Semantics
PUBLIC ENEMY #1
For what it's worth, I'm quite sure Balsillie could have moved the Penguins if he really wanted to. I suspect what actually happened is that during the process of the Pens deal he was told behind closed doors that the Predators were also going to be available, that it would be a lot easier for him and the league to move that franchise, that the league would provide a lot less opposition to such an arrangement.
Bettman and crew aren't idiots. They are reading all the same reports we do about Balsillie meeting with the mayor of Hamilton. They know darn well he's going to move the team. If they weren't prepared to let him the sale wouldn't have made it to this stage, it would have been killed in the due dilligence. What they're doing now is just playing an elaborate game of PR and politics so that the NHL doesn't come off looking really bad in this. They have to make it look like the league tried as hard as they could to keep the franchise in Nashville. Unfortunately for Nashville, the franchise will be already as good as gone as soon as the sale closes.
Bettman and crew aren't idiots. They are reading all the same reports we do about Balsillie meeting with the mayor of Hamilton. They know darn well he's going to move the team. If they weren't prepared to let him the sale wouldn't have made it to this stage, it would have been killed in the due dilligence. What they're doing now is just playing an elaborate game of PR and politics so that the NHL doesn't come off looking really bad in this. They have to make it look like the league tried as hard as they could to keep the franchise in Nashville. Unfortunately for Nashville, the franchise will be already as good as gone as soon as the sale closes.