In what appears to be a coup for place-shift gadget maker Sling Media — already in hot water with Major League Baseball — landed its first professional sports league partnership with the National Hockey League for its upcoming Clip + Sling service.

When it launches, fans will be able to save short clips of favorite hockey moments, which will be viewable publicly on Sling’s site. The clips will be searchable, by each club. NHL also plans to make other long and short-form videos available on the site.

Are leagues waking up to new business opportunities created by Sling’s technology, which pipes programming you’ve already paid for through your cable provider onto your laptop and Internet connected smartphones? Or will we see a slate of legal threats?

Stopping short of suggesting legal action, MLB Advanced Media LP (MLBAM), the digital arm of Major League Baseball, told the Wall Street Journal that they believed Sling does not have the legal right to transmit its baseball games over the Internet. The Journal story clarified an earlier Hollywood Reporter story(via ars technica) where MLBAM’s general counsel said lawsuits have not been ruled out.