We might be seeing the Carolina Hurricanes be moving. There have been some rumblings within the NHL world that due to a lawsuit that the owner Peter Karmanos just ended up settling, it may end up causing Karmanos to sell the team to another owner, who could potentially move the Hurricanes out of the Raleigh, North Carolina area.
[embedit snippet=”1″]
In case you were wondering about this lawsuit apparently, Jason Karmanos, the son of Peter Karmanos was being sued for allegedly borrowing more than $100 million from a trust that was set up on their behalf to help with funding for the Hurricanes. After that, he failed to pay the approximately $4 million that is required in interest payments on the debt. Currently, Jason Karmanos is a member of the Pittsburgh Penguins front office.
[embedit snippet=”jon-ads”]
As of last season, the Hurricanes had a value of $225 M and that put them as 28th in the NHL. All of this information is from Forbes.com, and it makes perfect sense for why Peter Karmanos may sell the team. Looking at the numbers, it isn’t good for the Hurricanes. In an area that has a population of 1.2 million, the teams operating income in the red as they lost 11.7 million, which isn’t good for any professional team or business. When you are drawing in such low numbers and bringing in poor revenue, it will end up forcing ownership to make drastic moves.
Where this will end up becoming the problem is that Gary Bettman, the commissioner of the NHL doesn’t want them to move out of the area and Karmanos wants to move them. When the person who has to OK the move doesn’t approve of the deal, then it becomes a much harder task.
[embedit snippet=”1″]
By some miracle that he can sell the team and the new ownership decides to take the Hurricanes out of Raleigh, one possible move could be Seattle. I feel it would fit perfectly in the West Coast city as Seattle is a much bigger area than Raleigh and they would be able to get more fans.