Long Island Business News: Henry E. Powderly II reports Charles Wang has sold the New York Dragons Arena Football Team to a New York investment group that will keep the team at the Nassau Coliseum.
Dragons Website: Has a release on the sale along with comments from the new owners.
NYI Fan Central Comments:
I read a year or so ago that Mr Wang was going to sell the Dragons but it is strange to see him sitting in the first row of the Wachovia center with Mr Dey and their families cheering for the club Saturday and a few short days later the team is sold.
If the Lighthouse is approved and renovations do actually happen at the Coliseumu in the summer it could displace the Dragons. I found it interesting the new owners first statements were they were going to market the club more to New York centric based audience which is something I have written about often for the New York Islanders.
Of course this is just speculation but it could also mean Mr Wang is clearing his assets in case the Lighthouse is not approved, anything is possible in that regard but he should be praised for bringing the team here from Iowa and putting a lot into running it going back to his early years as owner.
Updated 8:30pm
Newsday: John Jeansonne has a Newsday article on the sale of the Dragons.
Tsn.ca: Reports former Islander captain Michael Peca has reassigned a one year contract worth 1.3m with the Columbus Blue Jackets.
Tsn.ca: Report center Sergei Fedorov signed a one year extension with the Washington Capitals worth four million.
Espn: Scott Burnside does his usual negative Islander analysis in an article asking where the trends go for each club where he feels New York is going sideways, not up or down and refers to them as the NHL cockroach that you cannot get rid of despite all the stomping the media does on them.
NYI Fan Central Comments:
Only media covering the club on a regular basis is Newsday. Everything else is mostly writers like Mr Burnside who are too lazy to call the club up and do some actual work finding out what's going on so they throw anything against the wall hoping it sticks.
Mr Burnside to me (Mr Botta's comments notwithstanding) is kind of a joke with his reporting or plays favorites. He gives the Devils a favorable review partly based on Holik that he feels he could rebound while for the second time this week points out Doug Weight is an aging player on the downside after he writes his usual book report on the Rangers who of course trend up in his view despite the exodus from Msg and a team on paper not as good as the one that just left.
When it comes to Mr Burnside his reivew of Holik vs Weight is a joke and it's not about the color of the laundry for me but the facts, is it that hard to look at stats and do a fair review?
Again Doug Weight is not as old as Bobby Holik (by a few days) and Weight has outproduced Holik handily over the last three seasons even though they are virtually tied in goals (with Weight holding a significant edge in assists & plus/minus) but to Burnside only one player who can help their team?
That's non-sense.
Either both can help their teams or both are on the downside and aging. To write anything else is just a lazy effort from a writer who should confine his reviews to clubs he knows instead of giving us worthless fodder or Atlanta-based Burnside talks to former Thrasher Holik on more occasion.
When the games start Mr Burnside seems too busy to follow the Isles so he tempers his judgement only keeping the glass half empty writing they have no chance in the end, but during the summer that's when his laziness catches up with him and we get sloppy/poor journalism like this.
Media Blog: Cory Witt reports Brendan Witt will be on XM radio today at 5pm with the club rebroadcasting the interview on the Isles website.