Senators Owner Rod Bryden "warned" the team "could
leave town if hockey fans don't buy significantly more
tickets -- at a higher average price -- for next season,"
according to a Canadian Press report in the Toronto GLOBE &
MAIL. Among Bryden's "basic numbers for keeping the team in
Ottawa," season-ticket sales at the Corel Centre's main
section, now at about 6,100, have to reach a "minimum of
about" 12,000 and the average the team nets on each ticket,
C$39.62, has to increase to match the league average of C$44
(CP/Toronto GLOBE & MAIL, 2/22). Bryden: "That is not the
owner threatening to leave. That is the owner of a business
saying that if the customers of the business don't want the
business, you have to move the business somewhere where the
customers want it" (Rick Gibbons, OTTAWA SUN, 2/21). The
team is averaging 14,600 fans per game (OTTAWA SUN, 2/23).
WHY NOW? In Ottawa, the SUN's Bruce Garrioch, called
the timing "terrible," and wrote, "At a time when the focus
is supposed to be on a young franchise fighting for a
playoff spot for the first time in team history, the
Senators owner stole the spotlight" (OTTAWA SUN, 2/23). The
SUN's Chris Stevenson notes Bryden "might have been better
off waiting." Stevenson: "If the team does well down the
stretch and makes the playoffs, maybe a sales job won't be
needed to sell season tickets" (OTTAWA SUN, 2/23).
