Yeah - this is a thought that crossed through my mind as well.
I'm sure the CF guys are making pretty good money as it is without the sale. They average like 6 million independent IP address connections per month in traffic.
They were likely no where near rich - but all things considered also likely were well past financially independent and had been for years.
That said - I still do tend to blame the bigger guy.
What I'm not getting is why we're upset about the team pulling the trigger. I get the bummer of losing a public resource, it was the same for capgeek, but like.... it was the same for capgeek. It's going to be fine. Wikipedia is an institution but we're not
entitled to it. Caps fans are losing it too, anybody in deep enough to be posting on message boards isn't stoked about losing a resource.
But like, do we think this was a true shock for 31 other NHL teams? If an NHL franchise comes to you and says "hey we like this and we want to buy it" don't you at least shop around first and see if someone can beat that offer?
Seems to me like nobody else wanted it (unlikely) or somebody was going to be the high bidder before long regardless. Best case for the fans it's a bunch of low ball offers that aren't enough to beat what the owners could currently make, but it also seems to me like if we're that far along it's still only a matter of time.
The NHL can't get its shit together centrally and keeps relying on these public, independent entities to the point where they keep becoming an integral part of the process. It's not bad business to bring those in house and we've seen plenty of analytics blogs/websites shuttered after their creator was hired by a franchise. If NHL teams didn't have scouting departments and just kept relying on a group of really credible guys they know who post their reports online, it wouldn't be
crazy to want to hire those guys on....
So do I know exactly what made this good business on paper? Not really, but it's not my money and I don't think it's a spite purchase. Although if it is, doing it right before draft trades and free agency is really funny.