Today’s Take: The National Hockey League would be making a huge mistake putting another expansion team in Atlanta.

The Argument: It used to be that baseball was the sport where three strikes constituted an out. But there’s an investment group in suburban Atlanta looking to give the National Hockey League (NHL) it’s third strike in “Hotlanta.”

An Atlanta area businessman and CEO of Krause Sports & Entertainment, Vernon Krause is heading a group of developers who recently announced plans to build 100-acre multi-use entertainment complex in Forsyth County, Georgia near the city of Alpharetta…about 25 miles north of downtown Atlanta.

Known as The Gathering at South Forsyth, the complex will cover 100 acres including 2,400 residential units, 500 hotel rooms, along with 1.6 million square feet of office and retail space. It will also feature open greenspaces, fountains and retention ponds, walking trails, and a “state-of-the-art” community center. Basically, The Gathering is modeled after The Battery Atlanta, another mixed-use development in Cobb County which is anchored by Truist Park, home of baseball’s Atlanta Braves.

But instead of a baseball stadium, the centerpiece of The Gathering is an arena with 18,000-ish seats being built with the intention of luring an NHL team.

There’s just one problem…hockey is a non-starter in the “Hollywood of the South.” Consider the following…

Remember the Atlanta Flames? They were an NHL expansion franchise which began play in 1972. They moved to Calgary in 1980. Remember the Atlanta Thrashers? They were another NHL expansion franchise which played from 1999-2011, when they relocated becoming the Winnipeg Jets. Even minor-league hockey has failed in Atlanta. The International Hockey League’s Atlanta Knights were founded in 1992, but moved to Quebec City in 1998.

Atlanta’s newer nickname as the “Hollywood of the South” stems from it’s burgeoning presence in the film-making industry. But it also reflects a shared trait with the actual “Hollywood.”

Los Angeles is not a great sports town. Teams in Tinseltown need to win and keep winning if they want to draw any attention whatsoever. There’s a reason why the National Football League (NFL) eschewed Los Angeles for nearly a quarter-century.

More importantly, Los Angeles is a “star” town. There’s no bigger global star in baseball than the Dodgers’ Shohei Ohtani. The Lakers have LeBron; say what you will about his age…he’s got “single-name” star power. Even as the “Hollywood of the South,” how much “star power” can Atlanta draw? Even when the Braves were enjoying a run as one of baseball’s great dynasties in the 1990s and 2000s and had a roster full of stars, their attendance was pretty weak. What chance does yet another hockey team in “Hotlanta” have?

Given all that, what are the odds of this actually happening? Pretty good…all you have to do is follow the money.

Carl Hirsh is a member of Krause’s development team who is on record stating the NHL has told them the league is not looking to expand. Forsyth County manager David McKee has been quoted saying the county won’t issue $225 million in taxpayer-backed bonds to pay for its portion of the project until developers secure an NHL franchise.

But Hirsh also said the NHL would consider expansion if “somebody comes to us with a great situation.” Face it…Krause and Hirsh et al. know the NHL won’t pass up an expansion fee of umpteen millions, which means they’ll get the county’s money (and probably a bunch of other stuff we don’t know about yet). That’s why they’re already committed $3 billion to The Gathering project.

In other words, the only question is where will this hockey team be playing in 2037: Moncton, New Brunswick or Halifax, Nova Scotia.

Change my mind.

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