Coyotes CEO Xavier Gutierrez said team execs have had conversations regarding a dozen potential arena sites in Arizona and have narrowed it down to six, yadda yadda, this is what team owners always say, and it’s not like Gutierrez even named any of the sites. No, the real news was this gem of a quote:
“I think referendums have proven to be very difficult, not just for us,” Gutierrez said. “You look at the backlash that certain other sports teams are having, it’s very clear that there is a narrative that this isn’t what really the public wants to approve via a vote. And so we’re looking at other options.”
Sports venue funding referendums in fact pass about half the time, but that’s far less consistently than when elected officials vote on them without letting the public have a direct say, so it’s understandable that Gutierrez would categorize this as “very difficult.” Still, admitting that the Coyotes want to steer clear of an arena referendum because “this isn’t what really the public wants to approve” is a remarkable bit of saying the quiet part loud.
Whether any local elected officials or developers want to approve a new Phoenix-area arena for the Coyotes is an open question, too, of course. NHL commissioner Gary Bettman said last week that he hoped to have some resolution “by midseason,” and if not then he would “consult with management” to “explore further options.” It all sounds very much like a fishing expedition, but fishing expeditions sometimes score a catch, so expect further vague mumblings until the next sucker is born.
If any of these were economically or politically viable, wouldn’t they have tried them before rolling the dice with the Tempe voters?
You’d think, right? But, as we have seen, the Coyotes’ braintrust doesn’t have much of a brain and can’t be trusted so much.
East Valley makes sense. Without knowing the other locations, Tempe was a reasonable choice because of access and the population center of the Valley is, I believe, just slightly south of there. (Someone check me.)
But, yeah, they would much rather just lobby a handful of electeds than spend a bunch of money trying to convince the populace.
(I think all these things should always be subject to referenda, but I hear the representative democracy argument, that you already voted for the people who make the decisions. Problem is, they sell us all out much of the time.)
They certainly do sell us out. And often without a second of consideration.
I guess the east valley ‘makes sense’ if the team is looking for the least bad of all it’s options… but is there really any sense that there is a fan base there that will pay NHL prices to watch NHL hockey?
If so, on what is that idea based? It might be true (I’m not from the area), but through almost 30 years of failure in that market, this team has never really been able to identify where it’s fan base might be.
There have been many contributing factors (and I won’t attempt to list them all), but the heart of the matter is and always has been that hockey fans in Phoenix metro aren’t willing to pay NHL prices to watch the Coyotes.
Doesn’t that need to be fixed before anything else can work?
The answer any time I’ve ever asked a hockey fan from Phoenix hasn’t changed since 2001: Scottsdale.
But Scottsdale city officials have never bent as requested so the theory has never been tested.
It’s a bit unfair to say there is no fan base in the Phoenix area. When they played in downtown Phoenix they averaged about 15,000 a season, not great but not awful.
They have won a grand total of 2 playoff series the entire time they’ve been in Arizona and their last non-covid playoff appearance was in 2011-2012. There are not many hockey markets outside of maybe Toronto, Montreal, Boston or Detroit that would be doing much better attendance wise with the awful product and three ring circus sideshow that has surrounded the team for most of its Arizona existence.
Getting to Glendale for a weeknight hockey game at 7pm was a nightmare. I live about 45 minutes from the stadium with no traffic. In rush hour it could take up to 1 hour and 20 minutes just to get to the stadium and then another 20 minutes (maybe longer, the ingress/egress is atrocious to the lots) to get parking and walk to the stadium. I would have to take off work early (and I work from home) to make it for a game. Someone that has to commute would either have to drive from work or just take the entire day off to reasonably make it to a game. They have since opened a downtown Phoenix bypass freeway in December 2019 that makes the drive 50 minutes in rush hour but that’s a moot point for hockey games now.
Is Phoenix a great hockey market, of course not but the NHL could do worse than the number 12 US media market.
It sounds like you live in Chandler or Gilbert. When ADOT opened the 202 South Mountain Freeway, instead of saying “now you can get to the arena 30 minutes faster and cruise at 75mph most of the way”, the Coyotes amped up their complaints about Glendale being so far from their fanbase. When ADOT widened the 101 over the hill near Cave Creek Road from 3 to 6 lanes the Coyotes said nothing about faster traffic, just more complaints about Glendale. There are 3 exits off the 101 in the Westgate area, which was designed for traffic for a 70,000 fan football game. Delays getting into the parking lots are the Coyotes fault, it was their idea to charge for parking. As for attendance at America West Arena in the 90s, I never attended a game there, but have heard hundreds of complaints about terrible sight lines and blocked off seating areas. Redfield Baum made a huge mistake siding with Bettman over Basille, fans in Southern Ontario could have been enjoying NHL hockey for the last 15 years instead of watching a 3 ring circus drag on endlessly in the 116 degree Arizona desert.
Trying to locate the centerpoint of the Coyotes’ fan base is a strenuous exercise, not least because the team doesn’t have a fan base. One imagines it is located wherever a free stadium appears, but that is what led the Coyotes to Glendale. It won’t matter where these welfare-mooching orphans land, the song will remain the same: Our success depends on other people’s money, and the less the Other People have to say about it, the better.
They don’t have a fanbase because they have made a series of decisions to deter anyone who might possibly be interested. Openly admitting that they want to avoid public opinion is just one more in a long list of decisions that tarnish their brand, such as it is.
But they’ve done that largely because they’ve been operating from a position of weakness since they were the WHA Winnipeg Jets. Every move they’ve made has been out of desperation.
They need an owner who actually cares about hockey – not just real estate and casinos – and has enough backing to build the arena without huge public handouts.
I’m not sure there’s a billionaire out there who fits that description and wants to be in Phoenix. If I were a billionaire who liked hockey and wanted to own a team just because it’s cool, I’d want to be in a city with a lot less competition for sports fans’ attention – Salt Lake, Portland, Sacramento, Saskatoon, Quebec, etc.
Well said, Dave.
There have been a lot of failures related to the team’s ownership and management over the years. But ultimately, the problem is that there aren’t enough people willing to pay NHL prices to watch the Coyotes.
Sure, there were times when they put 15k or 16k in the building… but when you are offering four tickets AND a fifth of vodka for $25, well, you really should sell out in less than an hour.
Everything other than the fan demand issue is really window dressing.
Arizona Coyotes have homed in on 6 Phoenix-area locations. Here are the most and least likely
https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/local/mesa/2023/06/30/where-might-the-coyotes-move-in-the-phoenix-area/70370978007/
I do not think any of these ‘locations’ are realistic.
That’s just a list that the Arizona Republic made up, to be clear.
Any list that includes Phoenix or Scottsdale is full of Rottweiler number 2, the Coyotes are less welcome than rattlesnakes in both cities. The Salt River Tribe has zero incentive to work with a loser hockey team, they already have sports betting. The ownership since NHL ownership is a string of losers. Gosbee was a drunk who hung himself, Barroway was a big Philadelphia 76ers fan who never cared about hockey and tried to strangle his wife, and Meruelo is Cuban and cares even less about hockey than Barroway. Meruelo appears to only care about real estate and casinos, what’s hockey? Loading up his payroll with almost 50% dead contracts shows how committed Meruelo is to making hockey succeed in Arizona.