Kansas City Predators?

So instead of letting his soon to be former franchise end up in Canada, Craig Leipold will let it go to Kansas City.

Ok, so other than manic "Gary Bettman hates Canada, eh!" conspiracy theories, could somebody please explain this to me? I could understand taking less $$$$$ for the franchise if the new owners were willing to pledge to keep the team in Nashville, but taking less $$$$$ to keep the team from moving to one city over another just does not make any sense.

Furthermore, as I've stated before, Leipold would have had to have been downright oblivious to not have know about Balsillie's desire to bring another team into Ontario. If Leipold didn't want the team in Canada, he should have never agreed to sell the team to Balsillie and had done better reconnaissance in the first place.

However, the fight isn't over yet either. Nashville could very well get the corporate support it needs to get attendance back over the 14K threshold this season. That alone will make it very difficult for any owner to break the lease and take the team out of Nashville.

So what happens to Basillie now? Odds are that despite the glowing reviews of the league by some, there will be another franchise available for him to try to buy sooner rather than later. Whether or not he gets one remains to be seen but lets all hope that the NHL won't attempt to placate Basillie by giving him an expansion team.