Beast Unleashed

On Tuesday night I received a tweet from the Brampton Beast, inviting me to come out to a player signing announcement event. I thought that was really cool of the team and it goes to what I was saying in my previous blog post about the Beast in terms of their goal to reach out to the community and actually try to sell tickets (as opposed to the Battalion who never advertised).

So my good friend and I went down to Oscar's Roadhouse, a local Brampton restaurant, to check out the event. I have to admit, I was surprised when we arrived to find that the restaurant was packed. We got a seat in the back corner and settled in to hear the news.

The first person we heard from was Carey Kaplin. Carey is the President, General Manager and, co-owner of the Beast. The first thing he mentioned was that the team has sold 2,000 tickets to every game thus far (keep in mind he did not say that they sold 2,000 season seats) and that the club feels that they are trending towards getting sell out crowds. I remain in the "I'll believe it when I see it" frame of mind. In all fairness, that's not directed towards the team but rather the citizens of Brampton and how much they really care for hockey.
Carey also mentioned that the Beast will have both an NHL and a AHL affiliation team and that will be announced in the next couple of months. Personally that was the biggest news of the night to me. If the team can gain an affiliation then they may get a chance to be loaned an AHL player coming back from an injury which can't hurt the ticket sales.
The next piece of information is that the new scoreboard is about to begin construction. Apparently it will be big one too, spanning from blue line to blue line. I got the impression that it will basically be a mini version of the scoreboard the Dallas Cowboys have in their new stadium, which is to say a big video screen in a rectangular shape.
There was also mention that the team's jersey will be unveiled soon and there will be another event for that (which I'm looking forward to) but we were basically told to "stay tuned" for that information.
We were also told that the Beast intend on having plenty of give-a-ways at all of their games and theme nights. I'm sure my friends over at the Chris Creamer Sports Logo Community will look forward to those themed nights (and potential themed jerseys) as much as I will.

Next a video was played showing pictures from the community event the Beast have attended, I do not recall the number mentioned now but I know it was over 100. That was pretty impressive.

Next up we had counselor Sanderson. He didn't really say anything in terms of news. He gave the Beast organization kudos for their community involvement, told us that he bought his season tickets and, told us to buy our season seats. The highlight of his speech was when he said the Battalion didn't ever do a thing to advertise. I found that funny. True, but funny. In fairness to counselor Sanderson, he did say that he wished the Battalion the best of luck right after.

At this point head coach Mark DeSantis came up and told the crowd that he has been constantly on the phone and the computer scouting and talking to player agents. He mentioned that his goal is to have a competitive team right off the bat. He admitted that it is hard as an expansion team to do so but he wanted a winning team. He then went into the player signing announcements:

Calin Wild is the first player announced. Cal is a Brampton resident who was born in Winnipeg. Calin played the last 3 season with the Texas/Fort Worth Brahmas organisation who are right now an "inactive" team looking for a new venue to play in. Calin seems to be about a 20 point a season who plays center. My friend kind of laughed when he heard Calin's last name mentioning that it was perfect to fit in with the club's branding. Calin "The Beast" Wild, ha ha ha.

The second player announced was Jason Pitton. Jason was born and raised in Brampton. Jason is a former member of the old Junior "B" Brampton Capitals, played with the Sault Saint Marie Greyhounds and Guelph Storm in the OHL. He's the older brother of former Battalion goaltender Bryan Pitton and spent last year with his brother in the UK playing for the Fife Flyers. Jason plays on the left wing.





Finally, Bret Smith (the first Beast signing) came up to the podium to confirm he will wear number 41. He mentioned that the Beast said they were so excited to sign him and that when he arrived in Brampton they gave him the number 14 and he started to wonder if they really wanted him (jokingly of course). He also said that he was glad to have some teammates because he wasn't sure if he could do it all himself. Seems like a pretty funny guy.

The night ended with a couple of questions from the audience, nothing serious, just wanting to know the players positions, ect.

All in all, pretty much what you would expect from a player announcement but it was cool that the team gave out so much information as to what they are working on so willingly.

Next week I plan on going into more depth on the players with a some player profiles, so stay tuned if you'd like to hear more about the Brampton Beast players.

***Edit: The nickname was to be Calin "The Wild Beast" Wild. My apologies Garrett!***