CXLIX - FINAL thoughts on the Arizona Coyotes

[MNNumbers]

Concerning Entertainment Districts:

The Islanders have one, and it is the reason that UBS Center could be built. This is in New York, mind you.

It is not a disgrace for ownership to link a sports team to an entertainment district today. Considering the very high prices one has to pay for on ice talent, and the way the CBA is set up, and the upward pull on HRR from Toronto, Montreal, and the Rangers, it's almost necessary.

The league continues to suffer one elephant in the room:
The income disparity on money from local fans between the top 5 or so teams, and the bottom 10-15 teams, is absolutely huge. And, the ownership of the top revenue teams doesn't want to share more, even though they should.
Continent wide TV contracts having grown enough to make up for it, and the last I knew, the Canadian broadcast contract is likely to be less on the next round.

All of that contributes, and all of it contributes to the Yotes problems. ESPECIALLY, after IA lost their 15m/yr subsidy.

 

[MNNumbers]

It's obviously a post-mortem that has been written many times, but.....
At the end, the Yotes were the only team in the league without arena control. So, they were surviving (or not) on game night revenue and local advertising. That's impossible in any league.

A list of 'what should have happened' might well include these changes:
1- Never leaving Winnipeg
2- Not giving up on Minnesota when Burke and Gluckstern balked at the lease the City of Mpls offered them. They could have taken it, and ended up as owners of the Wild.
3- Realizing that AWA would never work, and therefore not going there in the first place. Nashville, I believe was another possibility, and would have been better.
4- In no wise dropping into a warm market with no early marekting strategy. The team literally had no chance to gain any traction locally.
5- Ellman and Moyes should never have been approved as owners. A relo at that point would have been better
6- I totally understand opposing Balsillie, and this is the one thing that the league may have done right.
6a - Having purchased the team themselves, the league needed to be more active in pursuing marketing and ownership options. They did nothing for 2 years except take 25M/yr from Glendale.
7- The IA ownership was clearly unfit for the big leagues, and the 15M/yr lease was a sham. It was a bad idea, although Bettman thought it might be a door to the idea of host cities giving MORE money to teams.
8- The list of owners afterwards.

Truly, rather than propping the IA ownership, it's possible that it would have been better to sell the Yotes back to Winnipeg, and the Thrashers to Quebec City. I know that QC might have a tough road, but the province built an arena for free....

And, for the future in Arizona, it would have saved 10 years or so of ridicule and bad feelings continuing to fester and grow, and left the market far more amenable to expansion later.