Utica College Pioneers 2012-13 Season (Part Two)

[sshablak]

Re: Utica College Pioneers 2012-13 Season (Part Two)

The AHL team would play weekday games along with weekend hopefully alternating games or same day weekend one team could play a matinee time. I think it would be great giving us more options to watch hockey. And, it doesn't get any better unless it's the NHL. I think it would be great for all ! What don't you like about it ? Plus the rink gets refurbished . To me it's a good thing for all.

[Fishman'81]

Re: Utica College Pioneers 2012-13 Season (Part Two)

It's not necessarily that I don't like it; it's just that it won't work... The Devils were drawing fewer than 1,500 in The Aud years ago -thus the move to Albany- and Utica's economy is even more abjectly moribund now than it was then.

Factor-in the tickets going for 4-5X what UC charges, and do you really think there's any way in the world that an AHL franchise can survive here..? I don't!

My biggest concern is that throwing any minor-league pro team in the scheduling-mix will mess with the great relationship that UC has with the community. (Matinee games don't draw, for instance.) There is just no reasonable justification to risk that on a hopeless flier regarding a pro team that will soon be gone.

Just my opinion.

[sshablak]

Re: Utica College Pioneers 2012-13 Season (Part Two)

I'm pretty sure the Devils averaged 2300, I went to about half the games, there were sellouts(Binghamton and Rochester) and "sometimes" 1500 people were there but not often.

[Fishman'81]

Re: Utica College Pioneers 2012-13 Season (Part Two)

Shabby, I had my numbers wrong as usual; the Devils were averaging around 1,800 as they swirled around the drain.

Same difference, though... Utica is just not an AHL town. Not enough people have the requisite income to make it work here.

This is a $5/ticket D-3 town, and one of the best in that regard. There is no reason whatsoever to pretend otherwise.

Let's go ahead and be good at what we do, however humble it may be. UC is on the map in D-3, and nobody really cares about the AHL anyway, any more than they do about D-3. (Has somebody won the Calder Cup yet? I honestly don't know.)

[Pioneers#1]

Re: Utica College Pioneers 2012-13 Season (Part Two)

There is so much to say to a lot of what you're all saying about this AHL-Utica fiasco because you're all wrong on a number of things you think may or may not happen and comparing the 90's AHL franchise that was here to something that would happen now. Well I'll say two things.

1: A lot happens in 20 years, so stop comparing the 1990's to the present day.

2: The people who are in charge of bringing the team in and setting all those "AHL prices" you think they're going to set at the games when Vancouver comes into Utica, know the people of this area and what they will and will not pay. They're not stupid & they're sure as hell not going to set the ticket prices at such a cost that the people that would be attending the games wouldn't be able to pay. Because that'd defeat the purpose of even bringing in a team. When & if Utica gets another AHL franchise, believe me when I tell you that the ticket prices would be set appropriately to what the people of this area could pay.

[sshablak]

Re: Utica College Pioneers 2012-13 Season (Part Two)

I am not wrong, I know the two chief investors and I am very careful about what I let out. It is "very" close.

Syracuse gets about $15 a ticket, that's not too bad, $20-25 now in playoffs. I see people at UC games you wonder where they got the money to come. But, these same people are bringing back 5-6 beers every 20 minutes at $30 a pop ! I think the ticket prices will be ok.

[elbojpb]

Re: Utica College Pioneers 2012-13 Season (Part Two)

... Utica's economy is even more abjectly moribund now than it was then. Factor-in the tickets going for 4-5X what UC charges, and do you really think there's any way in the world that an AHL franchise can survive here..? I don't!

Just wondering ... other than hockey, what else is there to spend money on in Utica during the Winter? Turning Stone?

[Fishman'81]

Re: Utica College Pioneers 2012-13 Season (Part Two)

There is so much to say to a lot of what you're all saying about this AHL-Utica fiasco because you're all wrong on a number of things you think may or may not happen and comparing the 90's AHL franchise that was here to something that would happen now. Well I'll say two things.

1: A lot happens in 20 years, so stop comparing the 1990's to the present day.

2: The people who are in charge of bringing the team in and setting all those "AHL prices" you think they're going to set at the games when Vancouver comes into Utica, know the people of this area and what they will and will not pay. They're not stupid & they're sure as hell not going to set the ticket prices at such a cost that the people that would be attending the games wouldn't be able to pay. Because that'd defeat the purpose of even bringing in a team. When & if Utica gets another AHL franchise, believe me when I tell you that the ticket prices would be set appropriately to what the people of this area could pay.

Yeah, a lot has happened in 20 years, as-in Utica becoming an even worse hole than it was in the 90's... MUCH worse. (You can look that up.)

While you're researching things, check out the average AHL attendance... Even if Vancouver sells-out The Aud for every single game, Utica would still be among the last in the league in that regard.

Guys, it's either not going to happen at all, or it's not going to happen for long. You can take that to the bank.

[Fishman'81]

Re: Utica College Pioneers 2012-13 Season (Part Two)

Just wondering ... other than hockey, what else is there to spend money on in Utica during the Winter? Turning Stone?

Not a fair question, because it assumes that there is money around here to be spent...

(But we have plenty of hookers and meth available for the locally-affluent, and for visitors too, just so you know.)

[Pioneers#1]

Re: Utica College Pioneers 2012-13 Season (Part Two)

Yeah, a lot has happened in 20 years, as-in Utica becoming an even worse hole than it was in the 90's... MUCH worse. (You can look that up.)

While you're researching things, check out the average AHL attendance... Even if Vancouver sells-out The Aud for every single game, Utica would still be among the last in the league in that regard.

Guys, it's either not going to happen at all, or it's not going to happen for long. You can take that to the bank.

I will take that to the bank, because I think you're dead wrong on it not happening at all.

[UCBadger]

Re: Utica College Pioneers 2012-13 Season (Part Two)

"its not going to happen for long..."

Interesting that the materials say they will be in Utica for the 2013-2014 season---as opposed to "starting with the 2013-2014 season." If they come, they may very well just be passing through.

[Fishman'81]

Re: Utica College Pioneers 2012-13 Season (Part Two)

"Passing through" at best... I suspect that the putative interest Vancouver has in Utica is just some leveraging ploy to cut a better deal in a realistic market.

To flesh-out my argument, allow me to mention that I moved here site-unseen in 1984, when Utica was still on its feet. Since then, the population of the town has shrunk to exactly half of what it was then, when there was something of a tax-base here... Now, my old neighborhood is in shambles, and the primary industry here is procreation to increase Welfare benefits.

Professional hockey- even at its dregs - has died here on every level, and it'll die again if The Aud cuts another misguided and hopeless deal with yet another transient franchise.

Low-budget D-3 hockey suits this decrepit burgh, and UC has done a great job of filling that niche. It's become the thing to do during the winter. To displace it for some pipe-dream of enduring "big-time" hockey would be completely futile, and utterly stupid.

[Pioneers#1]

Re: Utica College Pioneers 2012-13 Season (Part Two)

"Passing through" at best... I suspect that the putative interest Vancouver has in Utica is just some leveraging ploy to cut a better deal in a realistic market.

To flesh-out my argument, allow me to mention that I moved here site-unseen in 1984, when Utica was still on its feet. Since then, the population of the town has shrunk to exactly half of what it was then, when there was something of a tax-base here... Now, my old neighborhood is in shambles, and the primary industry here is procreation to increase Welfare benefits.

Professional hockey- even at its dregs - has died here on every level, and it'll die again if The Aud cuts another misguided and hopeless deal with yet another transient franchise.

Low-budget D-3 hockey suits this decrepit burgh, and UC has done a great job of filling that niche. It's become the thing to do during the winter. To displace it for some pipe-dream of enduring "big-time" hockey would be completely futile, and utterly stupid.

Things are "on the move" trust me... just wait and see. You've made your point well, just watch and see what happens now

[Fishman'81]

Re: Utica College Pioneers 2012-13 Season (Part Two)

Well, P-1, if it happens, it's just going to amount to another Quixotic attempt to pound a square peg into a round hole.

I don't care about it one way or the other, unless it messes with what UC has built here in the past 13 years. (And it most likely will.)Then, the whole issue will evaporate again, just as it has time and time again, and UC will once again be the only viable game in town.

Utica cannot/will not support any professional sport, which has been proven in an empirical sense over and over... Not single-A baseball, nor the lowest form of pro hockey...Nothing.

Any AHL team looking to move here is jerking our collective chain for the short-term, and I want no part of it.

[sshablak]

Re: Utica College Pioneers 2012-13 Season (Part Two)

If it happens, for me it's all good. Whether it lasts one season, two, three, I hope longer, but whatever happens, happens. It is just "awesome" hockey and it is plain and simple, a treat for all. Good Lord it's one level under the NHL.

You say there's nothing to do in Utica, how about another option, mid week games for one. What about NHL players rehabbing or conditioning from injuries, my only chance to ever see these guys play. World class like Fetisov, Stasny, etc and we got to see Marty Brodeur for a whole season.

Money from the state has been granted to make the "Aud" a better place to watch hockey, it's all good.

Plus you get to see NHL ex players, coaches, scouts, rookies like Brodeur who will be impact players in a year or two on a nightly basis, I don't understand your "disdain" for all of this. When the Devils were here it was just super.

Almost forgot, even Bobby Clark was walking around the aud one game.