The Maple Leafs — the most powerful, most beloved and wealthiest team in hockey — face a unique threat to their near century-long dominance in Toronto.

It comes in the form of a $325 million, 20,000-seat arena to be built in Markham.

“Any time you hear something about a new arena, it could potentially be competition,” said Tom Anselmi, the chief operating officer of Maple Leafs Sports and Entertainment. “We’re watching this process unfold.”

Half publicly funded by Markham, half funded by the private sector —headed by mover and shaker Graeme Roustan and land baron Rudy Bratty — construction on the GTA Centre could start this fall. Even if it’s true that Markham is building an arena for concerts and cultural events and not for the NHL, it still represents a threat to MLSE.

“Look how anal MLSE was when Ryerson said they were going to put concerts in the old Maple Leaf Gardens,” said Richard Powers, executive director of MBA programs at the Rotman School of Management. “They blew a gasket.

“There are very few arenas that can hold those concerts. To put in another one, in such close proximity, that’s a real threat to MLSE.”

Rogers and Bell cleared the regulatory hurdle of the Competition Bureau on Wednesday. Ottawa essentially said it’s OK by them if the two telecom giants share in the purchase of the majority stake in MLSE.

But the landscape, for the Maple Leafs in particular, has changed since the would-be owners first shook hands with the Ontario Teachers Pension Fund in December.

By the time Bell and Rogers take over, the NHL could have a new collective bargaining agreement, one which will try to reach further into the pockets of the league’s wealthiest teams to share revenue with the poorer ones.

At the same time, NHL commissioner Gary Bettman, having had the success of moving the derelict Atlanta Thrashers to Winnipeg, will be under pressure to move more teams to Canada.

We take a look at some of the biggest off-ice questions looming this offseason in Toronto.

Markham’s logic in building the GTA Centre is that it will be an arena that could turn a profit without an anchor tenant.

“Given that the Air Canada Centre is filled 250 nights a year, there are probably some shows or events that Toronto is not aggressively going after because of how busy Air Canada Centre is,” said Mario Lefebvre, director of the centre of municipal studies with the Conference Board of Canada, a business think-tank.

“It’s extra space, and as far as that is concerned, there probably is demand to fill it. Probably not 365 days a year, but all events want to come to Toronto.”

Anselmi is not inclined to agree with that.

“It’s not like we turn away a lot of events,” said Anselmi. “We’re a very busy building, one of the busiest buildings in the world.

“Between this building and the Molson Amphitheatre, and Ricoh Coliseum, the GTA is pretty well served.”

Powers doesn’t believe concerts and truck shows are the end-game Markham has in mind.

“You’re not building a 20,000-seat stadium for concerts and truck shows. It doesn’t make sense,” said Powers. “When you start talking about Markham, they can say whatever they want, but they’ve already admitted they met with the NHL.

“The end-game here is obviously to get an NHL team. … You need an anchor tenant.”

The NHL long ago concluded southern Ontario could support a second NHL team.

When Blackberry billionaire Jim Balsillie tried to purchase the Coyotes and move them to Hamilton in 2009, confidential NHL documents were released in bankruptcy court that showed the NHL put a price tag between $261 million and $279 million (U.S.) on the value of a hockey team in Hamilton. The same league documents concluded a Hamilton franchise would be among the top five in league revenues.

“Toronto and southern Ontario is the largest and most affluent hockey market in the world,” said a consultant close to the league. “I’m an advocate for putting your stores where there are people who want to buy the product. And in Canada, hockey is the national sport. If I have a chance to put a team in Canada and move it out of a crappy southeastern or southwestern market, why not?”

There is no shortage of financially troubled NHL teams that might like a more secure fan base. Start with the Coyotes, still owned by the league; move to the New Jersey Devils, teetering on the brink of bankruptcy in their new rink; add in the St. Louis Blues, still looking for new ownership; and the basket-case that is the New York Islanders, still hoping against hope for a new rink to be built in Uniondale.

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Not everyone agrees that Toronto could support a second team. Sure, the New York area has three teams. But only the Rangers make money.

“There’s an incredible appetite for tickets for the Leafs. But enough to justify a second team? That we’re not sure about,” said Lefebvre. “There’s a lot going on in Toronto, a city that has a lot to offer, not only in the sports world but everything you want, cultural, artistic.

“It’s potential market saturation.”

In the Coyotes bankruptcy case, the NHL put a value on relocating a team to Hamilton between $101 million to $195 million (U.S.).

However, there’s a bylaw in the NHL constitution that gives each member club a veto to prevent another team from relocating into its territory. The NHL, in that Coyotes bankruptcy case, said that bylaw is no longer in force even though it remains on the books. The reason? That bylaw is believed to be in violation of U.S. anti-trust law and Canadian competition laws.

In 2006, however, the Leafs wrote a letter to the league saying they believed that veto remained in place. That letter was also made public in the Coyotes bankruptcy case.

If the Leafs tried to enforce that veto, through Canadian courts or the Competition Bureau, the results could be disastrous, said Powers.

If the Leafs won, the league would find itself vulnerable to anti-trust lawsuits in the U.S.

If the Leafs lost, the team could find itself with a competitor in its backyard, one that wouldn’t be required to pay a fee to the Leafs for encroaching on their territory since a court would have struck down the veto as a barrier to competition.

“At the very least, it is unclear whether the current constitution would be enforced or not,” said Powers. “It has never been tested. Best case scenario for the Leafs is that should an NHL team be granted for Markham, they’re going to work out a price. Just agree with it and work out a deal financially.”

A new team in the GTA could hurt the overall value of the Maple Leafs, but not by much and not for long in an ever-growing market.

“The topic of NHL expansion in the Greater Toronto Area resurrects itself about every year or two, and if the National Hockey League comes to the board of governors with a recommendation … we’re going to evaluate it at that time,” says Anselmi.

“They could actually benefit from having a second team,” said professor Mihkel Tombak of the Rotman school at the University of Toronto. “In New York City, you have a cross-town rivalry. That could actually stimulate more demand.

“And if (Bell and Rogers) are also involved with the TV part of it and they’re concerned about the TV audience part of it, does this heighten interest? They’ll start having to think about the other aspects of the business, rather than just one side of the business.”

For some, a second team can’t come soon enough.

“The Leafs need a competitor,” said a source close to the league. “Without a competitor the Leafs will always be a crappy team. Until they get somebody who’s really going to light a fire under them, I don’t think anything is going to happen. They make a ton of money and they don’t have to perform.”

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