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The NHL is expanding to Las Vegas, the city's first pro-sports team

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F

Frozenprince

Banned
There's more talent than ever in the NHL right now too, shrink Goalie pads and expand the net slightly to get scoring back up and we could be entering a new golden age.
 
JetBlackPanda

JetBlackPanda

Member
Frozenprince said:
There's more talent than ever in the NHL right now too, shrink Goalie pads and expand the net slightly to get scoring back up and we could be entering a new golden age.
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I was just saying the same thing to my buddy. I'm from AS and love the coyotes but I live in Utah now so I will watch some Golden Knights!
 
A

Ace Harding

Member
The logos look like available options when you create a fictitious team in Madden. Or clip art. So bad.

And the name is even worse. Blackjacks would have been so much better.
 
Q

Quick

Banned
Underwhelming name, but awesome logos, speaking as a uniform/logos geek.

I'm looking forward to the jerseys. The Golden Knights are starting next season, when the transition from Reebok to Adidas branding (same company, I know) sets in.

BigJonsson said:
Why drop the Las? =/
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When you ain't first, you're Las.
 
C

Crazymoogle

Member
CosmicQueso said:
Stahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhp
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Have to admit their franchise has had some pretty low points.

- Bad arena
- Bitter war with city
- Minimal regular season success
- Best players have aged out
- Bankruptcy
- Worked with NHL to chase Gretzky out of the league (!)
- Awful uniforms

Thrashers will go down as a worse franchise simply because ownership bailed and ran the team to Winnipeg, plus the Coyotes at least had a glimmer of playoff success. But PHX is still a really troubled franchise.
 
T

theRizzle

Member
BigJonsson said:
Why drop the Las? =/
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Nobody from Vegas says they live in Las Vegas.


Crazymoogle said:
Have to admit their franchise has had some pretty low points.

- Bad arena
- Bitter war with city
- Minimal regular season success
- Best players have aged out
- Bankruptcy
- Worked with NHL to chase Gretzky out of the league (!)
- Awful uniforms

Thrashers will go down as a worse franchise simply because ownership bailed and ran the team to Winnipeg, plus the Coyotes at least had a glimmer of playoff success. But PHX is still a really troubled franchise.
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You forgot complete and utter lack of ability to develop their draft picks. I think that is their most glaring issue as a franchise. I can't name one NHL player off the top of my head who was drafted by the Yotes and developed into an NHL player. They probably had the best shot with Brett MacLean but even with him I never felt like he was given a legitimate chance to make the NHL roster even though they were terrible at the time.

As far as I can rexall, their most successful prospects (OEL & Domi) stepped into the league right away
 
R

RBH

Member
theRizzle said:
That can't be the real reason. It's three letters. This is the same league that brought you The Mighty Ducks of Anaheim
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Foley said he was conscious of the name being too long, and he addressed that by dropping the “Las” from the official team name. This is, simply, Vegas. They play in Vegas. They’re the Vegas Golden Knights.

“The local people refer to Vegas, not Las Vegas,” he said. “The people from out of town refer to, ‘Las Vegas.’ It’s, ‘Where are you from?’ ‘Oh, I’m from Vegas.’

“I thought Las Vegas Golden Knights, four words, too much. Three words is kind of the limit.”
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http://deadspin.com/vegas-golden-knights-eh-1789300930
 
C

CosmicQueso

Member
Crazymoogle said:
Have to admit their franchise has had some pretty low points.

- Bad arena
- Bitter war with city
- Minimal regular season success
- Best players have aged out
- Bankruptcy
- Worked with NHL to chase Gretzky out of the league (!)
- Awful uniforms
Click to expand...

Okay, sure.

But other than that, what's wrong with the Coyotes?

Answer: NOTHING

(Oh, the Arena is actually really great. Excellent sightlines, reasonable prices, plenty of bars and restaurants right outside the doors. It's one of the better rinks in the league imo, and cheap for Vancouver fans to fly to.)
 
E

ElephantShell

Banned
CosmicQueso said:
Okay, sure.

But other than that, what's wrong with the Coyotes?

Answer: NOTHING

(Oh, the Arena is actually really great. Excellent sightlines, reasonable prices, plenty of bars and restaurants right outside the doors. It's one of the better rinks in the league imo, and cheap for Vancouver fans to fly to.)
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Y'all got Max Domi so you're fine by me.
 
R

RBH

Member
Vegas Golden Knights owner Bill Foley gave a more combative view about the Raiders’ arrival in an interview.

“If I had complete control, I would have rather the Raiders would not have been here. But I didn’t, so welcome. Bring em on,” he said.

Foley also slammed the public financing behind the new stadium for the Raiders.

“I felt like there are a lot better ways to spend $750 million than bringing the Raiders to Las Vegas,” Foley added, “Thought we could spend it on police and schools, and make them the best in the country. Instead I guess we’re getting a football stadium.”

In the past, the NHL has struck a mostly indifferent tone on the Raiders and the possibility of the NFL jumping into the market. The NHL’s Board of Governors approved the expansion of the league into Las Vegas last June making the Golden Knights the first major pro sports team to enter the area. At that time, there were rumors of the Raiders moving to Las Vegas, but there was nothing concrete.

“I would say overall, it’s neutral. We were certainly aware of the talk and the possibility of the NFL locating a franchise in Vegas at the time we made the decision to expand into Las Vegas,” Daly said via email to Puck Daddy last January after it was reported the Raiders would file relocation papers. “So, obviously, we felt an NFL team – if it transpired (and certainly time will tell on that) – wouldn’t materially affect the business of the hockey team. That continues to be our feeling. I think while fan bases undoubtedly overlap, the sports ‘buy’ for sponsors is materially different as between football ‎and hockey.”

Still, there are some questions on whether the NHL should be concerned about the Raiders and whether they’ll slow some of the Golden Knights’ momentum with fans and local sponsors. The NHL has seen this happen before with the NFL when the Nashville Predators and Tennessee Titans entered Middle Tennessee in 1998.

“Initially the NHL’s Nashville Predators surprisingly held their own against the NFL’s Tennessee Titans, but it soon became apparent that the novelty of hockey in a non-traditional sun-belt hockey market was risky business,” Vanderbilt economics professor John Vrooman said. “Both NFL and NHL teams rely heavily on the corporate client season ticket base. The problem is that almost all gate revenue in the NFL is derived from season tickets whereas only about half of the tickets sold in the NHL are season tickets. Corporate season tickets are more valuable than walk up tickets because they are more certain and inelastic with respect to winning and price."
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http://sports.yahoo.com/news/nhl-st...-after-raiders-relocation-vote-210431470.html



I'm a bit uncertain about the Knights' chances in Las Vegas. With them being an expansion team and building from the ground up, that team is going to struggle initially. And now with only 2-3 years until the Raiders come to town, they might get overshadowed pretty quickly.
 
NYR

NYR

Member
Nice to see the NHL with massive egg on their face. You don't compete with the NFL. A one year or even a two year head start is meaningless against them, Vegas will be Raiders country, just another failed experiment by the NHL to be the first In Vegas and they won't get anything out of it. It should have been Quebec. The city wasn't big enough for one professional team, now two and one in the most popular sports and leagues in the US? No chance Vegas will be a hockey town.
 
L

lupinko

Member
NYR said:
Nice to see the NHL with massive egg on their face. You don't compete with the NFL. A one year or even a two year head start is meaningless against them, Vegas will be Raiders country, just another failed experiment by the NHL to be the first In Vegas and they won't get anything out of it. It should have been Quebec. The city wasn't big enough for one professional team, now two and one in the most popular sports and leagues in the US? No chance Vegas will be a hockey town.
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That would create an even bigger balance issue with regards to conferences.
 
E

Earthbound64

Banned
NYR said:
Nice to see the NHL with massive egg on their face. You don't compete with the NFL. A one year or even a two year head start is meaningless against them, Vegas will be Raiders country, just another failed experiment by the NHL to be the first In Vegas and they won't get anything out of it. It should have been Quebec. The city wasn't big enough for one professional team, now two and one in the most popular sports and leagues in the US? No chance Vegas will be a hockey town.
Click to expand...

Because the NHL can totally read the NFL's mind, and the NFL let the NHL know about this years ahead of time, right?
And it's not like the NFL hasn't had the past number of decades to have a team in Las Vegas and didn't do it.

It's beyond absurd to expect the NHL to have prepared for this in any way whatsoever.
 
G

gutter_trash

Banned
Earthbound64 said:
Because the NHL can totally read the NFL's mind, and the NFL let the NHL know about this years ahead of time, right?
And it's not like the NFL hasn't had the past number of decades to have a team in Las Vegas and didn't do it.

It's beyond absurd to expect the NHL to have prepared for this in any way whatsoever.
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Seatle, Quebec City, Hamilton
 
S

Sheroking

Member
gutter_trash said:
Seatle, Quebec City, Hamilton
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Seattle doesn't have an ownership group nor an NHL arena, Quebec City had the chance to go further in the expansion process but was gunshy on the 500M expansion fee because of the exchange rate and Hamilton is a bigger fight with the Maple Leafs that hasn't happened yet.

The Golden Knights will be mostly fine. NFL competition is not actually a huge burden for the NHL because it runs for half the season, missing the playoff season entirely and there are only 8 home dates. The NHL is a gate driven league and the Golden Knights have sold a ton of season tickets.

If this were the NBA, it'd be a bigger deal because those seasons run almost completely parallel.
 
R

RBH

Member
Uniforms revealed:


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More: https://www.nhl.com/goldenknights/news/the-golden-knights-debut-their-jerseys-photos/c-290028756
 
R

RBH

Member
i


Marc-Andre Fleury already is a champion. Now, he's a Golden Knight.

The veteran goaltender was selected by the Vegas Golden Knights in their expansion draft, the results of which were announced Wednesday during the 2017 NHL Awards telecast. The announcement comes on the 14th anniversary of Fleury being selected by the Pittsburgh Penguins in the first round of the 2003 draft.

Fleury, who was on hand for Wednesday night's ceremony, received the largest cheer in front of the Las Vegas fans, something that surprised the 32-year-old.

"I didn't know that was coming," Fleury said. "I was a little surprised by that. That was a warm welcome, and I'm getting excited about it."

Fleury now goes from the two-time reigning Stanley Cup champions to the desert expansion team.

"I'm not looking to be the face of much," Fleury said when asked of being his new team's star player. "I'm just trying to come and play hockey."

His old team's star player, Sidney Crosby, spoke glowingly of the netminder.

"He's going to be so important for their team with his experience and the kind of person he is," Crosby said following the awards show. "You couldn't have a better guy."

The Golden Knights' selections were revealed in reverse order of their originating team's regular-season standings, meaning the Colorado Avalanche's player (Calvin Pickard) came off the board first, while the Washington Capitals' pick (Nate Schmidt) was announced last.

With their first expansion draft picks, Vegas selected Pickard, a goalie, forwards William Carrier, Cody Eakin, Jonathan Marchessault, Teemu Pulkkinen and Tomas Nosek, and defensemen Brayden McNabb, Jon Merrill and Luca Sbisa.

James Neal was the biggest individual name revealed in the second round of expansion announcements. The veteran forward posted 41 points for the Stanley Cup Finals runner-up Nashville Predators during the regular season.

In addition to Neal, the Golden Knights also announced the selections of forwards Pierre-Edouard Bellemare, Connor Brickley and Chris Thorburn, defensemen Jason Garrison and Deryk Engelland, and goalie Jean-Francois Berube.

The selection of Berube from the New York Islanders brought a windfall for the Golden Knights, as they also acquired via trade forward Mikhail Grabovski, defenseman Jake Bischoff and two picks -- a 2017 first-round selection and 2019 second-round pick from the Isles.

Vegas got defensive for the third round of announcements, selecting five defensemen among the group of eight announced players.

Defensemen Alexei Emelin, Marc Methot, Colin Miller, Griffin Reinhart and David Schlemko were all picked by the Golden Knights, along with forwards Brendan Leipsic, Oscar Lindberg and David Perron.

In the fourth and final round of announcements, Vegas added two forwards (Erik Haula and William Karlsson) and three defensemen (Schmidt, Clayton Stoner and Trevor van Riemsdyk), in addition to Fleury.

As part of other trades, the Knights acquired Reilly Smith from the Florida Panthers and Nikita Gusev from the Tampa Bay Lightning, as well as a bevy of picks that were tied to some selections.

Vegas has something of a hometown talent on its roster, as well, thanks to the selection of Engelland from the Calgary Flames. Though Canadian, Engelland makes his offseason home in Las Vegas, after spending two seasons playing for the Las Vegas Wranglers of the ECHL.

"My roots are here," Engelland said. "It's kind of been in the back of your mind since they announced the team. For it to finally happen, it's amazing. It was a fairly easy decision on my part, and I'm excited to be here."

Golden Knights owner Bill Foley had hinted at the caliber of the team's selections.

"What surprised me was the quality of some of our forwards that we were able to get out of this situation," Foley said prior to the announcement of the team's expansion picks. "The people of Las Vegas are going to be happy with what we did. They're going to be pleasantly surprised."

The Golden Knights had to choose one player from each NHL team, with a composition of 14 forwards, nine defensemen, three goaltenders and four additional players at any position. Vegas had a pool of 673 players made available by the league's other 30 teams from which to choose.

"They're way past getting off the ground," said Nashville general manager David Poile, who was named GM of the year during the night's awards ceremony. "I think this is by far the best expansion team ever."

Vegas coach Gerard Gallant had entered the evening with Reid Duke already on the roster. The 21-year-old forward became the Golden Knights' first-ever player after agreeing to a three-year entry-level contract with the team in March.

The Golden Knights' first home game will be Oct. 10 against the Arizona Coyotes.
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http://www.espn.com/nhl/story/_/id/...ined-marc-andre-fleury-marc-methot-james-neal
 
R

RBH

Member
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LAS VEGAS -- It was a bittersweet start.

Before the Vegas Golden Knights took the ice in their inaugural home game on Tuesday night, the team introduced first responders in an emotional 15-minute ceremony. Doctors, nurses, policemen and firefighters were called out by name, accompanied by Golden Knights players.

There also was a 58-second moment of silence to honor the 58 people killed in the worst mass shooting in American history, which occurred Oct. 1 at a country music concert in Las Vegas -- less than a mile from T-Mobile Arena, home of the Golden Knights. The names of the victims were emblazoned on the ice.

"We will do everything we can to help you and our city heal," Golden Knights player Deryk Engelland told the crowd.

Engelland has made Las Vegas his offseason home since playing for the city's ECHL team; he also met his wife here.

Reminders of the tragedy were everywhere.

The boards at T-Mobile Arena were wiped of advertising; instead, the words #VegasStrong were printed around the rink. Many billboards leading into the resort city have been painted black with similar messages. The Knights and their opponents, the Arizona Coyotes, both wore decals honoring victims.

"Some things are bigger than rivalries," the Coyotes' official Twitter account posted. The account also changed its avatar to an image melding the teams' logos for Tuesday night's game.

Knights staffers had conducted a run-through of the pregame ceremonies on Monday, and according to Vegas coach Gerard Gallant, even that got emotional.

"I could feel myself getting teary-eyed," the normally stoic Gallant said Tuesday morning. "And [the game] will be a lot tougher than that."

The Knights beat the Coyotes 5-2 to become the first expansion team to start 3-0.
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http://www.espn.com/nhl/story/_/id/...ights-honor-victims-mass-shooting-home-opener
 
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