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2024 PWHL Offseason

Timothy A said:
The vibe I get is the league is operating like it's 1982 and not 2024.
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Just look at the CBA. If you are not one of the elite players, it's a terrible deal, and barely any of those non-elite players can earn a decent living. Not to mention the CBA was "negotiated" in suspect conditions.

The PWHL was a much, much larger success than I ever thought it would be. Kudos to that. It was great to see the wonderful energy in the buildings, amongst the hockey community, and for women sports in general. And it was fantastic hockey on the ice. They really knocked it out of the park in those areas.

But I'm still concerned about the business end of it. Not the losing money part. We all expected that early on, and as long as the Walter family is willing to ride out that expected time period, it will be fine. It's the other areas that concern me -- the long term effect of the CBA, the seemingly "inmates running the asylum" vibes you get out of Minnesota, issues with the staffs, it appears the attitude they had in how they destroyed the previous league continues to permeate the attitude on how they operate moving forward, etc.

Hopefully, I'm just overreacting to the supposed drama coming out during the offseason. But time will tell either way.
 
Most minor league and a lot of major league teams do not make money. The value is in the franchise itself for rich people who want to own a sports team. It is a vanity project for the most part. The only way the Walter family or whoever is bankrolling this will see any return is when they are able to find other rich people wanting to buy a team. But this will only happen if there is a truly independent governance. This league seems a VERY far way from that. I have no idea what the time frame for the Walter family is, or how much of a 'drain' this league is to them (or if it matters given their wealth), but this league lives or dies solely on the generosity of them, and not any sustained business model I am afraid in its current incarnation (look at the CBA for example). Drama like in Minnesota does not help to broaden to other perspective owners.
 
They just out of the blue fired basically the entire Boston business side staff and trainers as well as people from other teams. No warning for these people who at the last minute last year took a chance with this new league. Poorly handled and another black eye for the league.
 
joecct said:
Why? She's a Goddess in Columbus. She'd be a 1" column on page 4 in the PWHL local paper.
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Is she though?
  • OSU has been saying they're going to build a new rink for approximately a decade
  • Gene Smith promised her a new rink again and again (cf. Ohio State Board of Trustees Approves Plan to Build New Facility for Hockey Programs: "And I gotta give a lot of credit to Gene Smith and his team, as that’s his mission ... that is what he said he’s gonna leave behind before he retires. We are his final mission, so I feel very confident that he will get this done with his team" [Smith has since retired, leaving a $10M deficit for the current fiscal year])
To say nothing of the fact that...

Timothy A said:
Because she's playing 4th fiddle to every men's sport along with vb and wbb.
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Ohio State hired a new athletic director this year...the disaster at Texas A&M that was Ross Bjork. Sure the new president might have played hockey in college but he hired an AD primarily known for his intense focus on football (and who completed a contract with their previous FB coach that included a fully guaranteed $80M buyout with no offsetting clause should the now former coach get another job).
 
Another Hockey Canada guy, Jim Midgley hired as Toronto asst coach. No real long term investment in womens hockey in his resume.

New York got an assistant USA Hockey coach when they hired the former Union coach.
 
PWHL Compensation has clearly been an issue from day one and has worsened this coming season for the new draftees as the current PWHL bargaining agreement does not allow even the best new players a salary equal to that of average players signed last year much less last year's best players. It will apparently remain this way next year as well until the present agreement expires at the end of the 2025-26 season.

Given this I have wondered why the PWHL, it's fans or parties in interest in each of the PWHL cities has not created an "NIL" like arrangement whereby top players suffering under the current agreement can be "equalized" or better yet, fairly compensated until the agreement ends or can be changed to allow uncapped free agency or some fairer plan. I was hoping to get Ian Kennedy of The Hockey News to write an article suggesting something like this to get people thinking and maybe push the issue out there. Unfortunately, I cannot determine how best to contact him. If anyone knows how to reach him please suggest an article on this subject as it's what is causing many of the top players to be delaying their signings or considering signing in Europe. The money being offered this year and next is simply not close to being reflective of the worth of these athletes...
 
joecct said:
8 days until the end of August. Any word on team names and new sweaters and possibly new venues?
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I think the word is the schedule and team names and logos will be available in mid September. This is from an interview by Mike Hirshfeld of PWHL Ottawa. So, it is later than the league originally said. Eager to see where NY and others will be playing - and hoping that many of the team names are not the ones originally registered for trademark last year.
 
BowWowWow said:
I think the word is the schedule and team names and logos will be available in mid September. This is from an interview by Mike Hirshfeld of PWHL Ottawa. So, it is later than the league originally said. Eager to see where NY and others will be playing - and hoping that many of the team names are not the ones originally registered for trademark last year.
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Considering they scrapped the team names last year because of the blowback from fans, it would be beyond stupid to consider them again.
 
Two pieces of news were announced today on thepwhl.com:
- the PWHL hired Melissa Caruso, who has experience managing the AHL, as the new general manager of PWHL Minnesota;
- Coca-Cola Coliseum, with capacity of over 8000 for hockey, will be home ice for PWHL Toronto for the 2024-25 season.
 
Apparently the person Minnesota hired has zero experience in roster evaluation and building. I kind of thought the primary job of a GM was to do just that.
 
Timothy A said:
Apparently the person Minnesota hired has zero experience in roster evaluation and building. I kind of thought the primary job of a GM was to do just that.
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True - also keep in mind that this is the league hiring someone for Minnesota rather than the Minnesota team personnel making the hiring decision, I think.
 
Didn't the HC force Darwitz out because he wanted to control the roster? If so this makes sense as they don't need another conflict....
 
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