Leiweke’s experience boon for Seattle bid
Ex-Canucks exec part of NHL quest
SEATTLE During his first stint in Seattle, Tod Leiweke helped develop the Seattle Seahawks into a benchmark franchise.
He’s returning to the Northwest this time with a chance to build a franchise from scratch — pending NHL approval.
Leiweke was introduced Wednesday as the CEO and president of the prospective NHL expansion franchise seeking to call Seattle home beginning with the 2020-21 season. The announcement has been expected since Leiweke announced he was stepping down from his role with the NFL earlier this year.
“It’s kind of fun to start from scratch because you can build a culture the way you would want a culture to be built with like-minded people who want to serve, who love the game of hockey. In this, it is a grand opportunity,” Leiweke said.
The prospective majority owner of the franchise, David Bonderman, said he expects a possible conditional announcement about the franchise from the NHL in June and a potential formal announcement in September coinciding with upcoming NHL board of governors meetings.
“We hope there is not any doubt about it and it’s certainly not just a formality. However, there is a process with the NHL and we expect to play through that process,” Bonderman said.
While announcing the president and CEO for a team that doesn’t exist yet might seem a bit presumptuous, Leiweke brings the kind of clout that will only strengthen a bid that almost appears to be a foregone conclusion.
Oak View Group, a partner in the franchise and the group responsible for renovating KeyArena, is expected to begin construction on the building later this fall and have the remodel done for the 2020-21 season. The season-ticket drive that started March 1 was a rousing success and capped at 33,000 deposits.
Leiweke got his start in hockey with the Minnesota Wild. He also worked in Vancouver and most recently helped build Tampa Bay into a powerhouse in the Eastern Conference. Leiweke left the Lightning in 2015 to become the COO of the NFL and didn’t have any interest in leaving the league office until the project in Seattle began to gain real traction.
“The fact is I found the NFL to be a pretty amazing and fascinating place to work and I was starting to get quite comfortable in my role there, so I wasn’t looking,” Leiweke said. “But I think the stars aligned and my son’s advice was, ‘Dad, how can you not do this?’ Today, I think he’s right.”