Edmonton Oilers Heritage Website

It was late winter of 1979, and the World Hockey Association (WHA) was facing a debt crisis. The Indianapolis Racers, the team that signed both Wayne Gretzky and Mark Messier to professional contracts, had just folded. With the departure of the Racers, the WHL had just six remaining teams—the Edmonton Oilers, Winnipeg Jets, New England Whalers, Quebec Nordiques, Cincinnati Stingers and Birmingham Bulls.

The Stingers and Bulls barely had cash to finish the season, but the other four teams were desperate to keep professional hockey alive in their respective cities. The governors of the WHA had long given up their hostility aimed at the National Hockey League (NHL), and in fact, the four teams saw the NHL as a way for survival.

Since 1977, behind closed doors, the WHA and NHL had been negotiating about the possibility of a merger. As the WHA faced financial ruin in 1978-79, the two leagues stepped-up talks, and a proposal for the Oilers, Nordiques, Jets and Whalers to join the NHL for the 1979-80 season was tentatively agreed upon. Each of the four teams would be required to pay $7.5 million USD to make the deal work. Of that, $6 million would go to the NHL as an entrance fee, while $1.5 million would go to a fund that would buy out the Stingers and Bulls’ franchises.

However, for the deal to get the final go ahead, three-quarters (13 members or more) of the existing 17 NHL franchises needed to give support. On March 9, 1979, the vote disappointed the prospective NHL members. Only 12 teams voted in support of the deal, with the Los Angeles Kings, Vancouver Canucks, Toronto Maple Leafs, Montréal Canadiens and Boston Bruins all voting against admittance. Ironically, the three existing Canadian NHL teams all moved to block a decision that would double the NHL’s Canadian content.

The Canucks and Kings, outposts on the West Coast, worried that the new teams would make for an even-more grueling travel schedule. As well, they worried that a new 21-team schedule would mean less visits by the "Original Six" clubs, and trouble at the gate. The Leafs and Canadiens feared they would have to divvy the lucrative sponsorship dollars they earned from Molson Breweries. They did not want Edmonton, Winnipeg and Quebec City getting pieces of that pie.

So, with only months left in the season, a deal that looked to save the Oilers and three other WHA teams went sour.