Zac Electrifly

They should move to Reno Nevada. As a winter sports town we are a prime location for an ice hockey franchise. The Reno Tahoe area is growing fast. With a metro area of close to half a million people it would be one of the smallest markets in all of major sports. I think the market would also include parts of Northern California as well. I could see people traveling from places like Sacramento and Susanville to come watch games on a consistent basis. Not to mention the huge crowds that would come in when they play the San Jose Sharks or Vegas Golden Knights.

Reno is somewhat unproven as a hockey town. The last professional hockey team left over twenty years ago. The University of Nevada Reno has not been able to secure a foothold with a hockey team despite multiple attempts in the last twenty years. The most success hockey team in Reno in last twenty years has been the Reno Ice Raiders who are basically an adult travel team. However despite not being a professional or junior team they have been able to sell out every game (around a 1,000 people) over the first two seasons at $30 a ticket. I think that shows the desire from the market for ice hockey. I have said it before but I do think the Reno Ice Raiders could move into a larger venue and sell between 3,000 and 5,000 a game. I think the demand for a team is there.

Reno Nevada has not always supported its sports teams. In the last ten or so years a lone a lot of teams have come and gone. The Reno Bighorns of the NBA G-League relocated to Stockton California. That was more of a decision from the Bighorns parent team the Sacramento Kings. The Reno Barons indoor football team couldn’t find a foothold in the market but the league they played in as a whole didn’t last that long. The Reno Express didn’t find a fanbase but that can be chalked up to them barely doing any marketing. Honestly there have been a few football teams that thought their existence was enough to draw in fans without having any marketing. Some of the local youth football teams have better marketing than most of these pro football teams had. Reno 1868 FC didn’t work out but was largely the fault of the marketing and front office. If COVID-19 didn’t happen the team might still be around. But those are all minor league sports. The closest thing Reno has to major sports teams is the University of Nevada Reno. Their basketball team gets fairly consistant support. They averaged 7,000 last season which more people than the current Arizona Coyotes arena can fit. Their football team drew in an average of 14,000 last season. Which is the lowest it has been in thirty years but I think the desire and the support is still there.

Here is where I think it really comes together. The owner of the Grand Sierra Resort (one of the largest hotel casinos in the Reno Tahoe area) is the majority owner of the Arizona Coyotes. I think they could move the Arizona Coyotes to Reno with an arena built at the Grand Sierra Resort. The property is big enough to fit an NHL sized venue on it not even including the massive man made lake that could probably hold hotel casinos the size of the Grand Sierra resort. I think this could work. The cost of a project like this would be massive but could be worth it in the end if the team sticks around for twenty years.

I don’t think that Reno will ever get a National Hockey League team. I don’t think Reno will get any teams from the big four major sports teams. Even the smallest NHL cities are twice the size of the Reno Tahoe metro area. Even if Reno had an American Hockey League (division 2) or and East Coast Hockey League (division 3) team that sold out at 20,000 seats for multiple seasons the NHL still probably wouldn’t consider Reno as a possibility. That being said the Reno Tahoe area did see some NHL action with the NHL Outdoors at Lake Tahoe. That however was a special thing. That doesn’t really count towards or help Reno get professional hockey. Reno has seen the Sacramento Kings play preseason games here before. There are talk surrounding the (soon to move) Oakland Athletics playing games in Reno. Maybe that will open up the flood gates to people seeing Reno as a viable major sports market. For now I think Reno will remain as a minor league sports town with teams coming and going with the only true consistant being the University of Nevada and maybe the Reno Aces (the triple a baseball team).

On the subject of teams moving I don’t think they should be allowed to relocate. I think the culture that has persisted basically throughout the history of North American major professional sports that has allowed teams to abandon their cities is wrong. I think teams in the current state of sports in North America should be forced to fold if their team is put into a situation where they don’t have an arena or are no longer financially viable. Allowing teams to relocate has allowed a culture where teams are sold just to be relocated. Public funded stadiums are also largely attached to that. Teams are threatening relocation if they don’t get public funds to either build new stadiums or fix their own. Cities are using public funds to try and lure teams to their cities. Teams are also asking for public funds from the cities they are moving too. I do not think public funds should be spent on building venues that the public will see little to no use from. I don’t think that all venues shouldn’t be publicly funded. I support like the local ice rink, field, court or any venue that will see a lot of local community activity getting public funding. I don’t think the billion dollar National Football League stadium that has little benefit to the community and only benefits the NFL team should be paid for with public funds. Most of the peoples tax dollars who go into projects like billion dollar stadiums never step foot in the stadium. Billion dollar stadiums also largely price out most of the tax payers who helped fund those projects. It would be different if the teams invested more into the communities and allowed more public use of these projects. But they don’t. These are built for profit by millionaire and billionaire owners. By design they are largely for use only by the teams of the millionaire and billionaire owners.

Another problem with relocation is cities accepting teams as their own. Las Vegas is a good example of this. The Vegas Golden Knights have been accepted by Las Vegas locals as their team. The Las Vegas Raiders have not. From what I have seen most of the people attending the Raiders games are away team fans looking for an excuse to head to Las Vegas for the weekend. The locals that are attending games are not going because the Raiders are their team (even if they wear Raiders gear) but just because it is an NFL game and the experience of it. All of the Oakland fans and atmosphere is gone. The Raiders haven’t really created a fanbase in Las Vegas. I think the same thing will happen to the Oakland Athletics when they move. It has happened to a lot of teams that have relocated. That is why I think it would be better in the current age of North American sports to let teams fold and allow more room for expansion teams. League gain nothing when allowing teams to relocate and they risk the team issues following the team. Often times the league moves back into the very markets they move away from anyway. Expansion teams are like the opposite. There are no preexisting issues, the fan base is new and leagues would gain a lot of money.

There has been a lot of positive relocations across all of sports. Some markets probably would have never gotten an expansion team. Some markets only have their team thanks to expansion. I am an advocate for promotion and relegation in sports. I think a lot of issues facing modern North American sports could be fixed with promotion and relegation. Promotion and relegation will probably not be seen in North American sports anytime soon as the current system is too powerful. If their was promotion and relegation in the NHL the Arizona Coyotes would have been relegated from the NHL years ago and would have had to figure out their issues a long time ago. Instead what is going on is the Arizona Coyotes face no repercussions (causing no urgency to fix their problems) as they continue to they continue to propose stadiums until one works out or they relocate. At this point all they are doing is hurting the league.

What do you think. Can the Reno Tahoe area supports major sports teams? Should the Arizona Coyotes move to Reno? Should sports teams be allowed to move at all?