Magnitogorsk. If Hayes can be that guy, Ak Bars Kazan will be in a good position to battle their way back to a second Gagarin Cup Final this year.

And if things go well, Hayes could be hoisting the trophy at the end of the campaign, proving that listening to his wife was the best decision he made when it comes to his professional hockey career.

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!