CXLVI - Future of Coyotes up in air after Tempe rejects arena deal - will remain at Mullet Arena for 2023-24, looking at Fiesta Mall site in Mesa

[mouser]

@mouser - Are the Coyotes generating any income from their sports betting license from the state?

Could they go back to Glendale and beg for a long-term deal?

AND we don't want to guess about the future of Bally Sports Arizona.

Meruelo/Coyotes are currently generating almost no revenue from the AZ sports betting license. But they’re also in a unique situation compared to all the other AZ betting license owners.

Most of the other AZ license betting holders have partnered with big name online gambling sites.

What makes Meruelo’s situation unique is he owns a Vegas casino with a sports book. Meruelo’s current sportsbook partner is SaharaBets, his own Sahara casino, but the sports book is a minor player online. Not having a 10k+ arena to play in also means establishing a physical sportsbook in AZ is a issue.

If Meruelo can get a new arena built in AZ, how much value is there for Meruelo to try to build out the SaharaBets online brand vs partnering with a more established online partner? The most reported Plan B is on Salt River (Maricopa-Pima) reservation land. The tribes have their own AZ sports book license and are running sportbooks, but no major online partner. If Plan B does happen on the reservation I’d expect some sort of consolidated sportsbook gambling agreement included.

I think Glendale is dead and gone, the finances don’t work there. But if the Coyotes did approach Glendale the city would happily sign them to a new 10-15 year lease.

 

[Fenway]

Glendale, Coyotes officials react after Tempe voters reject hockey arena deal

To quote:

"Glendale City Manager Kevin Phelps, who has been an outspoken critic of how the Arizona Coyotes handled its tenure at the Westgate Entertainment District, told The Arizona Republic he thought Tempe voters would have approved the deal for a new arena and entertainment district there but the project would have never been built.

"I want to acknowledge that I come from a position of bias and a position of experience. I've always questioned the ability for the team that was put in place, the development team, to deliver on such a complex, high intensity-development, especially as the financial market changed dramatically," he said Wednesday."

Source: www.azcentral.com/story/news/local/glendale/2023/05/17/glendale-reacts-arizona-coyotes-arena-deal-election-rejected-tempe-voters/70229186007/

@Llama19

Can Glendale and the NHL/Coyotes kiss and make up?

 

[Ernie]

I think Glendale is dead and gone, the finances don’t work there. But if the Coyotes did approach Glendale the city would happily sign them to a new 10-15 year lease.

Glendale is making more money from other shows, there is no need for the Coyotes, and you've gotta think that there is zero chance they'll ever have any business relations with Meruelo. As long as there are no additional competing arenas they're golden.

Going to be fun to watch Coyotes fans start murmuring "oh the traffic to Glendale wasn't so bad after all.."

Lots of parallels between the Coyotes and the Panthers. Both non-traditional, large, but unfamiliar with the sport. The Panthers worked out a new deal for their lease. The franchise is stable and successful, at least on the ice.

The Coyotes could have done similar.

 

[mouser]

Glendale is making more money from other shows, there is no need for the Coyotes, and you've gotta think that there is zero chance they'll ever have any business relations with Meruelo. As long as there are no additional competing arenas they're golden.

Going to be fun to watch Coyotes fans start murmuring "oh the traffic to Glendale wasn't so bad after all.."

Lots of parallels between the Coyotes and the Panthers. Both non-traditional, large, but unfamiliar with the sport. The Panthers worked out a new deal for their lease. The franchise is stable and successful, at least on the ice.

The Coyotes could have done similar.

How much more is Glendale making from those other shows? Can you provide any financials?

 

[Ernie]

How much more is Glendale making from those other shows? Can you provide any financials?

Desert Diamond Arena, former Coyotes home, had record revenue year

Desert Diamond Arena, the former Glendale home of the Arizona Coyotes, said it had a record-breaking revenue year in 2022.

ktar.com

 

[Shwan]

Glendale is making more money from other shows, there is no need for the Coyotes, and you've gotta think that there is zero chance they'll ever have any business relations with Meruelo. As long as there are no additional competing arenas they're golden.

Going to be fun to watch Coyotes fans start murmuring "oh the traffic to Glendale wasn't so bad after all.."

Lots of parallels between the Coyotes and the Panthers. Both non-traditional, large, but unfamiliar with the sport. The Panthers worked out a new deal for their lease. The franchise is stable and successful, at least on the ice.

The Coyotes could have done similar.

If one were to believe Coyotes to be cursed Glendale would have a story to tell here in 2023.

They're about to have the state's largest resort complete with a C-level theme park and about 1,400 new apartment units just on the southern end of State Farm arena. That would have done wonders for attendence at Coyotes games (if they ice a competitive team)

Now that the pandemic is over, desert diamond west valley is operating at full capacity which is just north of Westgate, also could have given attendence a good bump.

The housing market situation in the valley is also putting pressure on families to move outwards to the west valley or southeast to Queen Creek/San Tan valley so there's migration toward the arena.

Basically everything Glendale envisioned happening right before the '08 recession. Now they just have to hope this coming one doesn't do them in again.

 

[madhi19]

If one were to believe Coyotes to be cursed Glendale would have a story to tell here in 2023.

They're about to have the state's largest resort complete with a C-level theme park and about 1,400 new apartment units just on the southern end of State Farm arena. That would have done wonders for attendence at Coyotes games (if they ice a competitive team)

Now that the pandemic is over, desert diamond west valley is operating at full capacity which is just north of Westgate, also could have given attendence a good bump.

The housing market situation in the valley is also putting pressure on families to move outwards to the west valley or southeast to Queen Creek/San Tan valley so there's migration toward the arena.

Basically everything Glendale envisioned happening right before the '08 recession. Now they just have to hope this coming one doesn't do them in again.

Good for them, and you know what bizzare they did not need a hockey team to do all that... It's almost like pro-sports is just a parasite on more profitable business anyway.

 

[mouser]

Desert Diamond Arena, former Coyotes home, had record revenue year

Desert Diamond Arena, the former Glendale home of the Arizona Coyotes, said it had a record-breaking revenue year in 2022.

ktar.com

The Coyotes played 21 home games in Glendale during 2022 from January through April.

 

[Ernie]

The Coyotes played 21 home games in Glendale during 2022 from January through April.

And Glendale made no money from those dates while being restricted as to what other shows they could bring in.

 

[mouser]

And Glendale made no money from those dates while being restricted as to what other shows they could bring in.

Can you cite any source that Glendale made no money from Coyotes games? Or how much money they're making now with the newly open dates?

Glendale was highly pushing the Coyotes to sign a 10+ year lease less than a year ago. Would be weird that the financials changed so much that Glendale wouldn't still want that anchor tenant back now.

 

[Ernie]

Can you cite any source that Glendale made no money from Coyotes games? Or how much money they're making now with the newly open dates?

Citations? Is this an essay? You were around when the agreements were signed, do you not recall?

 

[mouser]

Citations? Is this an essay? You were around when the agreements were signed, do you not recall?

You made the claim Glendale is making more money from other shows now that the Coyotes are gone. The obligation is on you to substantiate it.

Only link you provided was record revenue for the arena, which includes all the Coyotes arena revenue in 2022. Then you switched over to claiming Glendale made no profits from Coyotes games, which is not only different from revenue, but the article included no profit numbers for Glendale on their "record revenue".

 

[Hammahtime]

I don’t get too up in arms about things, it’s funny that the Jazz arena is “not suitable” when Mullet has ~5k seats.
I don’t want anyone losing their team, but if they played temporally in the Jazz arena until a new one was built I guess I don’t see how the setup is a way to rule out that option with what they were planning on doing anyway in AZ.

For all involved I hope this is resolved quickly, there are players, staff etc. who’s lives could be greatly affected by this.

 

[patnyrnyg]

I haven't heard a single economist claim an arena made money for a city, so why split the costs?

It amazes me that cities even fund it I think it's an ego thing for mayors, city councilors, governors etc to keep/get a team as it is for a rich billionaire to own a team.

Very true, but obviously it still happens.

About a year ago I read they'd been averaging between 11,000 & 12,500 viewers per game from 2019-2021. For a city of 5 million, these are less than ideal ratings. It's a dirty little secret that often goes overlooked when talking about the overall interest in the team. Of course fans of the team will argue they haven't been given reasons to tune in, but those numbers are extremely bleak.

If that is true, I would say yes those numbers are very bad.

compared to the big 3 sport leagues in the US, the NHL tv deal is peanuts....

Not disagreeing, but it is still better than the "nothing" they had.

 

[patnyrnyg]

I think the idea was "this is smarter. Less wear and tear on players. Who's unhappy?"

The idea of visiting TB-FLA one weekend and then doing it again three weeks later is what's stupid.

And don't tell me that "people don't want to see the same teams back-to-back, you want to play each team early once and late once" because THEY DON'T DO THAT AT ALL ANYWAY.

The number of times it's "We're gonna see this team twice in the next 17 days and that's it for (the season series / until three months from now)" is off the charts.

There IS a better way to do this.

But again, you only play 11 teams twice in their building. Your 7 division team and 4 from the other division in your conference. It made sense for 2021, doesn't really matter now. Could the schedule be done better? Of course. But this is not it.

 

[Brominator]

They kind of need to come out and say something like that regardless of what's happening. You want to put water on the speculation, not fuel the fire.

Thinking about the summer the Thrashers moved to Winnipeg, the big story that the deal was effectively done came out in the Globe and Mail on May 19th, and by May 31 The deal was officially announced. At the time of the G&M article, both the NHL and the team refuted the story, but did not make any strong statements like "The Thrashers will be playing here next year."

In this case, I think the NHL could have given a more uncertain answer like "we are still evaluating but have no further comment at this time" and they would just deal with the noise and speculation for 2 weeks. By making a strong statement, it means the NHL will be in Mullet next season.

I guess we will see what happens over the next few weeks, but it sure seems like there isn't a relocation option ready to go this spring.

 

[Fatass]

Can you cite any source that Glendale made no money from Coyotes games? Or how much money they're making now with the newly open dates?

Glendale was highly pushing the Coyotes to sign a 10+ year lease less than a year ago. Would be weird that the financials changed so much that Glendale wouldn't still want that anchor tenant back now.

Why don’t the Coyotes just sign that long term lease in Glendale? or is there zero chance they can go back there?

 

[JimAnchower]

Correct me if I am wrong but there are five ways I can possibly think of them staying in Arizona long term.

1. Find a new municipality to partner with and try another TED type proposal, Not sure there would be enough time to get something like that done without extending the lease at ASU and I think the NHLPA would throw an absolute fit over that. Would also likely require another public vote of some sort,

2. Partner with one of the local tribes to build on reservation land. Lots of potential issues with that setup including that Meruelo would almost certainly have to be a tenant not the owner of the arena.

3. Sell the team to Matt Ishbia and he keeps them at ASU while starting another renovation at Footprint? Not sure how much he would want that but I suppose it could be an option if the price was right.

4. Sell to Bob Parsons who also buys the arena from Glendale and puts the original Westgate dream finally under one owner? Almost certainly not going to happen, but since there is an arena sitting there I tried to come up with a possible scenario where they could go back to Glendale and this was the only way I could see it happening.

5. Refurbish Arizona Veterans Memorial Coliseum perhaps as part of some bigger project with the fairgrounds? Not sure it is even possible to renovate it to it or if that part of town would be able to support an NHL franchise but it is an arena in the area so I thought it should at least be mentioned.

#1 and #2 are the most plausible, and probably #2 more than #1. #3 only makes sense if Ishbia wants to own a NHL team. I'm not sure how interested Phoenix would be in doing another new redevelopment of Footprint, given they just did one and signed the Suns to a long term lease. If the Suns get a lot of the revenue from other events at Footprint, then why fill up more available dates if you don't have to? I think the state owns AVMC, so #5 brings in a whole other bunch of wackiness. Entertainment for megathread, though.

 

[MNNumbers]

Notwithstanding Craig reporting the existence of a Plan B and Plan C, I would guess that there is no 'fast track' forward in Arizona. Who knows what might happen, but that suggests to me that the other owners, and the PA, will not want to watch the Coyote play in Mullett 3 more years.

For that reason, and this is simply a weighted guess at this point, I guess that plans will be made behind the scenes for a relocation to SLC in time for 2024-25. There is simply no time to arrange such a thing for 23-24. I say SLC for a few reasons, most of which have already been mentioned:
- Western Conference city
- Willing owner (this moves SLC ahead of Houston)
- Currently playable arena (Delta Center, home of the Jazz)
- Very good chance of a new arena coming with Olympics being there fairly soon

This seems to fit better than Houston. I am intrigued, however, with the news from KC. Moving there would require a nice lease from the city, and I am not sure the city wants to give away that much just to fill some dates.

 

[SunDancer]

Time's up for Gary Bettman's obsession with the Coyotes and Arizona

You might imagine that even Gary Bettman is finally prepared to admit defeat on the Coyotes. But knowing his playbook, he can’t or won’t.

theathletic.com

Editorial. Duhatcshek calls on Bettman to allow relocation

Interesting.

One constant in this saga has always been that the more things change, the more things stay the same. However, one aspect that is noticeably different today is how it's covered by the media. It used to be that firebrands like Gary Lawless and David Shoalts would be all over this story tearing Bettman a new one. Now coverage largely falls to the league's parrots like Darren Dreger and Elliotte Friedman. Even bloggers like Greg Wyshynski who used to goof on the NHL all the time have joined the establishment.

I was listening to Dave Poulin on TSN radio yesterday and was amazed at how pointedly he refused to say anything negative about the Coyotes despite repeated prods from the hosts. Almost embarrassingly. Just kept towing the NHL line and blathered on about how "It's unfortunate, could be great market if only blah, blah, blah ...."

The Athletic is probably the last media outlet willing (able?) to criticize this league. Bettman must be so happy that journalism is dead.

 

[SImpelton]

@Llama19

Can Glendale and the NHL/Coyotes kiss and make up?

Frankly to me this is the single bigest indicator of why the effort failed. There is simply too much bad blood in the region for the Coyotes to operate as normal. Prior ownership broke too many promises and went back on too many deals.

 

[Tawnos]

Thinking about the summer the Thrashers moved to Winnipeg, the big story that the deal was effectively done came out in the Globe and Mail on May 19th, and by May 31 The deal was officially announced. At the time of the G&M article, both the NHL and the team refuted the story, but did not make any strong statements like "The Thrashers will be playing here next year."

In this case, I think the NHL could have given a more uncertain answer like "we are still evaluating but have no further comment at this time" and they would just deal with the noise and speculation for 2 weeks. By making a strong statement, it means the NHL will be in Mullet next season.

I guess we will see what happens over the next few weeks, but it sure seems like there isn't a relocation option ready to go this spring.

To me, at least some of the shift on the part of the league from "will be evaluating over the coming weeks" to "will be playing in Mullett next season" stems from the league checking in with Meruelo and him saying "I've got another arena plan that's this far along"

I think it's probably that some of the shift comes from that and some of it comes from considering a relocation process that isn't rushed.

All sides should've been better prepared for this result IMO.

 

[jonathan613]

What seems clear to me is that for the coyotes to stay, the NHL is going to have to handle the situation directly. Meruelo is not the man for the job. A lot of the posters here are discounting glendale, but i believe the following solution could work:

Team signs a 10 year deal with glendale in which the team buys out the arena debt from glendale in exchange for being allowed revenue streams from the arena. In another words, the coyotes and glendale would be joint partners in the arena.

The 2 additional clauses would be that the team could unilaterally demolish the arena prior to the deals end provided they are relocating the coyotes in the phoenix area and are willing to pay some royalties to the city of glendale for when this new arena gets built.

Next the team signs a lease at chase field to play monday-thursday games there from November through March. Friday night games would be moved to 8 PM in glendale, as well as playoff games which would start at 8PM.

Location should be less of an issue for weekends and playoffs, and if fans felt the franchise was stable, I believe they would be more willing to invest in travelling to glendale. Playoff games should sell themselves, provided the team is willing to actually spend the required money to compete on the ice.

 

[Llama19]

Would Phoenix take the Coyotes? Here's the state of play

Source: www.azcentral.com/story/news/local/phoenix/2023/05/18/does-phoenix-want-the-coyotes-what-city-council-members-are-saying/69893791007/

 

[Ernie]

You made the claim Glendale is making more money from other shows now that the Coyotes are gone. The obligation is on you to substantiate it.

Only link you provided was record revenue for the arena, which includes all the Coyotes arena revenue in 2022. Then you switched over to claiming Glendale made no profits from Coyotes games, which is not only different from revenue, but the article included no profit numbers for Glendale on their "record revenue".

Ok dude. If you've been following along you'll know what I'm saying is correct. But you've had a tough few days so I'm guessing you're pretending you don't know to try to argue some obscure point. Not taking the bait.