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Read: Fan-Base Rankings

by Adam Rotter on August 26th, 2009 at 11:28 am

Derek Felska has his 2009 rankings of the top NHL fan bases, via Puck Daddy.

Felska uses some sort of formula derived from, arena capacity plus online presence plus editorial bias to calculate his rankings.

His top five fan-bases are:

No. 1: Montreal Canadiens
No. 2: Chicago Blackhawks
No. 3: Toronto Maple Leafs
No. 4: Minnesota Wild
No. 5: Vancouver Canucks

At 12, dropping five spots from last seasons rankings, are the Rangers.

His justification is such:

The Rangers will always have a distinctive advantage of being NYC’s #1 team regardless of where it finishes in the standings.  If you ever watch the NHL Network’s “NHL Live” program New York Rangers fans are always quick to call in to offer their thoughts to the lucky guys (sometimes gals) working the show.  New Yorkers are tough on their teams but they’re immensely loyal and that is certainly the case for the Rangers as well.  However there are signs that some of that strength is eroding slightly.  The Rangers lately have basically been just good enough to get to the playoffs only to be bounced in the 1st round and the fans clearly have much higher expectations and do not have a whole lot of faith in General Manager Glen Sather.  For the first time in a while the Rangers failed to average a sellout for the season and that should set off some alarm bells even though the difference is quite small.  It could a prelude to a more notable drop if the team does not show some definite progress and with Sather hedging his playoff hopes on the wonky groin of the often injured Marian Gaborik it does not provide a wide margin of error.

….This is bogus, the Rangers have a top ten fan-base and everyone knows it. The drop-off in tickets that he talks about, is 28 tickets. Madison Square Garden holds 18,200 people for a Rangers game, according to Felska, the Rangers averaged 18,172. I don’t think that has anything to do with the Rangers play, but more likely to do with the economy and people dropping their tickets because of that.
  • TheGreatOne

    The difference in the attendence is probably because one of the Rangers home games was in the Czech Republic which had a lower capacity than the Garden. I am pretty sure at the Garden the Rangers averaged 18200

  • TKACZUK

    While I agree that statistically 2008/2009 was sold out (been a season ticket holder for about 20 years), I do know that they have exhausted their waiting list and have been solicited to see if I wanted to buy additional tickets and/or had friends who did……got two phone calls and an email (as recently as last week)……I think the economy will play a big factor in NHL this year…..

  • beckfan

    Funny, 3 of the top 5 teams are Canadian and the other 2 are very north in the United States. Yet Bettman refuses to let Basille buy the Coyotes and move them north to Canada.