Ross McKeon is an idiot

Ross McKeon of Yahoo.com Sports is a chapter chairman of the Pro Hockey Writers Association, and yet he seems to know nothing about hockey.

In his most recent article, a feature on the front page of the Yahoo portal, he highlights the decline in attendance at Detroit Red Wings games and claims that Detroit is "no longer Hockeytown, USA." He then presents arguments for why other cities are worthy of the title. The problem, of course, is that his criteria are entirely arbitrary (despite being predicated on home attendance). And get this:

Pretty darn good, in their own way: Dallas, Pittsburgh, St. Louis, San Jose
Nice try, but this doesn't really work: Tampa Bay

Let's look at average attendance figures from the past three years, shall we?

2005-2006

Tampa Bay: 20,509 (103.8% capacity)
Dallas: 17,828 (96.2%)
San Jose: 16,831 (96.2%)
Pittsburgh: 15,804 (93.2%)
St. Louis: 14,213 (74.7%)

2006-2007

Tampa Bay: 19,876 (100.6%)
Dallas: 17,914 (96.7%)
San Jose: 17,422 (99.6%)
Pittsburgh: 16,424 (96.9%)
St. Louis: 12,520 (59.6% -- last in the NHL)

2007-2008

Tampa Bay: 19,172 (97%)
San Jose: 17,496 (100%)
St. Louis: 17,492 (83.3%)
Dallas: 17,193 (92.8%)
Pittsburgh: 17,058 (100.6%)

As you can see, hockey clearly doesn't work in Tampa. Feel free to provide Ross some feedback on his misguided assertions.