The thing that makes them worth the money is their media market. Outside of that, ya it makes no sense having teams in failing markets. Why even have a team in Phoenix that will have lost $100 million over the last four years? Outside of increased media footprint, the NHL makes so, so much more sense as a 26 team league than it does as a 30 team league, but because the NHL feels like they need to have teams in major media markets like Phoenix, Miami, Los Angeles, and Dallas the league is going to be saddled with teams that are unhealthy for their local owner but perhaps in the bigger scheme are worth having around just to increase the footprint. Phoenix(14), LA(2), Dallas(7), and Miami(17) are media markets too large for the NHL to ignore (national rank in parentheses) so while it makes more financial sense for the individual franchise to be in say Quebec, greater Toronto, etc. for the greater league presence perhaps it makes enough sense to have those teams there. Who knows. Nothing the NHL does makes sense.