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Every professional sports league has been hit hard by the pandemic from a financial standpoint and that especially rings true for the NHL. The league has been affected so much so that it has reportedly borrowed approximately $1 billion, according to Sports Business Journal.
Who the league borrowed the huge sum of money has not been revealed and the NHL itself has yet to issue a statement about the loan. According to the report, each team around the league will have access to borrow up to an estimated $30 million to help with cash-flow problems, payroll issues, and various other expenses.
In early January when the 2021 season began, NHL commissioner Gary Bettman was transparent and honest explaining that he expected the league to lose billions in what will be a shortened season largely without any fans at all.
“It would be cheaper for us to shut the doors and not play. We’re going to lose more money, at the club level and the league level, by playing than by not playing.”
“While there is an economic consequence to playing the season, all of our owners and our clubs are in position to weather it and we have no concerns in that regard,” Bettman said, according to ESPN. “Except that everyone is going to lose a lot of money to do this.”
The Sports Business Journal report stated that sources explained that teams with wealthy owners aren’t expected to take advantage of the borrowed $1 billion.
One BILLION dollars is quite the chunk of change and while it obviously costs millions upon millions for each team to put on a season, it’ll be interesting to see reports of any other professional leagues, those more successful and popular than the NHL, taking out substantial loans through 2021 as well.