Certainly, he has flaws and could use some geography lessons (in one article, I’m not sure if it is this one, he suggests a Thunder Bay-Sudbury team, which wouldn’t work even when the roads aren’t icy), but for all that says a great deal worth thinking about.
One other thing that he misses is that a Canadian team from no where Americans have hear of might serve to reduce the prestige of the NHL as a whole.
I don't know if he's a hockey fan, but I suspect he bases a lot of his recommendations just on his analysis of various statistical measures. Along those lines I can tell you where this idea probably came from: I believe there are more players in the NHL today from Thunder Bay, Ontario than from any other city in the world. Go figure.
One other thing that he misses is that a Canadian team from no where Americans have hear of might serve to reduce the prestige of the NHL as a whole.
That's exactly why the NHL rejected Saskatoon's two bids for an NHL team in the late 1980s: first as part of a purchase and relocation of the St. Louis Blues, then as an expansion bid. Someone on the NHL's Board of Governors said he could never wrap his mind around the image of a game at Madison Square Garden, with the words "Rangers vs. Saskatoon" on the marquee lights outside in Manhattan.