Archive: Kraken Co-Owner Bruckheimer Detailed the Kraken Joining the NHL in 2021 Exclusive Q&A

As a Grade-A movie producer and entertainment guru, Jerry Bruckheimer long ago cemented his personal brand on the planet. And in this exclusive interview with The Hockey News publisher W. Graeme Roustan from the Money and Power 2021 edition (Vol. 74, Issue 1), Bruckheimer pulled back the curtain on his journey to becoming one of the owners of the Seattle Kraken.

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Bruckheimer’s interest in becoming an NHL team owner dated back decades, but the stars did not line up for him until Seattle was awarded an expansion team in 2018. From that point on, Bruckheimer and his co-owner group did just about everything letter-perfect. 

The biggest question was about the arena the new team would play in, but Bruckheimer and his partners agreed to remodel the old KeyArena into Climate Pledge Arena. They were thrilled with the results of the makeover and with the reception from Seattle fans.

“(T)he stadium is a state-of-the-art stadium – not only for hockey but for music. It’s a brand new arena,” Bruckheimer told Roustan. “It’s not like we were re-doing the KeyArena, we’re not. We dug down another 15 feet from where the KeyArena was, I think we doubled the size of the square footage in the arena; it’s gonna be a great place for music, for all kinds of sporting events, but it’s gonna be a very steep arena. So, the fans will be almost over the ice. So, it’s gonna be a very loud arena, which is exciting for the fans.”

As he proved in his moviemaking career, Bruckheimer knew that casting would be crucial in building the Kraken. He humbly deferred praise in favor of highlighting the cast of workers he assembled for the project.

“Well, I was on the committee that worked on the (Kraken’s) branding and the logo and the naming,” Bruckheimer said. “But there were a lot of smart people on that committee. And my success has all come from surrounding myself with people who are a lot smarter than I am.”

Vol. 74, No. 1, Jan. 19, 2021

With W. Graeme Roustan

GRAEME ROUSTAN: I moved to L.A. in ’89, and in ’94 I put on a celebrity hockey game to raise money for charity. And there was no shortage of celebrities that came out and played in that game. L.A. celebrities either love hockey or they love to watch hockey. Is it the same today as it was? Or is it more? Do you find that the celebrity community – the Hollywood community – is really still very big into hockey?

JERRY BRUCKHEIMER: They are. You know, fortunately or unfortunately, there’s so many sports in southern California. With two big college football programs and basketball – we got two major basketball teams. During the Kings’ Stanley Cup runs we had a lot more celebrities coming out. But there are people that have followed the sport wherever they grew up, and they’re fans, and they’ll show up. When Gretzky was here, that was the place to be – at the arena, watching hockey. Once he left, it dissipated a little bit. But they sell out – they’ve been selling out for years for the Kings. So, that’s fantastic for Philip Anschutz and that whole organization. And that’s where, really, I met a lot of people that helped me get going for Seattle.

GR: How did that come together? Because I’ve known you for a long-time hockey lover. And, by the way, long-time subscriber to The Hockey News, thank you very much for that. But when did that light bulb go on for you that you were interested in NHL franchise ownership?

JB: Well, I never thought it was ever possible. It’s an enormous amount of money, and I have a day job I gotta pay attention to. But, first of all, I met Tim Leiweke when he was running the Kings, and we became very friendly. So, I always kept in contact with him; we always talked about owning a team. He was running a team at the time, so he knew about my interest.

Then I met this man named Harry Sloan, and I was on a board with him. And he is one of these financial guys who’s brilliant. He really is. And so we started talking. He said, “Look, let’s try to figure this out.” And he talked to people in the financial community, and we started meeting people.

And we met some people who were interested in buying the Pittsburgh Penguins. This goes back to, like, ’04 or ’05. And we were negotiating, but then they drafted Sid and they weren’t interested in selling.

Then, I don’t know what order it came in, but then Disney was gonna sell the Ducks, I had a deal with Disney. So, we talked about that for a while, but we didn’t see that as a great opportunity, because (Henry) Samueli owned the arena, and he had very deep pockets. So, he very smartly bought the team, and he’s done very well with it. So, kudos to him.

And then, we started kicking the tires on Vegas. But before that, Harry introduced me to David Bonderman, who’s like the Wayne Gretzky, Michael Jordan of finance. He’s a brilliant man, and a terrific man. So, with his connections, we got to sit down with Gary, and he hammered out a deal to put a team in Vegas. And then, I think we worked with MGM at the time, to try to build the arena, or Caesar’s, one of the two. And then, ’08 happened, and the market crashed; nobody had any money. So, we were out of Vegas.

Then, three or four years ago, Tim came to us and said, “Look, I think I’ve figured out a way to take the KeyArena, re-do it, keep the roof, and build an arena there. Are you guys interested?” I said, “We’re all in.” So, you know, Tim’s a genius at doing this; he figured it out, he made it happen, he got it through the city, all kinds of obstacles. He jumps over everything; he figures out how to get things done. So, that was great. His combination with Bonderman was the all-star team.

GR: I’ve known Tim, like you have, for a long time. And he’s that kind of a guy, where if he sets his mind to something, it’s gonna get done.

JB: That’s right. He’s really a genius. And he’s building arenas all over the world right now. He made the Islanders thing happen. If you get in business with Tim, it’s gonna happen. Now, the key element that we figured out early on was, “who’s gonna run it? That’s the key person.

So, Tim said, “My brother’s at the NFL, he’s the No. 2 man there. I don’t think he’d ever wanna do this, but…” So, I called Tod up, and I say, “Tod, I know you’re very happy, I know you’re on top of the world, you’re in one of the biggest sports in the world. Would you ever consider doing this again?” Because he did it in Tampa. He did it for soccer in Seattle. And I know he has roots in Seattle. And he also did it with Minnesota. So, he’s done this many times. And convincing him to do it was one of the key elements to getting this thing going on the right foot. Because he has put the thing together in a phenomenal way.

He’s so confident and careful on everything that he does. He finds the best people, even if they have other jobs, he’ll convince them to come to Seattle and work with us; that’s how good he is. And then, Bonderman put together a great group of people to participate financially. So, that’s another great element. Some of the people we have, the No. 2 or 3 guy, Andy Jassy, at Amazon, who’s one of the big investors; and the Wright brothers, David and Jeff. We had this group of local investors who are actually so value-added – just the technology that Amazon is helping us with.

And the stadium is a state-of-the-art stadium – not only for hockey but for music. It’s a brand-new arena. It’s not like we were re-doing the KeyArena, we’re not. We dug down another 15 feet from where the KeyArena was, I think we doubled the size of the square footage in the arena; it’s gonna be a great place for music, for all kinds of sporting events, but it’s gonna be a very steep arena. So, the fans will be almost over the ice. So, it’s gonna be a very loud arena, which is exciting for the fans. When we first started, we were worried because we had to get 10,000 season-ticket people to put down a deposit. We did a little advertising, not much, and I think within an hour, we had 10,000 people signing up. We’re almost completely sold-out, and we still have 61,000 people on a waiting list to try to get tickets.

What Tod and Tim have done, they’re a powerhouse combination. And I’m really fortunate to be a part of it.

GR: You gotta wonder what was in the water in the Leiweke household when those two guys were growing up.

JB: They’re very smart, ambitious, and they’re great at what they do. They will make things happen. I learned so much from just being around those two. And then bringing in Ron Francis as GM – what a great move that was for Tod. And he brought him in early. So, he had scouts out there, we have an analytics team, already, working for us. It’s really a top-class operation.

GR: And from a branding point-of-view – the color, the design, the logo – they hit that out of the park.

JB: Again, the decisions they make are so well thought-out and smart. They just look at things in a 360-degree manner, every aspect of it, they look at it. And our brand, our merchandise is No. 2 to Tampa Bay, which is unbelievable since we haven’t been on the ice; we haven’t won a game. So, it’s quite an accomplishment. Adidas helped design the logo, and we worked for a long time on it, trying to get it right. But again, Andy, from Amazon, was a big part of making that; he was instrumental in getting that design and making it happen. And we have a lot of other great people working with us.

GR: So, when you launch movies, a big part of launching a movie, obviously, is the branding and the marketing of a movie. And I would imagine you spend a great deal of time thinking about the launch of a movie and the right marketing strategy…Did you have some thoughts about how the Kraken were going to launch their brand and put their story out?

JB: Well, I was on the committee that worked on the branding and the logo and the naming. But there were a lot of smart people on that committee (laughs). And my success has all come from surrounding myself with people who are a lot smarter than I am. If you think you’re the smartest guy in the room, that sometimes isn’t good. So, my whole career has been built on great writers, great actors, great directors. And one of my skills is recognizing talent. We’ve done it over and over again. Whether it’s the actors we put in front of the camera or the directors who are behind the camera, we take big chances on people who haven’t done it before, and after they do it with us, most of them become superstars. So, hopefully it’ll be the same thing in hockey. So, I think we’ve surrounded ourselves with, you know, one of the best behind-the-scene teams around.

GR: Let’s go back to when you were that five-year-old kid in Detroit…do you reflect back to that little kid, and now you’re sitting here, you’ve been super successful in business, you’re one of the majority owners of the new Seattle team, you have a Sunday Night Hockey league that celebrities, retired NHL players play in…do you think back to that kid in Detroit and say, “Wow, you could’ve never dreamed?”

JB: You know what, I’m always looking ahead, I never look back. I only look back to look at the mistakes I made so I won’t do them again. I’m always worried about the next day, and the next year. And it’s rare that I have the moment to sit back. I do it in the moments like now, when we’re talking about this, but when I’m laying in bed at night, I’m worried about, “How am I gonna get this done? How is this movie gonna do? What are our problems on the hockey operations? How do we solve them?” Fortunately, we’ve got great people doing it, so I don’t have to worry about that, and I shouldn’t. But I still worry about everything. And I always look forward to doing better and getting up in the morning and trying to make an impact every day. To get a movie made, it’s like pulling a freight train across the country. It’s so difficult; there are so many moving parts. When a movie gets made and doesn’t work, you have no idea how many people worked so hard to get it there, and then you’re disappointed. So, we try to do it better every time we go out there.

GR: So, it’s a team effort.

JB: Exactly. We have a movie coming out, hopefully this coming summer if the theaters will be open, called Top Gun, with Tom Cruise. It’s terrific, I can’t wait for you to see it. So, it took me 35 years working with Tom to finally get to a place where he felt the script was right and we had the right talent around him to make the movie. That’s how fastidious he is in what he does for his career. So, it’s difficult to get these things done. We started this in ’04 to try to bring this together and look where we are now. So, it was a long time. You dream about these things, but you never think they’re ever gonna happen.

GR: How many games do you think you’ll be going to? You’re so busy, you’re running around the world making movies, will you be able to go to games?

JB: Yeah, I’ll try to get up there on weekends. When I’m in L.A., I’ll try to make those games. But I never know where in the world I’m gonna be. We’re looking about doing a couple movies in Australia, we’re looking about doing some stuff in Atlanta, we have two TV shows that are filming – one in Los Angeles and one in North Carolina. So, we have a lot of stuff. We’re doing a pilot for Showtime that’ll start after the first of the year. We’re doing another CSI series that’ll start sometime in March or April. So, we have a lot of stuff going on.

GR: Of course, when they play the Kings you’re down the street, so you’ll be there.

JB: Yeah, definitely. Well, I still have my season tickets to the Kings. Hopefully I won’t have to give those up. I’m not sure Luc (Robitaille) will give ’em to me now that I’m an owner of another team, so I have to butter him up a little bit to hold my seats.

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