After a very mixed debut season, the Seattle Kraken have a chance at the playoffs this year. The Vegas Golden Knights will also compete in the finals for the fifth time in their six-year history.
How did the two teams get into the league in the first place and what differentiates them from their predecessors in terms of NHL expansion?
LAOLA1 expert Bernd Freimüller explains:
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The Story of the NHL Expansion
The era of the Original Six (Rangers, Red Wings, Bruins, Blackhawks, Canadiens and Maple Leafs) lasted from 1942 to 1967.
The first major expansion followed in 1967: from the teams of that time (Kings, Flyers, Penguins, Blues), the North Stars existed in a different form, the California Seals no longer existed at all. In the years up to 1972 the Sabers, Canucks, Islanders and the Atlanta Flames (now the Calgary Flames) followed.
New two years later: The Washington Capitals and the Kansas City Scouts. Via the Colorado detour (Rockies, not Avalanche), the Scouts mutated into today’s New Jersey Devils.
In 1978 there was a reduction for the first time: the former California Seals (now active as Barons in Cleveland) unite with the North Stars.
In 1979, it was not teams that merged into one another, but the competing WHA league in the NHL. Newcomers: Edmonton Oilers, Winnipeg Jets, Hartford Whalers and Quebec Nordiques. We stop at 21 teams, after that the Nordiques mutate into the Colorado Avalanche, the Jets move to Phoenix and the Whalers become the Carolina Hurricanes.
After that it gets more stringent again: The San Jose Sharks (1991), Ottawa Senators and Tampa Bay Lightning (92), Anaheim (Mighty) Ducks and Florida Panthers (93), Nashville Predators (98) and Atlanta Thrashers (99) as well as Columbus Blue Jackets and Minnesota Wild (2000) increase the number of teams to 30. Younger fans have long been accustomed to this number, and the Thrashers’ move to Winnipeg (2011) remained a zero-sum game. The additions of the Knights (2017) and Kraken (2021) bring the league to 32 participants with four divisions of eight teams each.
Why the frequent expansion?
Without writing a historical treatise – it was of course about the filthy Mammon, especially in recent years. Just as examples of how the admission fees developed:
All 1967 teams: Two million dollars
All 1979 teams: 7.5 million
Florida Panthers and Anaheim Ducks (1993): 50 million each
All teams from 1998 to 2001: 80 million
Vegas Golden Knights (2017): 500 million
Seattle Kraken (2021): 650 million
What you need to know here: The fees of the last few years are not “HRR” (Hockey Related Revenues), i.e. the league income, which was laboriously worked out during the CBA negotiations in 2012 and is now at a 50:50 ratio between the teams and be shared with the players. The 30 teams (the Knights didn’t get any of the Kraken fee) were able to split more than a billion dollars among themselves. Conversely, the HRR must now of course be divided among 32 organizations.
How does a city get an NHL team?
The best thing is to apply quietly, wait for the first league reactions, and start a subscription campaign if you are encouraged. An overly aggressive campaign doesn’t sit well with league boss Gary Bettman and the other teams. Best example of this: While the Knights were relatively quiet in their campaign, Quebec quickly went public with it and also turned on politics for their NHL comeback.
An application basically costs ten million dollars, two million of which are non-refundable and the Nordiques fell over for this money. In recent months, however, there have been rumors that Quebec wants to try again. Only: Does the NHL really want 33 teams and therefore an odd number?
An arena that can be played on immediately upon admission is of course also a prerequisite. However, considering the antics in Phoenix, where the Coyotes will play in a 5,000-seat college arena for years to come, there’s certainly a double standard here. But it is clear that a transition hall like the legendary “Cow Palace” (mainly intended for animal auctions) can no longer go through for the Sharks today.
A statement by Bettman a few days ago is interesting: the times when the principle “the bigger, the better (because more income)” applied to the arenas are over: Halls with around 18,000 are currently considered ideal because they have better and therefore more expensive seats make possible.
Who decides on entry?
The “NHL Executive Committee” (=league employees such as Bettman’s right-hand man, Bill Daly) prepares the applications and makes recommendations. The “Board of Govenors” then votes, with each team providing an emissary who is usually the majority owner.
A ¾ majority is required for admission, in reality these decisions are always made unanimously.
Why did the Knights and now the Kraken have instant success and the earlier teams didn’t?
The higher entrance fees went hand in hand with relaxed rules. The newer organizations were thus able to choose from a pool of players that was denied to earlier entrants. The NHL realized that new teams that just raked in hundreds of millions should have a chance to succeed right away.
Just as an example, the rules for the Atlanta Thrashers and the Vegas Golden Knights:
The Thrashers were allowed to choose one player from each team (except for the Predators, who had joined the year before).
Each team was allowed to protect one goalie, five defenders and nine forwards, or two goalies, three defenders and seven forwards.
The Knights could or had to take 30 players (one from each team).
Each team was allowed to protect one goalie, three defenders and seven forwards, or eight skaters and one goalie.
There were secondary rules, but the difference is obvious. At best, the Thrashers got the backup goalie, Defender #6, or a fourth-line forward from each team’s depth chart.
The Knights, on the other hand (again simplified) have a top 4 defender and a third-line forward.
Another huge difference: Due to the salary cap that has since been introduced, teams were even forced not to protect good players. The expansion draft of the Thrashers, which I witnessed first-hand, only yielded the dregs of the competing squad, and there was no upper salary limit at the time.
The NHL expanded fivefold from 1967 to 32 teams from 1967 to 2021. Logical common sense says that once should be enough, especially when you’ve been dragging a corpse like the Arizona Coyotes for years. But the expansion fee of another team may one day prove too tempting…