[DENVER, CO] -- Hey, buddy, can you
spare $140 million?
I’m guessing this is the starting price to take the Phoenix Coyotes
off the NHL’s hands.
The league this week purchased the team to take it out of bankruptcy
and with the hope of eventually finding a buyer who will keep it at
the Jobing.com Arena in Glendale, Ariz.
Why in the world would anyone want to purchase this team? For
starters, the Coyotes are looking pretty good so far this season. They
took a 9-5-0 record into Wednesday’s game against the Colorado
Avalanche, yet another surprisingly strong team in the early going.
The Coyotes have a talented and gritty captain in Shane Doan; some
good young players in Martin Hanzal, Peter Mueller, Scottie Upshall
and Keith Yandle; and a red-hot goalie in Ilya Bryzgalov.
Wayne Gretzky no longer is involved with the team, but new head coach
Dave Tippett is a winner. He led the Dallas Stars to playoff berths in
his first five seasons there – they missed last year’s postseason
party with 83 points – and he has the Coyotes looking like a team that
could qualify for the playoffs for the first time since the 2001-02
campaign.
There are problems, of course, or the Coyotes wouldn’t have gone into
bankruptcy in the first place.
The arena lease is one of them. Bill Daly, the league’s deputy
commissioner, has said that any new buyer would need to get a revised
lease agreement with the city of Glendale, which owns the building.
The NHL isn’t in the business of owning franchises and would have to
look at relocating it if a buyer doesn’t come forward.
Ice Edge, a group of investors from the U.S. and Canada, reportedly is
interested in purchasing the Coyotes, as are the owners of the CFL's
Toronto Argonauts.
Chicago White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf, whose team holds spring
training in the area, is another possibility.
It certainly would help draw interest if the Coyotes continue to win,
but the drawn-out bankruptcy proceedings did a great deal of harm in
terms of corporate sponsorships and the all-important fan base.
Attendance has been abysmal. The Coyotes have drawn an average crowd
of 7,276 in their past five home games, with a gathering of 5,855 for
Monday’s contest against the Los Angeles Kings.
I happen to know some pretty rabid hockey fans who live in the Phoenix
area, and they just don’t like having to make what can be a pretty
demanding drive during rush hour out to Glendale.
The NFL Cardinals work across the street, and they don’t seem to have
attendance problems, but they mostly play on Sundays when traffic is
relatively light, and they only play eight home games a season.
And, let’s face it, the NFL is a much bigger drawing card in the U.S.
than the NHL.
Still, if the Coyotes continue to put an entertaining and successful
team on the ice, it shouldn’t matter a whole lot where they play.
Everybody loves a winner.
****
No Alex Ovechkin? No problem, the Washington Capitals insist.
Sure, they’ll miss the two-time Hart Trophy winner, but the Capitals
still have plenty of firepower and are vowing to play a tighter
defensive game.
Ovechkin, who scored 14 goals in the first 14 games, is listed as
week-to-week with what the team says is an upper-body injury. He began
the year having missed just four games in his four previous NHL
seasons.
“As much as he gets all the press, I’ve got to believe we’re not a
one-man team and there’s still a lot of good players here,” Capitals
coach Bruce Boudreau told the Washington Post.
He’s right about that, but center Nicklas Backstrom conceded it will
be a challenge to play without Ovechkin for any length of time.
“We have to show we can play without him,” he said. “We have to keep
going. We're going to miss him in the locker room and his picking up
the guys, but we'll have to step up in that way, too.”
****
Phil Kessel made an impressive debut for the Toronto Maple Leafs on
Tuesday, but a 2-1 overtime loss to the Tampa Bay Lightning left them
winless in six games at the Air Canada Centre (0-4-2).
Not that the Leafs have been much better on the road, where they’re
1-3-3.
Wasn’t this the year when the Leafs were supposed to, well, turn over
a new leaf under general manager Brian Burke?
“It seems like Groundhog Day – over and over, the same things happen,"
coach Ron Wilson said. “We have to persevere. We can't change what
we're doing, because we're right there knocking on the door.”
For now, it looks like that door is locked pretty securely.
Rick Sadowski is a
columnist for TheFourthPeriod.com and the Colorado correspondent for
The Fourth Period Magazine.
He has covered the NHL since 1981, most recently for the
dearly-departed Rocky Mountain News in Denver. He's written for
several publications and web sites, including NHL.com. Check out his
blog
Through the 5 Hole.
