James Metzger - Everything I ever needed to know about business I learned on the sports field

A Hockey Stick Is Planted In Brooklyn
Dec 03, 2012Posted by james

While the New York Islanders have planted their hockey sticks in Brooklyn to begin play at the Barclays Center during 2015, this will not be the first time that a professional puck has been dropped in the borough.

The Brooklyn Americans, known to fans as the Amerks, played in the borough as a last gasp before phasing into nonexistence. The team started as the New York Americans during 1925 and became the second U.S. team in the National Hockey League after the Boston Bruins. They played at a new Madison Square Garden, and they were such a hot commodity that the Garden got another team—the New York Rangers.

The Amerks were consistent losers over 15 years and had plenty of financial problems. The end of the prohibition period cut into the main business of the team’s bootlegger owner. He put the team on the market. With no takers, Bill Dwyer just walked away from the team. By 1941, the team’s manager was selling players to raise cash. To prevent the league from dropping the team, he decided to move to Brooklyn.

Unfortunately, Brooklyn did not have an arena for hockey. The 1941-1942 season was played at MSG but the practice facility was moved from New Jersey to the Brooklyn Ice Palace on Atlantic and Bedford avenues. The manager hoped that this would build a buzz for the game and the team. An arena was planned for after the war.

The outcome—a last place finish with a 16-29-3 record and a roster depleted by the war—forced the league to suspend the team. The NHL door was left ajar for a revived Americans team, but this never developed. An arena was not built in Brooklyn. The Ice Palace building was rented to a scenery-design company. Today, the site, a mile from the Barclays Center, is a parking lot.

Since that time, a lot has happened. After all these years, NHL hockey finally will settle in Brooklyn. Though the Islanders, similar to the Amerks, once had a shady owner, this deal to keep the team on Long Island involved an owner who knows how to run a business.

Sometimes old ideas are worth revisiting. With new information and a change in conditions, a tweak of an old idea can result in a win-win situation for investors and owners, the economy and all the others who benefit from good and timely business decisions.

With this move, the expectation is that the Islanders will attract better players to a state-of-the-art arena located close to Manhattan, and that the team will win many more games each season and play deep into the playoffs. The Islanders might again compete for the Stanley Cup, the value of the franchise will rise and the NHL will not need to move or fold another franchise.