Eric the Mauve posted:

As a Pens fan I really want to say "of course don't be an idiot" but truthfully it's hard to give an emphatic yes. They were broke and about to move when they got Mario, and they were broke and about to move when they got Crosby. Of course they went bankrupt WHILE THEY HAD JAGR AND SOMETIMES LEMIEUX and were still a high seed every year, and Lemieux ended up with a big stake in the team because when it filed for bankruptcy he was a major creditor from years of unpaid salary. So a lot of it was just that previous ownership was spectacularly incompetent. They were selling seats those years.

I think in Pittsburgh there's always going to be a problem where when the team is bad things will get real bad because most of the city doesn't really begin to pay attention to hockey until after football season is over, and if the Penguins are out of serious contention by then, no one but the real diehards will even give them a glance.