So Mario Lemieux is giving up the dream. Being the chief executive officer of a company as large and influential as the Pittsburgh Penguins is just too huge an endeavor for a guy with a dodgy heart and more goals than all but Wayne Gretzky and a handful of others.
OK, when we say "huge," we exaggerate. When we say "influential," we mean "last place in the Eastern Conference." And when we say the rest of it, well, it's pretty straightforward.
And so, we suspect, is Lemieux's eagerness to find someone to rid him of this turbulent cash-eater. Most times a sports owner is saying the business is for sale, what he is actually saying is, "Give me a new arena or I'll move to a place that will." It's called extortion, and it is deliciously effective, given that none of the major sports leagues have lost franchises in the past ... oh, 55 years or so.
But Lemieux's case is special, and not because the latest scheme to save the Penguins involves getting a slot-machine license. He was put at the top of the team's organizational chart because he is the most beloved Penguin of them all -– even more beloved than Ken Schinkel, if such a thing is possible. The logic went that the town's love for him would trump whatever aversion they had to throwing their money at the franchise, which has had more competitive and economic downs than ups in their 40 years on the planet.
Well yes, but ultimately no. The crowds still do not habitually fill the Igloo, the town's antediluvian arena (through 23 games this year, they have sold out 10 times, a passable figure in today's NHL), even though we have been flogged nearly to the marrow with Sidney Crosby this, Sidney Crosby that.
You know Sidney Crosby, of course. The silver medalist in the NHL's Rookie of the Year race, if you've paid any attention.
And according to Lemieux (and anyone else who has ever owned it), the team is leaking cash, and if they don't get a buyer and a new building soon, the team will become the Winnipeg Penguins, or the Quebec City Penguins, or the Newfoundland Penguins, or the Portland Penguins, or the Las Vegas Penguins.
Maybe all them, who knows?
Either way, this fascinating emotional tug-of-war in Pittsburgh, a town with one major-league franchise (the Steelers) and a couple of time-wasters until the Steelers start again (the Pirates and Pens), makes this at least slightly more interesting than the usual arena blackmail case.
This is, in at least one weird way, a loyalty test for the cult of Lemieux. Unlike Phoenix, which so loved Wayne Gretzky that its new hockey arena is in Glendale, a suburb of Phoenix that feels like it's actually a suburb of Palm Springs, there aren't a lot of places to put a new arena in Pittsburgh. Indeed, the current location is probably as good as there is.
And yet, either Pittsburgh can't afford its hockey team, doesn't want to afford its hockey team, or its hockey team has an insatiable appetite.
Its departure would reduce the number of original expansion teams from 1967 to three, Philadelphia, Los Angeles and St. Louis (and if you've seen the Blues lately, you'd have a hard time buying the notion that they are surviving, either). The Oakland/California Golden Seals were the first to go, to Cleveland. Then the Minnesota North Stars folded into the Cleveland franchise when that one blew town, then the whole thing fled for Dallas.
But nobody remembers that kind of silliness any more than there is a market for the life of Chester A. Arthur. I mean, sure there's a new Lincoln book or movie out every week, but Chet Arthur ain't Lincoln, y'know.
This is all about whether Lemieux's sad eyes and earnest demeanor can make an arena (and slot machines) bloom. I mean, he's standing there with two Stanley Cups, a gamey heart, his pockets turned inside out, and Sidney Crosby. What more can he do?
Well, one idea might be to keep plugging, because Pittsburgh loves nothing more than someone who keeps running into the same wall in hopes of eventually breaking it down. See Art Rooney for further edification.
The other notion, which seems unthinkable, is to just give up and send the franchise to Canada, where it will be loved and cared for as it rarely was in Steeltown. Vegas won't work, Portland's too small and too used to paying 15 bucks to see the junior team to go for $85 to see Crosby, and the six Canadian franchises have actually filled their arenas to capacity every night this year, save one night in Edmonton in November. Maybe Cirque du Soleil was in town.
Either way, it will be interesting to see if Lemieux has the face that launched a million lemons, cherries and bar-7s. He's done a lot to save hockey in Pittsburgh, but somehow seeing him in a cocktail waitress outfit plying old ladies with cosmopolitans while they're firing down on the quarter machines ...
No, you know what? If it comes to Mario Lemieux in fishnets and stilettos, then the Penguins should leave. I mean, how much can one guy do?
