Oh Canada?

Yes, but he (our Mayor) is a complete idiot. I don't use the term lightly, I mean it. He is without a doubt a complete embarassment to our city. The weird thing is, he wins big, and I don't know anyone who'll own up to voting for him.
Back to the subject at hand. One poster mentioned the dollar issue, and I adimt I was remiss in not mentioning it before. Yes, it is a huge factor in making things here more difficult. I don't think it is enough, by itself, to incite a relocation, nor do I think the gent who mentioned it said it was, but it is a factor, no doubt.However, the dollar, the lack of a 'naturalized' basketball fan base, and the tax reputation alone would be enough to make Vancouver a struggling franchise, yes, but the NBA has several of those, and they don't relocate. One gentleman pointed out that the reason Vancouver relocated and others don't is simply a matter of having been the only one to try to do so, but I feel that is overly simplistic. Many steps of approval, feelers, ect. are taken before it gets to that stage, and usually meet with oposition. The NBA under Stern has been noteworthy for his iron fisted control of these things, and he has continually emphasised the importance of maintaining status quo integrity. When the latest owner bought the Grizzlies, he made public commitments to stay, and Stern, as usual, pledged that he would seek to enforce his afore mentioned policy. Less than a year later, a year wherein the Grizzlies attendance surpassed at least 4 other franchises (including Houston, as mentioned) despite terrible on court performance, and the continuing suspicion that the American who bought the team only did so with the intention of moving, the owner announced his intention to move, and Stern reverses course and says that it is time to move on. My qusetion is, what happened in less than a year that we don't know about? I mean, yes, the team was playing poorly, but since when do you up and move based on wins and losses. Are we in any danger of seeing the Buffalo Bulls? And attendance, while not great, was certainly not sufficient cause to move,obviously, when other secure teams are below you.
And, to the person who responded that it all comes down to being a losing team, I disagree that that alone is enough to explain what happened, but let's suppose it to be the case. In my mind, that places at least a large part of the blame on the restrictions put in place for the express purpose of LESSENING THE EXPANSION FRANCHISES' ABILITY TO COMPETE for the first five years. You, me, and the mailman know how important the first five years of any new buisness venture is, and yet these supposed financial wizards and corporate enterpreneurs actually designed built-in failure features in their new product. And now they've given up on it,and most people site the fact that they didn't win enough. Does this bother anyone else. I honestly feel the Grizzlies weren't given a fair shot, and I feel they were given up on WAY too soon, and I feel that has at least something to do with the fact that a lot of owners were against expanding outside the U.S. in the first place, so when things got rocky, Stern didn't have enough support to say "Stick it out." to the owners. If this had happened in, say, Los Angelos, a long-time losing team with fairly poor attendance...oh, wait..it has happened...When did the Clippers move?

And this isn't a knee jerk Canadian defensive argument. For example, the Expos should leave Montreal. The fans there have consistently shown little or no support, irrespective of how succesfull the team has bee. They've been given a fair shot, and have come up wanting. I have NO problem with them moving, and in fact, I think it's financially irresponsible to keep them there much longer...But I don't think the Grizzlies were given the same chance, nor do I feel that they failed anywhere near to the same degree...

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With regards to the taxes: This is a misconception that the Raptors, for one, have been fighting for some time. While it's true that the Canadain taxes are much higher than those of,say, Texas or Florida, they're about the same as California, and nowhere near the roughly 55-60 % you suggested, if both my memory and math serve (unlikely).But, yes, I would agree that the tax issue, and especially the misconception about it, has been a factor with regards to free agents, as is thw weather, which is another misconception. For example, Vancouver's weather is very mild, and Toronto is south of over a third of the United States. One thing that is in Toronto's favour is that the African-Americans who comprise such a large percentage of the NBA often marvel at how less of an issue race is up here, as in fact do athletes of all the major sports.

With regards to Orlando, I fully agree that that was the original motivation to seek a means of preventing expansion franchises from developing overnight, however the reason that sentiment succeeded to such an extreme was, I've heard, the feeling among a lot of NBA owners that Stern was force feeding them the whole international idea. A simple ruling that one team can't win the lottery for back to back years would have sufficed in order to prevent another Orlando.

And hello fellow Torontonian! I don't think I've ever met another Rockets fan up here, except the fair weather kind during the Championship years. I'm also a Raptors fan, are you? And no, I've never posted under Jaguar, JAG are my initials.

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