By Evan Weiner

April 6, 2008

(New York, NY) -- The United States may or may not be in a shallow and short recession, whatever that is, according to experts but that isn't stopping people from planning new hockey leagues or new arenas and stadiums. There are no plans at present to expand Major League Baseball from 30 teams to 32 and truthfully MLB has run out of North American cities that can support the product in terms of building publicly funded stadiums or having both a large cable TV market or broad corporate support. The National Football League will remain at 32 for a while as there are no plans to expand although Toronto has gone to the head of the class in terms of owners’ interest. The National Basketball Association according to David Stern is staying put at 30 teams although if Clayton Bennett moves his Seattle SuperSonics to Oklahoma City and if Seattle comes up with a new arena, Stern could change his stance about never returning to Seattle once Bennett takes his team to Oklahoma.

Despite the US economic downturn, new baseball stadiums are on the drawing board in Miami and Fremont, California, a new football facility in Santa Clara, California, an arena upgrade in Oklahoma City, at Madison Square Garden in New York and the Nassau Colisuem in Uniondale, NY. There could be a new arena in Brooklyn, NY and Goodyear, Arizona is thinking of a way to fund the move of the Cincinnati Reds spring training facility from Sarasota to the Arizona desert.

The National Hockey League is not expanding in the next two years but if Las Vegas' new arena is ready, the NHL could jump into the Nevada desert skates first. Major League Soccer will be adding teams in Seattle and Chester, Pa. and the Arena Football League is seriously contemplating a move into Europe and starting an AFL division in the Old World.

But there is a planned expansion in hockey on the lowest professional levels. There is a new league being planned with an old name, the Eastern Professional Hockey League. This isn't a professional circuit that is going to draw any interest from the NHL like the old EPHL which lasted between 1959 and 1963 in Quebec and Ontario cities and was a legitimate feeder system with future NHL players like goaltenders Charlie Hodge, Ed Johnston, Cesare Maniago and Bruce Gamble, defensemen JC Tremblay, Pat Stapleton, Jacques Laperriere, Terry Harper and Jim Neilson, forwards Bobby Rousseau, Gilles Tremblay, Leon Rochefort and Keith McCreary. Another EPHL all-star was defenseman Harry Sinden who coached the Boston Bruins to two Stanley Cups and was the coach of Canada in the 1972 Summit Series against the Soviet Union.

This version of the EPHL is designed to attract players who are marginal pros, a step ahead of the beer league semi-pro players. The EPHL will play in Danbury, Connecticut, South Orange, New Jersey at the New Jersey Devils former practice facility and the one time site of a World Hockey Association pre-season contest. The EPHL also lists Rome, NY as potential city.

Is there money for the EPHL? That's a good question. The EPHL lists four planks on its mission statement.

"To enhance the quality of life in our markets by bringing affordable, family-friendly professional "A" Level minor league hockey to enthusiasts and fans.

To serve as a training ground to develop professional players, coaches and personnel on and off the ice. Emphasis will be placed on fundamental development, career development, community involvement and education for all on and off-ice personnel.

To provide a "Real" Pro Hockey Experience option to fans unable or unwilling to travel to higher level regional minor league hockey franchises.

To conduct our league and franchises in a transparent, responsible manner in the eyes of players, fans, sponsors, and the media."

The EPHL is operating in an economy that has already seen one proposed league not get off the ground, the All American Football League and another hockey league, the Mid Atlantic Hockey League, cancel the final games of its inaugural campaign in February because of finances. The MAHL plans to take the ice again in late 2008 and has folded one team, Jamestown, New York, and expanded to Dyer, Indiana.

Unaffiliated minor leagues have proliferated in the past two decades but picked up steam in the 1990s after Major League Baseball rewrote its agreement with Minor League Baseball that required all minor league baseball teams to take a close look at their stadiums to determine if the stadiums meet major league requirements. A handful of longtime minor league cities like Elmira, New York, Glens Falls, New York and others did not have the money from either the public or private sector to bring the stadiums to the new Major League mandates which took effect in 1994. Independent baseball sprang from the 1990 Player Development Agreement from cities that could not live up to the Major League dictates for minor league stadiums.

Hockey minor leagues are a bit different, The American Hockey League has been a development league for decades, hockey has development a Triple A, Double A, Single A status over the past two decades. The "Double A" ECHL formed in 1988 from the remnants of the Atlantic Coast Hockey League and All-American Hockey League, the Double A International Hockey League began life in 1991 as the low level Colonial Hockey League which was supposed to be a Northeastern United States league and eventually became a Midwest league when it changed its name to the United Hockey League. The United League became the International Hockey League about a year ago and is patterned after the old IHL which started after World War II. The other Double A hockey league, the Central Hockey League was formed in 1992 and merged with the Western Professional Hockey League in 2001. The CHL was a primary NHL farm league when it rose out of the ashes of the old EPHL in 1963 and folded in 1984. The Single A Southern Professional Hockey League was formed from two failed leagues, the WHA2 and the Southeast Hockey League in 2004. Those two failed leagues grew out of defunct Atlantic Hockey League.

Minor league hockey is a tough business even in good economic teams.

Can the EPHL succeed in the current economic environment? It is going to be difficult. The league isn't paying players much in salaries but the league is going into small capacity arenas and will depend on local businesses to buy tickets and advertising. There will be no real TV money available and the owners will need very favorable arena lease agreements. The sports landscape has hundreds of tombstones with the names of defunct teams and leagues, including that of the Eastern Professional Hockey League 1959-1963. It will be tough sledding for this league and the second year Mid Atlantic Hockey League

Finding players is never a problem. Finding money to fund a sports league is a different story entirely.

(evanjweiner@yahoo.com or eweiner@mcn.tv)