By Rick Wile www.kamloopsthisweek.com
Feb 11 2007
THESE ARE UGLY times for Rick Brodsky in Prince George. The owner of the WHL Cougars is in the eye of the storm, amid speculation that, because of poor fan support, he will relocate the team.
The threat of the possibility has prompted some hockey fans to establish a website: www.keepthewhlinpg.com.
They are urging fans to show that Prince George is a hockey town by packing the CN Centre for two BCHL games on Fe. 23. and Feb. 24 to show the WHL that Prince George has plenty of hockey fans.
But as the website points out, “we will not be ‘lining the pockets’ of the current local WHL ownership,” which seems to be a major source of the boycott of WHL games.
Dig deeper in the bowels of the site and you have a fans accusing Brodsky of nepotism, with son-in-law Dallas Thompson running the hockey operations and, daughter Brandi taking care of the business operations.
He’s accused of being too thrifty, of being unsympathetic toward fans and even being cavalier toward them. They’ve grown to resent the fact ownership has made millions of dollars over the years, but hasen’t put enough back into the franchise to make it the jewel of major junior hockey.
They even resent Brodsky for holding onto the team by refusing to accept either of two purchase offers presented before the current season, one from a Prince George group the other from a group of former players which included everyone’s all-time favourite Cougar, Eric Brewer.
One WHL governor I spoke to this week even knew of at least another group that also had an offer turned down.
Those are just some of the nasty things they’re saying about the Cougars’ owner, but they’re forgetting one thing — Prince George is damn lucky to be in the WHL in the first place.
The people making the noise today have no clue how much cajoling Brodsky had to do to convince fellow WHL governors that Prince George, and its new multiplex facility, was a win-win for him and the league.
The majority weren’t interested in going to Northern B.C. because of the travel, but they were begrudgingly swayed because the league had a responsibility to save an owner from financial ruin in a Victoria market where the major junior hockey image had been ravaged by previous owners.
Things were great early as attendance grew, with the Cougars averaging more than 5,700 fans per game for four years, from 1997 to 2001 before dropping to about 5,200, then 4,400, then 3,600, and down to 3,200 for the last couple of seasons.
The current season has the Cougars floundering at an average of just under 3,000 per game.
That is clearly not an acceptable number, and you can bet the mortgage that relocation will have to be visited sooner than later.
In the end, it will be Brodsky’s prerogative of whether or not to move.
Selling is not an option. He has already said that. He won’t be bullied by fans in a season of unrest that had the team telling everyone that it was going for it by winning the Devin Setoguchi sweepstakes, but 20 games in, found itself scrambling to stay healthy and in a tailspin that eventually led to the dismissal of the coaching staff.
As the Cougars attempt to regain a measure of respect for their on-ice product, which would ultimately improve the image of management, the onus is still on the fans to support the franchise if they want to keep it.
As much as we are all conditioned to believe the adage, “If you build it they will come,” you can add another one: “If you don’t support it, it will leave”.
Go to the bank with it.
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