Balsillie wants seventh NHL team in Canada

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This article was published 03/06/2009 (6268 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

All Jim Balsillie wants is a shot.

The co-CEO of Research in Motion told a black-tie dinner Tuesday night that he has made a fair and transparent offer to purchase the Phoenix Coyotes — formerly the Winnipeg Jets — and move them to Hamilton.

He hopes the NHL will follow its own rules and judge his proposal on its merits.

"Hockey doesn’t transplant well in the desert," he said, noting only a couple hundred people showed up to support the team at a recent rally. "The fan base already exists in Canada. "Considering that hockey is part of Canada’s soul it’s only right that its seventh NHL team be brought back north of the 49th parallel.

"It’s time to repatriate the team. It’s the right thing for the fans, it’s the right thing for the country and the right thing for the league."

He noted that Canada provides the majority of players on NHL rosters and that most Canadian players are from Ontario.

Balsillie said hockey’s greater good is at the heart of his proposal.

"I would help make the NHL and its franchises stronger."

Balsillie’s address was to 600 people at the Winnipeg Convention Centre after he received the International Distinguished Entrepreneur Award from the Associates, a group of business people with close ties to the I. H. Asper School of Business.

Balsillie kept Winnipeggers in suspense all day long as he declined to address the hockey question at two different events, a morning press conference at the University of Manitoba and a luncheon speech to the Manitoba Chambers of the Commerce.

Instead, Balsillie was more than willing to wax eloquently in response to business queries from students and faculty. Balsillie was equally tight-lipped at a Manitoba Chambers of Commerce luncheon.

He was more talkative about hockey, however, in an interview with The Canadian Press earlier this week. He said even if a judge rules that the team can’t be relocated without the consent of the league, he vowed to continue his pursuit of Canada’s seventh team.

Glenn Feltham, dean of the Asper school, said considering Tuesday’s press conference was held in a place of higher learning, he thought it was appropriate for Balsillie to discuss global business conditions rather than his personal pursuit of a professional hockey team.

"He really had a message for students on the strategy side and he offered some advice for young people just starting out. The quote that I absolutely loved, which I had never heard before, is the most important thing to do in any organization is to erase strategic ambiguity. I can’t think of a better message to give students and other business leaders," he said.

Justin Price, a finance and marketing student at Asper, took in the press conference and said he wasn’t surprised the self-made billionaire didn’t want to talk about bringing the Jets back to Winnipeg, despite the fact that Balsillie’s father is from here.

"Hockey is a real passion here but it’s clearly not what he’s here for," he said.

"I think he knows we all have Jets jerseys on at heart. But the big issue is he’s not from here, he’s from southern Ontario. When he decides he wants to bring the Coyotes to (Hamilton), he’s giving back to the people who have given him opportunities. If he grew up in Winnipeg, went to the ‘White Outs’ and saw Teemu Selanne score 76 goals in his rookie year, he’d be bringing the Coyotes here."

Bob Silver, president of Western Glove Works, a local jean manufacturer, said landing an NHL team isn’t a do-or-die proposition for Winnipeg.

"We’d certainly be a better city with a team but I don’t think in 2009 that the NHL defines who we are as a community. We’ll do fine without a team but we’d enjoy it if it was here," he said.

Silver, who is also part owner of the Winnipeg Free Press, said he had no idea whether the economics have improved to the point where a team could be sustained in Winnipeg and he hadn’t heard of any backroom meetings to bring one here.

geoff.kirbyson@freepress.mb.ca

More diplomat than tycoon

JIM Balsillie is the co-CEO of the company behind one of the digital age’s most iconic devices — the Blackberry — but in one of a handful of public appearances in Winnipeg yesterday he sounded more like an international diplomat.

Balsillie was in Winnipeg to accept this year’s prestigious International Distinguished Entrepreneur Award from the Associates of the Asper School of Business at the University of Manitoba at a gala dinner last night.

At noon he spoke to large luncheon crowd at an event sponsored by the Manitoba Chamber of Commerce and the Winnipeg chapter of the Canadian International Council (CIC).

The CIC is dedicated to supporting a Canadian foreign policy network that crosses academic disciplines, policy areas and economic sectors.

Balsillie’s company, Research in Motion, has revenues of $11 billion.

He said his company, like all global businesses, is particularly interested in global political structures and believes there are important opportunities to be had during these times when those structures are challenged.