Chirps from Center Ice

The annual Street & Smith’s Sports Business Journal 2013 Minor League Markets ranking is out. The Wilkes-Barre / Scranton area is ranked…..

…wait for it…..

159th.

That would be last among East Division teams, behind Hershey (3rd), Syracuse (6th), Binghamton (23rd) and Norfolk (76th).

Only Worcester (172nd), Rockford (205th) and Manchester (214) ranked lower than Wilkes-Barre / Scranton for AHL markets.

Wheeling, a standalone minor league town with just the ECHL affiliate in the Nailers, ranked 187th.

The top minor league market? Hint: It’s the home of Maxwell Klinger.

Here’s more detailed blurbs on the Top 10.

Here’s how the rankings were figured out. To summarize, each market was weighted in three categories. Tenure rank, Attendance rank and Economic rank.

I’m not about to turn this into a Social Studies discussion making arguments for or against how Wilkes-Barre can rank higher / lower. It’s worth mentioning though since it is a list ranking all of the minor league markets in America and Wilkes-Barre is a minor league market.

Cleaning up news that is not related to the cesspool of Sidney Crosby / DMV articles:

— Wheeling keeps signing guys. Mike Ratchuk joins the Nailers and 2009 draft pick Alex Velischek returns.

–Syracuse re-signed Carl Nielsen.

Schedule should be out soon.