Hey, who’s been watching the World Series? Not me! Baseball is my #1 sport and always has been, even as I’ve learned way too much about how the sport’s sausage gets made, but for whatever reason this year I’ve completely lost interest by now: I don’t know if it’s that I’m burned out after more rounds of playoffs than ever before, or by the presence of the 11th-best team in baseball in the finals, or that modern baseball means no starting pitcher goes deep enough into games to have a shot at a no-hitter anymore, or that the Phillies–Astros matchup feels like it should be the 1980 NLCS, or because I now know enough about the randomness of short series to feel like who actually wins the World Series is meaningless, or thanks to John Smoltz seeming like what you’d get if you ran every bit of baseball commentary ever through a Markov generator, or what, but it’s something.
I could come up with some hot take extrapolating this out into What It All Means For Baseball, but I’m probably not a representative sample of anything. It does, however, show how quickly things can change for an individual fan, and that sports fandom is not eternal or imperishable.
I’m not sure where I’m going with this, except to say that sports fandom is weird, man. That it’s also the basis for a multi-billion-dollar industry that has huge sway over our lives and politics is even weirder.
And on that note, here’s some news about sports and politics and lives:
- The Cincinnati Bengals stadium is getting a new corporate name, and even though Hamilton County owns the stadium and is supposed to get a 30% cut of any naming rights money over $16.67 million, Bengals execs say they won’t tell the county how much money they’re getting or share any of it because those numbers are “confidential.” The Bengals’ lease is truly the worst ever.
- Arizona is spending $9 million on a pedestrian bridge to make it easier for fans to get across a highway to Los Angeles Angels spring training games, and both Greg LeRoy and I point out that even if pedestrian bridges can be a good thing, funneling money to one that benefits a pro sports team means you’re not spending that money on some other public need.
- The Arizona Coyotes have opened their season in that college arena that doesn’t even hold 5,000 people, and team execs praised the “energy” of the tiny crowds after fans showed up dressed as bananas and characters from “Squid Game,” okay then.
- The San Antonio Missions Double-A baseball team are being sold to a new owner who wants a new downtown stadium with maybe public funding, and the San Antonio Express-News thinks this is a great idea because it could lead to an MLB expansion team somehow. And also “downtown stadium districts can drive economic development,” citation needed, no, newspaper editorial pages aren’t typically fact-checked, why do you ask?
- Jeff Bezos and Jay-Z (!?) may try to buy the Washington Commanders — according to the Washington Post, which Bezos owns — and if they do, Washington, D.C., may consider letting them build on the RFK Stadium site, maybe? More stories with no named sources, so this could be true or could be total BS, it’s up to readers to decide what to believe, isn’t American journalism great?
- And then there’s the op-ed pages, where former Philadelphia mayor Michael Nutter argues that a new 76ers arena is needed to fend off “blight” and create “jobs that we desperately need as we continue to struggle with challenges of poverty and income inequality.” More citations needed, but Nutter says residents should “keep an open mind” because “Philadelphia is the birthplace of freedom, liberty, and democracy”; or, you know, they could also follow local tradition by pelting Nutter with snowballs.
- Or maybe I’ve lost interest in the World Series because the head of MLB thinks the best way to promote it is with an op-ed that starts with the line, “Major League Baseball’s 2022 season will be remembered forever”? Yes, Rob, they all are, that’s why we have record books. Rob Manfred goes on to say that baseball “will leave the 2022 season with great momentum” and then head onto “a new path in 2023,” which definitely isn’t how momentum works — actually, this has been the most entertaining part of the World Series so far, please keep it coming!
‘Artificially’ capped at 4,600 — losing out on 425 revenue seats — in a 5,025 arena, just for ‘media’ accommodations?
Or, could it be that the small season ticket fan base wasn’t will to pay the higher, or normal, NHL pricing that exists in other arenas?
Seems to me to be the latter.
I like how you think! I agree with you 100%!!!
There are three reasons the Coyotes entertainment district will fail if anyone is foolish enough to finance it.
1. Mill Avenue
2. Arizona Mills
3. Tempe Marketplace.
Did I mention that Old Town Scottsdale is only 3 miles away?
No, I think it’s much more likely that the went out of their way to avoid a PR problem by giving the media – and there was a lot for that first game – plenty of space. It was clearly very important to them for the media to go away from that saying “hey, this wasn’t so bad.”
And there are minimum league requirements for that sort of thing too, I suppose.
Filling that arena or – any arena – for the first few games was never going to be a problem. As it is, I expect a lot of the tickets “sold” went to sponsors etc.
But when it’s March and the team is 20 points out of a playoff spot and the novelty has worn off, they might struggle to to fill even that arena. And if the vote doesn’t go their way in Tempe and it all looks like a bridge to nowhere, they’ll really have a hard time.
All the bitching about how it’s a “Joke” to be playing in a “university arena” and move them to Quebec and what not seems to mostly be coming from Canada where they don’t understand how nice a brand new NCAA hockey rink can be.
Yes, they have to put the visitors in the community rink covered with plywood, but they had lots of space and no team will have to do that more than once.
Those makeshift locker rooms are still 100 times better than the locker rooms at the Boston Garden, for example.
They will go out of their way to make sure the players and the media are accommodated. It’s worth that expense to mitigate the bad PR and/or the PA formally complaining that this isn’t up to their contractual standards.
From the other owners perspective, there’s really no point in complaining about this. The time to move the Coyotes was back when the league actually owned the team. At that point, they could have moved them to Seattle. They misplayed that and now they’re stuck with this.
Seattle and Vegas are taken. There isn’t currently an option in Houston ready to go. Quebec has an arena, but Quebec offers almost no potential to grow the overall fanbase and revenue of the NHL. It makes economic sense to at least see how this subsidized new arena in Tempe pans out before just giving up and going to Quebec.
Honestly, I can see the owners contracting a team before going to Quebec.
This franchise has been misplayed since 1996.
And, Mr Meruelo has misplayed owning this franchise since he got here.
Bettman has been pampering his baby Coyotes for 27 years. Burke, Ellman, Moyes, the NHL, Gosbee, who committed suicide, Barroway and now Meruelo have all failed in Phoenix, Scottsdale (after 2 years of council infighting Ellman gave up and ran to Glendale), Glendale and now Tempe. Very soon most, and then all NHL players will have been born after the Jets moved to the desert.
Bettman is a bad commissioner, but if anything, he accidentally saved the NHL in Canada rather than killed it.
People seem to forget that until the shutdown 18 years ago, the NHL had no salary cap and not much revenue sharing.
Winnipeg, Quebec and Hartford really were not viable in an economic system like that. They tried to get new buildings and couldn’t. The loony was very weak. The general assumption was that Canada would only have three NHL teams when the dust settled. It was their owners, not Bettman, who pushed to move those teams. Which, recall, we’re only in the NHL so that the NHL could kill off the WHA.
Whether the owners needed to force a shut down to get a hard cap or could have prevented that by agreeing to a soft cap, I’m not really sure. The players and agents claim now their idea was better, but I don’t trust them any more than I trust the owners. In the 90s, they said they’d never accept a cap at all. If it were up to them, the league might now be like baseball, except bankrupt.
Whereas, under the current economic system, as much as the players and agents hate it, the Canadian teams are all doing ok financially. Everyone is on the same page about keeping the Senators in Ottawa. That’s amazing given where they were 20 years ago.
The issue in Phoenix is whether a building in a better location could somehow unlock the potential of such a large market or if it’s just inherently a dud. I’m inclined to believe the latter, but I have never even been to Phoenix. I don’t see either side in that debate bringing any hard data to prove their point. But one rich guy is willing to lose a lot of money to bet that it can work.
I used to believe the “Bettman just can’t admit he was wrong” thing. I suspect he can’t, but I now don’t think it’s that simple.
I can see that Arizona at least offers the fading hope of tapping a big market. The only other place that offers that is Houston. Maybe Portland.
Quebec or Hamilton wouldn’t bring in a lot of people who don’t already watch hockey. I can see why the other owners really don’t want to put teams there if they can avoid it.
As somebody who is sentimental about the roots of the game and likes winter, I hate that.
But there really is no hope that the people who own the NHL are going to put tradition and sentiment ahead of the chance at making a few more dollars.
Money ruins everything.
Phoenix as a market has been so mismanaged by decades of bad owners. Not sure it’s recoverable, would need a lot more then just a new stadium.
“Honestly, I can see the owners contracting a team before going to Quebec”
I agree the owners don’t want to go to Quebec. They didn’t want to go to Winnipeg either. Nor are they happy about having to go to Ottawa, Edmonton, Calgary, Columbus, Carolina, Nashville or a few other markets. However, contraction means paying out the existing owners for the team – and at current franchise base values, not the expansion fee paid 20 years ago or more.
Not. Going. To. Happen.
If need be when the inevitable happens (no arena deal in Tempe or they build one and continue to lose money while pocketing revenue sharing for the next two decades…), the NHL will again assume control of the team (and it’s massive accrued debts!) and relocate it.
Could be Houston. Could be some as yet unknown western US city. Could be an eastern US city and move some unhappy eastern conference team back to the west. Could be Quebec… but only if there are no willing buyers anywhere else in the US (just like the Thrashers).
We seem to be acting like moving a team to Quebec city somehow deprives the US of a team… when it does no such thing.
If the NHL found a permanent home for them, they could immediately begin opening up RFPs for expansion (with a non-refundable deposit, of course) in the US. They aren’t going to do that while the fate of a team (or two) is uncertain.
You’re almost certainly correct about contraction. I hadn’t done all that math.
I think the Coyotes will stay in Arizona because I think that this Tempe thing will happen and will succeed well enough to keep them there. From the owners’ revenue perspective, the bar for “success” is very low if the only alternative is to move them to Quebec. It won’t have much cultural impact or really do much to grow the game, but that’s not how they see it.
But if the Tempe thing doesn’t happen, then the league will at least look for an option in Houston. I’m sure they’re doing that already every day.
But so far, at least, nobody has stepped forward, even though it’s in the interest of every other owner for one to appear, if for no other reason then it gives them leverage over the municipality they’re in now.
As this excellent blog has brought up before, we’re getting to the point in all the big leagues where there really aren’t a lot of untapped markets yet to be had and the size of all of these leagues – but especially the NHL at 32 teams – is approaching unwieldy.
At one point, the owners thought 6 was the ideal number to maximize their revenue. Then they got dragged into 21. Now it’s 32. Is there a natural limit?
The Hockey Guy – whose youtube channel is an excellent source for any hockey fan – did a video a while back about what a 40-team NHL would look like. It would mean having teams in a bunch of markets currently considered just too small and/or too close to existing teams.
It would also mean teams in all of the obvious big markets, which makes it much harder for owners to threaten to leave their current market.
But somehow it’s hard to imagine that there will never be more expansion.
“As this excellent blog has brought up before, we’re getting to the point in all the big leagues where there really aren’t a lot of untapped markets yet to be had and the size of all of these leagues – but especially the NHL at 32 teams – is approaching unwieldy.”
Wait, did I say that? If anything, I would say that the bigger your league gets, the more completely arbitrary it becomes where you draw the line at what’s a big enough city. Sure, leagues have done a good job at filling all the obvious markets, so moving the Coyotes elsewhere isn’t going to do that much for them or the league. But as far as overall league size is concerned, once you’re in Nashville, you may as well be in Sacramento, and there are a ton of cities in that population range.
(You still need to figure out revenue sharing at that point, but honestly you need to figure out revenue sharing as soon as you expand past NY and LA.)
“Wait, did I say that? If anything, I would say that the bigger your league gets, the more completely arbitrary it becomes where you draw the line at what’s a big enough city.”
I don’t know if you said that specifically, but you have pointed out that owners like having a few good expansion/relocation candidates out there to use as a threat. So filling in those blank spots on the map limits everyone else’s options.
The comment about the size of the leagues being unwieldy was just my own thought. My use of “And” In that sentence was misleading.
But I suppose that’s really only true in a few cases, now that I think about it a bit more.
When the NFL didn’t have any teams in LA at all, there was never any question that it would eventually so all the other owners looking for a hand-out – the Vikings come to mind – could leverage that.
And before the Expos moved to DC, a few owners used DC/NoVA as a viable threat. It seemed very unlikely that Angelos could keep a team out of DC forever. I recall a lot of people in Pittsburgh thinking it was likely that’s where the Pirates would end up.
But otherwise, for most of the last 40 years, relocation decisions (and even a lot of expansion decisions), have usually been determined mostly by which places have the more pliable politicians, not which city is a “better market” by any normal economic measure.
Hockey is a bit different in that it has always had the most extreme regional bent. But for a variety of reasons, it turns out that being relatively unpopular in a huge warm weather city may be more lucrative than being the biggest thing in a very small cold one, depending on which two places exactly are being compared and, again, what the arena situation is. So it has tried to take advantage of that, with mixed results.
But there’s nothing comparable like that in other sports right now.
And, that is one cost effective bridge I can endorse, Neil!
“Arizona is spending $9 million on a pedestrian bridge to make it easier for fans to get across a highway to Los Angeles Angels spring training games…”
Note: My post was sarcasm.
Why was a bridge built over I-10 at Alameda instead of at Vineyard/Western Canal where there would be far more bicycle traffic? Because ADOT and MAG are controlled by bi developers and now sports teams owners.
Judging by the amount of Coyotes merchandise (not much) and the way it is displayed (in the back corner) at Just Sports Desert Ridge, the Coyotes would fail anywhere in the Valley of golf and NASCAR.
Well San Antonio is a bigger media market than Kansas City, Cincinnati, Milwaukee, and Las Vegas. Look for Dave Kaval to post tweets from a Spurs game soon.
It’s just so hard to imagine where the Golden Baseball League went wrong with him at the helm…
First time I’ve heard a potential stadium linked to “freedom, liberty and democracy.” Have we hit the bottom of the sleaze barrel yet? Geez…..
As a San Diego Kraken fan I’m hoping to get to Glendale too see a game next year. I’m hoping the novelty of “NHL in a College Rink” will have worn off by then
They really missed the boat by putting a roof on the building. EVERYBODY knows that the outdoor game is IT in the NHL…
If only as many people would buy tickets to Coyotes games as are interested enough to comment on Coyotes related articles…
And here I thought when seeing 13 comments on today’s article it had to be a sign of the strength of MLB fan interest in the playoffs… hmmmph… how wrong can you be?
It’s all about the Coyotes today.
For the record, I am not surprised they ‘sort of failed to sell out’ the opening game at an arena smaller than most small town arenas.
I think they’ll fail to sell out lots of games this year… especially if they stick to the $80/ticket x 5000 is better than $9/ticket x 18000 model.
I’m sure there are a couple of thousand people who can and will pay real NHL prices to watch the dead dogs… but the fundamental problem is and always has been that there just aren’t enough of those people to make the business viable.
Bad and sometimes horrendous ownership (including the current bunch of carpetbaggers) have not helped… but that isn’t even close to heart of the problem.
Houston as a destination for the coyotes presents a lot of the same problems as the Phoenix market- no history of hockey, the fans that are there support other teams etc etc. both are over saturated markets that only have good attendance/ratings when the team is winning.
Toyota center would be a serviceable arena, but unless the team is good, I don’t think they’re garnering much attention.
Al,
Houston… No history of hockey?!
Houston Aeros hockey action since the 70’s in the World Hockey Association & IHL & AHL, Gordie Howe + his 2 sons, winners of the Avco Cup, winners of the Turner Cup, winners of the Calder Cup.
If it wasn’t for the jerk arena owner Les Alexander (who also owned the NBA Rockets) we would’ve had an NHL team already with John Watson years ago
Chuck Watson
Geez, Louise, Neil. The Phillies hatred perplexes me, especially given that the Yankees couldn’t even defeat the Astros a single playoff game. Also, the snowball reference is lazy — it dates back to a game played in 1968. That’s why I always say if sportswriters are going to keep bringing up how Philadelphia booed Santa, I’m going to keep talking about how Dallas murdered President Kennedy. Michael Nutter (who was an awesome Mayor) wrote a thoughtful column urging folks to be open-minded about a 76ers arena deal — it wasn’t a “let’s spend hundreds of millions of dollars on a boondoggle” column.
Last thought, to all the Quebec haters out there. Gary Bettman is a one trick pony — get a big American TV contract for the league. But guess what? The Canadian TV contract dwarfed the American one. If I were Rogers i would demand an eighth Canadian team, and maybe demand all 8 teams play in one division, or walk away from that TV deal.
I thought about using the picture of the Phillies fan kid giving the finger to a San Diego reporter, but the tweet was deleted, so I had to go with the classic.
Wait, somebody told me that Ted Cruz’ dad murdered JFK… pretty sure I heard that on tv somewhere… Still waiting for an explanation or any actual evidence, but then, consider the source of that story.
Mark: Canadian teams (and Rogers, and Bell) wouldn’t want an all-Canadian division, because of the time zone differences.
It was fun during the COVID season, but not practical.
And the travel would also suck.
I think Jeff Marek called the all-Canadian division like eating ice cream every day. It would be fun at first, but eventually you’d get sick of it.
Much like the six team NHL before 1967.
60 games with just 5 possible opponents.
But hey! Travel was a snap! (although I have never personally taken the train from Chicago to Montreal, for example)
When the NHL inevitably expands to 48 teams, the twelve four team divisions can include all Canadian or all California or all Texas or all New York divisions easily enough.
Putting a team in Quebec wouldn’t be all that helpful to Rogers or TSN. Most of the people who would ever watch hockey there already do.
Whereas, a successful team in Phoenix/Tempe could theoretically add a few hundred thousand people to the NHL’s total audience – people that would never have cared about hockey otherwise.
It will be interesting to see how the forthcoming death of regional sports TV networks changes this calculus. It may be
But for now, at least, that’s what the owners are betting on.
Even if they do move to Tempe and turn it around, it will take a long time for that increase in revenues to be more than the opportunity cost they lost by not moving them back when the league owned the team.
Or, perhaps, never moving to Phoenix to begin with. The original Jets were not economically viable at that time, but in retrospect, it’s clear at there were probably better options than Phoenix. But that’s all sunk cost at this point.