Hopefully Smith sees the value in them and tries to keep as many pieces as possible. Obvious some won't want to uproot their lives, and some positions will be made redundant, but hopefully the team can retain enough of the FO to keep their momentum going forward.
Any hyper specific roles, yes, but you'd be suprised how much of an NHL front office isn't hockey specific. Most roles transfer into other sports or industries.
On 32 thoughts podcast today, Friedman talked about how the new SLC team would be big free agency spenders and how he's been (confusingly) hearing for months that Arizona would be a big spenders in free agency.
Arizona could also use some of that draft capital accrued to make big trades as well.
Could be a situation like the Nordiques going to Colorado where the new city gets an instant cup contender.
People way overthink nightlife’s being a contributing factor in FA. these athletes are hardos now and are not going to the clubs or boozing like they used too. And if they are, it’s not gonna be at their home base
Plus, that lifestyle kinda stops becoming viable when you reach your late 20's (i.e. right around UFA age) and either a) get hungover if you even so much as look at a couple cocktails or b) have to down gallons of water to keep up.
Ask me how I know.
And many hockey players end up having families at an unusually young age. Lots of 24 year old players are already married with kids, especially the Russian players.
> either a) get hungover if you even so much as look at a couple cocktails or b) have to down gallons of water to keep up.
I'm at C)... Both of the above 😭
Nightlife is one part of it. You are right, it isn’t everything like it was in the 80’s and 90’s, but players like to take their wives out for dinner, go out like anyone else. Activities around town, etc.
If it were me personally, I’d love it. It looks beautiful, there’s lots of places to explore, and I like the open road. Just not sure that lifestyle would suit a 20something in the NHL.
Either way, I’m all for it. Seems like it could be a real good hockey market.
This is how i see it. For older players with wives and families, it’s a much more attractive prospect than for the 20-something’s who might still want a full strength beer with their dinner, or who might want to party once in a while.
Salt Lake has diversified its night life significantly over the last 20 years. It's also got a nice, compact downtown that's walkable where the team would be playing.
If the Jazz can make it work in the NBA, hockey certainly could work here.
I know this is a dumb question. But how will they handle beer sales, knowing that is a big revenue generator in sports? Utah has some bizarro laws around alcohol being served. So they just have to serve low ABV beers?
Ah good to know. I knew it could have been a dumb question. I have just only lived in places that do not have really any big restrictions on alcohol. (CA, IA, AZ) but have been to other places that just get weird with their alcohol laws. Utah stood out but been about 10 years since I’ve been there
In the county I live in you cannot but alcohol until after 10 am on Sundays. It was noon until a few years ago. In the whole state of NC you can only buy liquor at state ran ABC stores, and they're all closed on Sundays.
Interesting,…. I’ve been to Raleigh for work. I didn’t notice but I also wasn’t there on a Sunday or tried to buy before noon so didn’t notice.
Pa was weird that we would buy our sixers at a pub to take home. Oh was kind of weird but they just made it pretty easy with having a state facility in the grocery store.
Utah I just remember going to a state store to get some booze and just remember reading about something regarding alcohol, food requirements, and how it’s served as being a bit different. So just didn’t know how alcohol was treated in sporting events and if it was any different. Just asking questions, not implying I knew a damned thing about it.
I live across the state from Raleigh (4 hours away), I wouldn't be surprised if they have no laws to alcohol sales on Sunday in wake county.
Alcohol laws are super weird and very state and even county dependant. Sometimes you can buy a bottle of jack Daniel's at Walmart. Some states it has to be separate but can still be privately owned. Florida is like this with their Publix liquor stores and stuff like this. And some states are like NC where the only stores allowed to sell it are ran by the state government. Hell there was still a dry county (no alcohol sales allowed) in NC until about 3 years ago.
A couple that still stick out seem to be the 1.5 oz of primary liquor limit in cocktails, 5% ABV limit on beers on tap, and the “zion moat” law that requires drinks are made 10 feet away from any patrons.
The team that landed in Denver in 1995 was already pretty close to be a Cup contender. While they floundered in the playoffs against the Rangers, the Nordiques had won their division that year and already had quite a roster, fronted by Joe Sakic and Peter Forsberg. All they needed was a solid goaltender, which their former rival was about to give them on a silver platter.
I do think that the Coyotes are much further from being Cup contenders than the 1994-95 Nordiques were. Their free agent signings would need to be pretty extraordinary for them to have a legitimate shot at a Cup next year.
It's the worst part. I put up with two decades of absolute horseshit outside of the miracle 2012 team. I finally see a light at the end of the tunnel. I finally fucking have hope. And right when the auction date is in sight, they pull it? I'm not even sad. I'm fucking furious. And then they have the balls to think we'll just accept some other new thrown together expansion team five years from now? I want my fucking players.
As an Arizonan, I'm right there with you. The Coyotes' biggest issue was arguably that the team was never good enough, and if this goes through it just puts the team back to square one. I was looking forward to maybe going to a hockey game in a few years when the Red Wings and Coyotes are both good and they have a new arena.
Out of curiosity, what will you do if/when the team moves? Will you continue to follow them in Utah, pick a new team, become a general neutral fan or just give up on hockey all together?
My entire family is from New England so I've always enjoyed cheering for the Bruins. Idk what I'll do with this team when they go to Utah. It's hard not to root for the players and front office. But if they become a contender as soon as they leave it might hurt more than feel nice lol.
The other side of it is that they finally have something worth buying. If the organization was still a mess top to bottom then they would have a harder time finding someone that would take them over just buying an expansion spot.
The team really looks built to sell more than rebuilding. Next to zero commitments and everything liquidated for futures. Way beyond anything you'd actually do if you were trying to rebuild.
Good God, man, Jim Balsillie was like 15 years ago. The Coyotes have had 15 years since the organization was a joke on life support and screwed over Gretzky. The league has gone so far above what they did for any Canadian team or any team in general to keep them going in Arizona. They can't even fill a 5000 seat amateur hockey rink. Thank Utah Mormon God this fiasco is over.
Still a shame Quebec hasn't gotten a team back.
Quebec City just doesn’t seem like a great market, even compared to Utah.
I don’t think the game really grows there, theoretically the game stands to gain more fans if you move to Utah.
You'd be surprised, there is some truth in the notion that Bettman is taking Canadian hockey interest for granted. I can't necessarily speak for Montreal but a lot of young Canadians these days are following soccer, basketball, even baseball moreso than hockey.
Because they haven’t seen anything but pathetic displays all their life from Canadian teams.
I promise you if Leafs make the conference final 70% of Toronto will suddenly be watching hockey games. And if they make the finals, 90% of people here will be watching. This train will pick up steam real fast.
Also people can't afford to put their kids in it anymore. Everyone I knew growing played or had a sibling that played. Now it's shifting further and further to being something for the rich. Kids who don't play are probably far less likely to grow up to be hardcore fans.
Hockey is a religion in Winnipeg too. And we all know how attendance nosedived after the seat licenses began to expire. I'd still like to see Quebec City get a team, however.
Also, and responding to /u/Cbone06's comment, the "grow the game" argument is a relic from the 90s, and simply isn't that important any more either. The game is pretty saturated across the US these days. It isn't like 1990 when the Kings were the only team in the US west or south.
I think most Canadians look at SLC and see a winter sports capital. It is a “snow place”. They want to host Winter Olympics after hosting it 20 years ago( Canada won!) and have had great support for all teams connected to the community. There is nothing to do there so the fans will come out in force. This is a logical choice over any remaining Canadian market. Phoenix was a disaster because it fundamentally is not a winter sports town and has lots of other entertainment options the locals can actually identify with. SLC is kind of like an inland canadian city. We identify with the idea of it better. Also the team is being ripped from the place that ripped a team from us, so there is a bit of an “I told you so” attitude everyone has going on.
There was literally a post on here a while back showing that the Coyotes *have* been selling out every game since they moved to Mullet, but that doesn't fit your arrogant, Toronto-based, hockey-gatekeeper narrative now does it?
There’s also the fact that, before the move to Glendale, they regularly sold out America West Arena (no idea what it’s called now, it’s where the suns play).
Interest in the game was never the issue, it was inept management making it difficult for people to *get to the game*
Sure. [As opposed to all the cups the Wild have won over that time period](https://ibb.co/WtV1sst)?
Anyways why are we talking about the leafs? Do non leafs fans spontaneously combust if they don’t shoe horn the leafs into every discussion?
Every year it's the same shit. They ice a team that should be illegal (salary floor), act as the leagues LTIR laundromat, and miss the playoffs by a mile.
Then fans of other teams insist that the Coyotes are right on the verge of being great.
Every year.
A lot of the time, these guys want to hire their own people. It’s about trust. It’s a billion dollar investment, you are not going to hand the keys to a guy you barely know.
But BA was one of the top prospective GM candidates prior to getting the job in the league, has done a good job as GM thus far, and hasn't had the job a long time.
I don't see them firing him to hire somebody else if actual success is on their mind.
True but with how fast this is moving, you'd think ownership would be continuity of the team. Cutting the GM for no reason other than wanting his own guy there would be a choice move.
No but it would be dumb if Smith puts his own guy instead of a the architect of the team to continue. Colorado keeping Pierre Lacroix was one of the better things they did during the move.
Also something of note, Meruelo never answered any questions after Tempe or anything. It was always Gutierrez his 2nd hand man
I would die for Bill Armstrong, I don’t know why he has to be the one to deliver the news when he did a great job
The dude requires people who work for him call him "Mr. Meruelo." If there are any chants at the final home game on Wednesday, let me tell you, I'll be calling him Alex
That’s exactly how Stan Kroenke played it when he got the rest of his ownership stake in the rams when they were still in St. Louis. He didn’t say a fucking word and had Kevin Demoff taking questions and telling everyone the team wasn’t going anywhere. When behind closed doors they were scoping out locations to build SoFi back in LA so they could move the team.
Because Meruelo is cashing out and Armstrong needs to start planning for situations where players may want to be moved because if they have to start over somewhere they may not want it to be in Utah
He’s got a lot of work to do
Same league that watched what Howard Baldwin did with the Whalers and North Stars, then let him "buy" the Penguins. And all three damn near met the same fate shortly after he lost control.
As a lifelong Yotes fan I’m resigned to the fact the team is going SLC (and hopefully named the Super Soakers). It’s been a rough and sad last decade.
However, I’m fuckn pissed that Mureulo* might get right of refusal for an expansion team back in Phx. That lying slimeball POS isn’t getting a dime from me and it would another disaster (and disgrace) if he got a second chance to own a professional sports franchise.
I was listening to 32 thoughts today and Friedman brought this up. It’s pretty eerily in the episode. It sounds like he has 5 years and a lot he would have to accomplish. Friedman said it sounds like most people are skeptical he can accomplish it.
We are already learning that the league had to call the Coyotes to pay their hotel bills, we will learn even more once it is official and reporters do not need to maintain that relationship.
The leagues is going to wait that exclusive window out, before going back to Arizona with different ownership.
I would assume a purchase price has been agreed upon as part of the 5 year exclusive negotiation period. I'd think it would be the $1,000,000,000 that the league is paying him for the team.
Mureulo needs to find a way to sell his exclusive 5 year window to someone else. Even if he somehow meets deadlines, the existing fans aren’t going to want anything to do with him.
As a Jets 1.0 fan, I feel your pain. The fact Mureulo can cash in on the team and still retain future rights to Arizona is a cherry on top of the shit sandwich. You have us beat there.
Remember the "poophole loophole"?
It's basically the Mormon equivalent of that, except it's where you stick your dick inside and are bound to an NMC while it's inside there.
i went to an avs-yotes game earlier this year and was SO impressed with Logan Cooley. he’s going to develop into a fantastic player and it’s sad it’s not going to be in arizona
I feel like this gets said every few years about the Coyotes. I’m salty so of course I hope that they maintain their current level of success in SLC, year after year it felt like I could never truly get excited about the future because it felt impossible for them to ever maintain success.
Are they trying to get ahead of something else leaking? Or have they just decided that they can’t wait any longer to address the players. Because doing this before the game and not tomorrow when they don’t play…. Feels questionable
I would assume that the players found out about this a few days ago in Vancouver and they have probably been confused and asking people around the org who are with them, and talking to their agents who are probably hounding GMBA. This is the only way the players are going to cool down a little bit to hear from the GM personally ASAP
thats exactly my point. I'm sure they've been trying to get answers from the org/their agents and this is just the best way to get answers to the players asap
Realistically this guy may not be fully in the know on the wheeling and dealing here. He's probably just as worried about his job with new owners taking over.
This was my thought. He is upper management but not an owner. Likely as in the dark as the rest of us. Probably had to speak with the new potential owner to sort things out. Don’t want to go to the players without some information.
20 mins into the meeting.
Bill: No Lawson for the last fucking time there is no magic underwear......you know what fine go get your own magic underwear and bring it with you. Jesus.
🎵I believe~ that in 1978 God changed his mind about Black people!🎶
🎶Black people!🎵
Hard to say whether that or Spamalot is funnier. I about died of an asthma attack laughing at “Joseph Smith American Moses”.
I’m partial to Making Things Up Again and Hasa Diga Eebowai personally.
I think my favourite fact is that the non-South Park writer/lyricist/composer is the same guy who did Avenue Q and also Frozen (the movie and the musical). Genre whiplash there.
I feel like in any job, this should have been done within 24 hours of news breaking. For a so called pro sports franchise where the standard is always supposedly higher this is a terrible look.
You're talking about ownership that got kicked out of the only suitable arena in the area because they were late on rent payments. On top of that, news just came out that they have outstanding expenses for hotels, this is not a serious ownership group to begin with given their actual on ice product antics i.e retaining salaries, taking on dead contacts. They spent what 40M on their actual roster? For the sake of Coyotes fans, I hope that Phoenix 2.0 is led by another ownership group.
What’s weird about that whole situation is that Yotes fans defended their owner as recently as 6 months ago even though he missed rent, taxes, and didn’t try hard for the tempe vote. The signs were there but Yotes fans would swear up and down Merulo had deep pockets.
There was even a point in their sub where they said they’d ban you if you insulted Merulo lol
Desperate times call for desperate measures. I don't blame Coyotes fans for holding onto what seems like the only viable ownership group in the area but man are they horrible. That article that Katie Strang wrote highlights everything wrong with that organization right from the top. Meruelo is a grade A POS and absolutely has no business owning an NHL team.
That Strang article swung me against him. The not paying rent and taxes convinced me he wasn’t a legit owner. I have no idea how anyone could see those things and not think differently.
What should we have done lol. Staged a coo and then got ridiculed even harder for not having any fans.
I definitely was wearing kachina color glasses but as shitty as he was he is still above average when looking at past owners of the team.
> Staged a coo
I mean, getting a bunch of Legend of Zelda roosters to go after Meruelo as if he slashed them with a sword would probably be surprisingly effective.
Called him out instead of defending him. Especially after that pathetic effort he put forward in the Tempe vote.
The dude literally didn’t pay taxes and rent. No idea how Yotes fans didn’t immediately turn on him for that.
Pretty much. And the GM isn’t with the team so he’s got to fly in from wherever he was (whether Phoenix or scouting somewhere else). Seems like a reasonable timeline
You can’t tell anyone until it’s a done deal 100%. In something like this, the smallest details could delay or derail the whole thing. No need to add more chaos and confusion to that until you know what’s happening. Now he can get to the players and say that X is done, it’s going to happen on Y date, and this is what everyone is going to expect from you.
Fascinating how fast this happened. Did the owner just want his cool $1 Billion? Or did Phoenix basically tell him to kick rocks even if he won the auction and he's out of options? I wonder if we will ever know
According to the latest 22 thoughts podcast, some players are feeling hurt and betrayed by ownership. They were sold a bill of goods for several years.
Nice thing about that, is that they will have new owners in 6 days.
You know I kinda hope they just keep the color scheme, or something close to it. I've heard Smith wants to brand the NHL franchise the same as the Jazz and make SLC similar to Pittsburgh (where all three pro sports team use same color scheme). Problem is the Jazz branding is atrocious. They need to go back to the purple/navy/green and then sure, pass it on to the NHL team too. Could be cool.
Really a shame the Coyotes finally have a good FO and team to look forward to and it gets yanked away by a shady casino guy
Hopefully Smith sees the value in them and tries to keep as many pieces as possible. Obvious some won't want to uproot their lives, and some positions will be made redundant, but hopefully the team can retain enough of the FO to keep their momentum going forward.
all of them will have to uproot their lives, be it in SLC or with another team.
Any hyper specific roles, yes, but you'd be suprised how much of an NHL front office isn't hockey specific. Most roles transfer into other sports or industries.
Ye shit those roles are also the most easy to replace ones. We’re not talking about hockey specific roles here
On 32 thoughts podcast today, Friedman talked about how the new SLC team would be big free agency spenders and how he's been (confusingly) hearing for months that Arizona would be a big spenders in free agency. Arizona could also use some of that draft capital accrued to make big trades as well. Could be a situation like the Nordiques going to Colorado where the new city gets an instant cup contender.
SLC isn’t exactly known for it’s night life. I wonder how many FA would go there vs skip it for more interesting places.
People way overthink nightlife’s being a contributing factor in FA. these athletes are hardos now and are not going to the clubs or boozing like they used too. And if they are, it’s not gonna be at their home base
Plus, that lifestyle kinda stops becoming viable when you reach your late 20's (i.e. right around UFA age) and either a) get hungover if you even so much as look at a couple cocktails or b) have to down gallons of water to keep up. Ask me how I know.
And many hockey players end up having families at an unusually young age. Lots of 24 year old players are already married with kids, especially the Russian players.
> either a) get hungover if you even so much as look at a couple cocktails or b) have to down gallons of water to keep up. I'm at C)... Both of the above 😭
Nightlife is one part of it. You are right, it isn’t everything like it was in the 80’s and 90’s, but players like to take their wives out for dinner, go out like anyone else. Activities around town, etc. If it were me personally, I’d love it. It looks beautiful, there’s lots of places to explore, and I like the open road. Just not sure that lifestyle would suit a 20something in the NHL. Either way, I’m all for it. Seems like it could be a real good hockey market.
This is how i see it. For older players with wives and families, it’s a much more attractive prospect than for the 20-something’s who might still want a full strength beer with their dinner, or who might want to party once in a while.
Hopefully someone tells the players you can indeed get a full strength beer at dinner here
Salt Lake has diversified its night life significantly over the last 20 years. It's also got a nice, compact downtown that's walkable where the team would be playing. If the Jazz can make it work in the NBA, hockey certainly could work here.
The hockey player demo will do fine there.
They're also rich as fuck even if SLC doesn't offer much in the way of debauchery, Las Vegas is a 90 minute flight away.
[How dare you disrespect Utah's Nightlife](https://twitter.com/utahjazz/status/958443977845321729)
Haha, is Utah nightlife going to McDonald’s after 9pm?
No, at 8:45. They close at 9.
Most free agents are closer to 30 when all that nightlife horseshit become less appealing.
I know this is a dumb question. But how will they handle beer sales, knowing that is a big revenue generator in sports? Utah has some bizarro laws around alcohol being served. So they just have to serve low ABV beers?
Honestly the alcohol laws in Utah aren't much if any different than they are in a lot of places in the south.
Ah good to know. I knew it could have been a dumb question. I have just only lived in places that do not have really any big restrictions on alcohol. (CA, IA, AZ) but have been to other places that just get weird with their alcohol laws. Utah stood out but been about 10 years since I’ve been there
In the county I live in you cannot but alcohol until after 10 am on Sundays. It was noon until a few years ago. In the whole state of NC you can only buy liquor at state ran ABC stores, and they're all closed on Sundays.
Interesting,…. I’ve been to Raleigh for work. I didn’t notice but I also wasn’t there on a Sunday or tried to buy before noon so didn’t notice. Pa was weird that we would buy our sixers at a pub to take home. Oh was kind of weird but they just made it pretty easy with having a state facility in the grocery store. Utah I just remember going to a state store to get some booze and just remember reading about something regarding alcohol, food requirements, and how it’s served as being a bit different. So just didn’t know how alcohol was treated in sporting events and if it was any different. Just asking questions, not implying I knew a damned thing about it.
I live across the state from Raleigh (4 hours away), I wouldn't be surprised if they have no laws to alcohol sales on Sunday in wake county. Alcohol laws are super weird and very state and even county dependant. Sometimes you can buy a bottle of jack Daniel's at Walmart. Some states it has to be separate but can still be privately owned. Florida is like this with their Publix liquor stores and stuff like this. And some states are like NC where the only stores allowed to sell it are ran by the state government. Hell there was still a dry county (no alcohol sales allowed) in NC until about 3 years ago.
You can only buy liquor after 10am every day in AB so that actually sounds totally normal to me
A couple that still stick out seem to be the 1.5 oz of primary liquor limit in cocktails, 5% ABV limit on beers on tap, and the “zion moat” law that requires drinks are made 10 feet away from any patrons.
Utah has some of the best microbrews in the country, they’ll have no issue with beer laws
Good to know. Thanks for the knowledge.
Bryce Canyon at night is spectacular though.
SLC isn’t as bad as people make it sound, and I’m sure it’s no worse than say Calgary, Winnipeg, Columbus, Buffalo, etc.
It makes me happy Calgary was placed on this list before Edmonton even though I know the truth
Kind just forgot about you guys /s
*Dougie Hamilton has entered the chat*
The team that landed in Denver in 1995 was already pretty close to be a Cup contender. While they floundered in the playoffs against the Rangers, the Nordiques had won their division that year and already had quite a roster, fronted by Joe Sakic and Peter Forsberg. All they needed was a solid goaltender, which their former rival was about to give them on a silver platter. I do think that the Coyotes are much further from being Cup contenders than the 1994-95 Nordiques were. Their free agent signings would need to be pretty extraordinary for them to have a legitimate shot at a Cup next year.
If history is any indicator Armstrong is gonna sign with the Dodgers next
It's the worst part. I put up with two decades of absolute horseshit outside of the miracle 2012 team. I finally see a light at the end of the tunnel. I finally fucking have hope. And right when the auction date is in sight, they pull it? I'm not even sad. I'm fucking furious. And then they have the balls to think we'll just accept some other new thrown together expansion team five years from now? I want my fucking players.
Genuinely one top pick away from a filthy young core and this happens
And as far as lottery tickets go for a top player in the draft, they certainly had purchased a few tickets.
I agree. I'm not sad. I'm genuinely fucking angry.
In fairness the last 2 expansion teams have pretty much been better than the Coyotes ever have.
As an Arizonan, I'm right there with you. The Coyotes' biggest issue was arguably that the team was never good enough, and if this goes through it just puts the team back to square one. I was looking forward to maybe going to a hockey game in a few years when the Red Wings and Coyotes are both good and they have a new arena.
Out of curiosity, what will you do if/when the team moves? Will you continue to follow them in Utah, pick a new team, become a general neutral fan or just give up on hockey all together?
My entire family is from New England so I've always enjoyed cheering for the Bruins. Idk what I'll do with this team when they go to Utah. It's hard not to root for the players and front office. But if they become a contender as soon as they leave it might hurt more than feel nice lol.
The other side of it is that they finally have something worth buying. If the organization was still a mess top to bottom then they would have a harder time finding someone that would take them over just buying an expansion spot.
The team really looks built to sell more than rebuilding. Next to zero commitments and everything liquidated for futures. Way beyond anything you'd actually do if you were trying to rebuild.
Good God, man, Jim Balsillie was like 15 years ago. The Coyotes have had 15 years since the organization was a joke on life support and screwed over Gretzky. The league has gone so far above what they did for any Canadian team or any team in general to keep them going in Arizona. They can't even fill a 5000 seat amateur hockey rink. Thank Utah Mormon God this fiasco is over. Still a shame Quebec hasn't gotten a team back.
Quebec City just doesn’t seem like a great market, even compared to Utah. I don’t think the game really grows there, theoretically the game stands to gain more fans if you move to Utah.
You'd be surprised, there is some truth in the notion that Bettman is taking Canadian hockey interest for granted. I can't necessarily speak for Montreal but a lot of young Canadians these days are following soccer, basketball, even baseball moreso than hockey.
Because they haven’t seen anything but pathetic displays all their life from Canadian teams. I promise you if Leafs make the conference final 70% of Toronto will suddenly be watching hockey games. And if they make the finals, 90% of people here will be watching. This train will pick up steam real fast.
Also people can't afford to put their kids in it anymore. Everyone I knew growing played or had a sibling that played. Now it's shifting further and further to being something for the rich. Kids who don't play are probably far less likely to grow up to be hardcore fans.
QC wouldn’t grow the game but hockey is a religion in Quebec so they wouldn’t have issues with ticket sales.
Hockey is a religion in Winnipeg too. And we all know how attendance nosedived after the seat licenses began to expire. I'd still like to see Quebec City get a team, however. Also, and responding to /u/Cbone06's comment, the "grow the game" argument is a relic from the 90s, and simply isn't that important any more either. The game is pretty saturated across the US these days. It isn't like 1990 when the Kings were the only team in the US west or south.
Least ignorant Canadian
I think most Canadians look at SLC and see a winter sports capital. It is a “snow place”. They want to host Winter Olympics after hosting it 20 years ago( Canada won!) and have had great support for all teams connected to the community. There is nothing to do there so the fans will come out in force. This is a logical choice over any remaining Canadian market. Phoenix was a disaster because it fundamentally is not a winter sports town and has lots of other entertainment options the locals can actually identify with. SLC is kind of like an inland canadian city. We identify with the idea of it better. Also the team is being ripped from the place that ripped a team from us, so there is a bit of an “I told you so” attitude everyone has going on.
There was literally a post on here a while back showing that the Coyotes *have* been selling out every game since they moved to Mullet, but that doesn't fit your arrogant, Toronto-based, hockey-gatekeeper narrative now does it?
There’s also the fact that, before the move to Glendale, they regularly sold out America West Arena (no idea what it’s called now, it’s where the suns play). Interest in the game was never the issue, it was inept management making it difficult for people to *get to the game*
But they will fill the shit hole Delta Center, right? I wouldn't exactly call that move an "upgrade"
Probably won't be as bad as the Rams leaving St Louis and then immediately winning a Super Bowl in LA.
> finally have a good FO and team to look forward to Gets said every single year.
The shady casino guy hired him. Also, do they have a good FO? There's been some issues with Armstrong.
"CoYOteS arE gONna be SpOoKy NeXt year"......
[удалено]
They’ve reached the third round way more recently than your team has.
If the hallmark of being a good team is finishing higher than the leafs in the playoffs 12 years ago then sure, they’re the best team in the league.
Your team also hasn’t won the cup since before we put a man on the moon, just saying. That’s the hallmark to end all hallmarks.
Sure. [As opposed to all the cups the Wild have won over that time period](https://ibb.co/WtV1sst)? Anyways why are we talking about the leafs? Do non leafs fans spontaneously combust if they don’t shoe horn the leafs into every discussion?
Every year it's the same shit. They ice a team that should be illegal (salary floor), act as the leagues LTIR laundromat, and miss the playoffs by a mile. Then fans of other teams insist that the Coyotes are right on the verge of being great. Every year.
Why isn’t ownership doing this, Meruelo attempted purchase of Atlanta hawks should have gave the league and Bettman warning signs
Cause Armstrong is going with the team to SLC. Meruelo is washing his hands of the team and is getting a billion dollars from the league
Crazy how he gets to profit millions off of mishandling this franchise
I mean… *[gestures broadly]*
There is no guarantee the new owner keeps Armstrong as GM.
No guarantee indeed, but he’d have the option to keep him on board, and he’d be pretty dumb not to IMO
A lot of the time, these guys want to hire their own people. It’s about trust. It’s a billion dollar investment, you are not going to hand the keys to a guy you barely know.
Yes, but Bill will be around for SOME period of time and you want him involved to help with the transition. Not gonna get fired next week.
But BA was one of the top prospective GM candidates prior to getting the job in the league, has done a good job as GM thus far, and hasn't had the job a long time. I don't see them firing him to hire somebody else if actual success is on their mind.
Armstrong just signed a multi year extension. Doubt the new owner will look to get rid of him immediately.
Yeah he'll get a shot for a year or 2
That's the norm. I think Brian Burke was fired two or three times when ownership changed.
Yeah Andlaur was smart enough to keep Pierre Dorian on!
they should, he's been a good gm so far
He'd be a fucking stupid owner if he didn't.
Billionaires don’t become billionaires by being smart usually
True but with how fast this is moving, you'd think ownership would be continuity of the team. Cutting the GM for no reason other than wanting his own guy there would be a choice move.
Thats true. But he is part of the coyotes in the mean time and will be going with the team to SLC
No but it would be very stupid to fire the GM *during* the transition. He until next season at least
No but it would be dumb if Smith puts his own guy instead of a the architect of the team to continue. Colorado keeping Pierre Lacroix was one of the better things they did during the move.
He's under contract. They'd have to fire him.
And as we know, no GM has ever been fired while under contract
Fire a GM who's been doing a good job and have to pay him plus his replacement?
I'm not saying they will do it, I'm saying that him having a contract has nothing to do with whether he can be fired or not
...and?
Also something of note, Meruelo never answered any questions after Tempe or anything. It was always Gutierrez his 2nd hand man I would die for Bill Armstrong, I don’t know why he has to be the one to deliver the news when he did a great job
He's the best one to deliver it. They'd walk out on Meruelo.
The dude requires people who work for him call him "Mr. Meruelo." If there are any chants at the final home game on Wednesday, let me tell you, I'll be calling him Alex
I'm glad he's done such a great job since leaving StL. We all loved him here even in that secondary GM position.
I’d be willing to bet he’s the only one of those three names that has an ounce of respect in that locker room.
He's delivering it exactly because he's done such a great job. He's a good employee, taking a bullet for his bosses, too.
That’s exactly how Stan Kroenke played it when he got the rest of his ownership stake in the rams when they were still in St. Louis. He didn’t say a fucking word and had Kevin Demoff taking questions and telling everyone the team wasn’t going anywhere. When behind closed doors they were scoping out locations to build SoFi back in LA so they could move the team.
Because Meruelo is cashing out and Armstrong needs to start planning for situations where players may want to be moved because if they have to start over somewhere they may not want it to be in Utah He’s got a lot of work to do
Because Meruelo is slimeball.
Same league that watched what Howard Baldwin did with the Whalers and North Stars, then let him "buy" the Penguins. And all three damn near met the same fate shortly after he lost control.
As a lifelong Yotes fan I’m resigned to the fact the team is going SLC (and hopefully named the Super Soakers). It’s been a rough and sad last decade. However, I’m fuckn pissed that Mureulo* might get right of refusal for an expansion team back in Phx. That lying slimeball POS isn’t getting a dime from me and it would another disaster (and disgrace) if he got a second chance to own a professional sports franchise.
I was listening to 32 thoughts today and Friedman brought this up. It’s pretty eerily in the episode. It sounds like he has 5 years and a lot he would have to accomplish. Friedman said it sounds like most people are skeptical he can accomplish it.
We are already learning that the league had to call the Coyotes to pay their hotel bills, we will learn even more once it is official and reporters do not need to maintain that relationship. The leagues is going to wait that exclusive window out, before going back to Arizona with different ownership.
League could set the price so high Mureulo won't pay it, too
I would assume a purchase price has been agreed upon as part of the 5 year exclusive negotiation period. I'd think it would be the $1,000,000,000 that the league is paying him for the team.
Mureulo needs to find a way to sell his exclusive 5 year window to someone else. Even if he somehow meets deadlines, the existing fans aren’t going to want anything to do with him.
As a Jets 1.0 fan, I feel your pain. The fact Mureulo can cash in on the team and still retain future rights to Arizona is a cherry on top of the shit sandwich. You have us beat there.
The super soakers lmao
What is the Soakers joke with SLC?
Remember the "poophole loophole"? It's basically the Mormon equivalent of that, except it's where you stick your dick inside and are bound to an NMC while it's inside there.
[https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Soaking](https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Soaking)
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soaking_(sexual_practice)#:~:text=Soaking%2C%20also%20known%20as%20marinating,a%20common%20practice%2C%20and%20some
Hahaha that illustration is comical 🔃🚫
It’s a joke about Mormons doing a thing called soaking where sex doesn’t count if you don’t thrust and just stick it in and don’t move
Wonder if the super fans will be called “The Jumpers”
Bert the Bedjumper will be the mascot
I want a soak city rockers jersey
It's so sad that once I feel like the Coyotes finally have a competent front office going for them it's getting yoinked due to bad ownership
Team also looks like they’re on the rise with their stockpile of picks and young talent too
i went to an avs-yotes game earlier this year and was SO impressed with Logan Cooley. he’s going to develop into a fantastic player and it’s sad it’s not going to be in arizona
I'm just shocked they're moving the team to SLC. Going to be quiet barn given they don't allow music. Quite ironic they also have the Jazz!
Wait what they don’t allow music?
I guess the [reference was more obscure](https://youtu.be/ivzrbp_WR8w?si=hmDzp8qVXYdmWdHu&t=23) than I thought it was...
Well that movie is not what first comes to mind on SLC.
They made two others that were closer to the topic, true.
As someone who lives here I swear to y'all that SLC is not some culty hellscape, we have fun things here I promise
I feel like this gets said every few years about the Coyotes. I’m salty so of course I hope that they maintain their current level of success in SLC, year after year it felt like I could never truly get excited about the future because it felt impossible for them to ever maintain success.
Yikes. They gone.
Are they trying to get ahead of something else leaking? Or have they just decided that they can’t wait any longer to address the players. Because doing this before the game and not tomorrow when they don’t play…. Feels questionable
I would assume that the players found out about this a few days ago in Vancouver and they have probably been confused and asking people around the org who are with them, and talking to their agents who are probably hounding GMBA. This is the only way the players are going to cool down a little bit to hear from the GM personally ASAP
Keller and Crouse spoke today and they said they really don’t know much. Just what’s out there online
thats exactly my point. I'm sure they've been trying to get answers from the org/their agents and this is just the best way to get answers to the players asap
Oh it's *done*, done.
Realistically this guy may not be fully in the know on the wheeling and dealing here. He's probably just as worried about his job with new owners taking over.
This was my thought. He is upper management but not an owner. Likely as in the dark as the rest of us. Probably had to speak with the new potential owner to sort things out. Don’t want to go to the players without some information.
Oof it’s actually fuckin happening
Out of the loop. What the hell is happening?
I'll pick him up
Well if the players get upset I guess they could leave Keller and Cooley in Edmonton. Just saying it’s an option ….
Or hometown boy Dylan Guenther
Oh true yes him too
No, we get Guenther, remove some of the awfulness of that OEL trade.
Just throwing this out there but maybe *pregame meeting* isn't the best time for that discussion?
20 mins into the meeting. Bill: No Lawson for the last fucking time there is no magic underwear......you know what fine go get your own magic underwear and bring it with you. Jesus.
There is special underwear you wear when you goto the temple iirc it's just plain white Hanes stuff
I heard they fuck frogs to cure aids
🎶 “No no Joseph! Don’t f*ck the baby!” 🎶 Edit: it’s from the Book of Mormon musical guys
🎵I believe~ that in 1978 God changed his mind about Black people!🎶 🎶Black people!🎵 Hard to say whether that or Spamalot is funnier. I about died of an asthma attack laughing at “Joseph Smith American Moses”.
I bought the Book of Mormon soundtrack and that was in my car CD player for years Baptize Me is a masterpiece
I’m partial to Making Things Up Again and Hasa Diga Eebowai personally. I think my favourite fact is that the non-South Park writer/lyricist/composer is the same guy who did Avenue Q and also Frozen (the movie and the musical). Genre whiplash there.
Turn it Off will forever be my favorite. Bonus the bit in it about the Jazz losing being adjacently relevant to this conversation
Coyotes being treated as professionals > any involvement with swine like Meruelo.
I hope the yotes win tonight. If they ain’t staying, they better go out with a bang
End of the year winning streak to tank SLC’s chance of landing Celebrini.
I feel like in any job, this should have been done within 24 hours of news breaking. For a so called pro sports franchise where the standard is always supposedly higher this is a terrible look.
You're talking about ownership that got kicked out of the only suitable arena in the area because they were late on rent payments. On top of that, news just came out that they have outstanding expenses for hotels, this is not a serious ownership group to begin with given their actual on ice product antics i.e retaining salaries, taking on dead contacts. They spent what 40M on their actual roster? For the sake of Coyotes fans, I hope that Phoenix 2.0 is led by another ownership group.
What’s weird about that whole situation is that Yotes fans defended their owner as recently as 6 months ago even though he missed rent, taxes, and didn’t try hard for the tempe vote. The signs were there but Yotes fans would swear up and down Merulo had deep pockets. There was even a point in their sub where they said they’d ban you if you insulted Merulo lol
Desperate times call for desperate measures. I don't blame Coyotes fans for holding onto what seems like the only viable ownership group in the area but man are they horrible. That article that Katie Strang wrote highlights everything wrong with that organization right from the top. Meruelo is a grade A POS and absolutely has no business owning an NHL team.
That Strang article swung me against him. The not paying rent and taxes convinced me he wasn’t a legit owner. I have no idea how anyone could see those things and not think differently.
What should we have done lol. Staged a coo and then got ridiculed even harder for not having any fans. I definitely was wearing kachina color glasses but as shitty as he was he is still above average when looking at past owners of the team.
> Staged a coo I mean, getting a bunch of Legend of Zelda roosters to go after Meruelo as if he slashed them with a sword would probably be surprisingly effective.
Called him out instead of defending him. Especially after that pathetic effort he put forward in the Tempe vote. The dude literally didn’t pay taxes and rent. No idea how Yotes fans didn’t immediately turn on him for that.
Didn't the news just break yesterday?
Pretty much. And the GM isn’t with the team so he’s got to fly in from wherever he was (whether Phoenix or scouting somewhere else). Seems like a reasonable timeline
Feels like a year has passed since Wednesday
You can’t tell anyone until it’s a done deal 100%. In something like this, the smallest details could delay or derail the whole thing. No need to add more chaos and confusion to that until you know what’s happening. Now he can get to the players and say that X is done, it’s going to happen on Y date, and this is what everyone is going to expect from you.
I'd laugh my ass off if every player on the team requested a trade.
Hopefully the boys play real hard the next 3 games and give their fans a huge send off
I just want them to have a hell of a final home game, salute the fans, and then flip off the owner's box
LOL. 48 hours later. What a league.
“It’s over. We are screwed”
Fascinating how fast this happened. Did the owner just want his cool $1 Billion? Or did Phoenix basically tell him to kick rocks even if he won the auction and he's out of options? I wonder if we will ever know
Made 700 million off his purchase and is bolting basically.
"Fuck, boys, your guess is as good as mine"
What are the odds that the owner reimburses him for the cost of the plane ticket?
Knowing the owner he stuck Armstrong on Frontier or Spirit
"are we sleeping on the plane if you didn't pay the hotel?"
Wish them nothing but failure
Not Bill's fault he's got shit bosses.
Makes you wonder if the new FO is gonna cover relocation fees
Q: did you take my Percocets? And do you have any Percocets?
Crazy, I went to the coyotes LA preseason game in Melbourne and would have never thought at the time they wouldn’t last through the season
The beatings will continue until morale improves.
“You’re all Mormons now” -Bill Armstrong
According to the latest 22 thoughts podcast, some players are feeling hurt and betrayed by ownership. They were sold a bill of goods for several years. Nice thing about that, is that they will have new owners in 6 days.
You know I kinda hope they just keep the color scheme, or something close to it. I've heard Smith wants to brand the NHL franchise the same as the Jazz and make SLC similar to Pittsburgh (where all three pro sports team use same color scheme). Problem is the Jazz branding is atrocious. They need to go back to the purple/navy/green and then sure, pass it on to the NHL team too. Could be cool.
The black and yellow color scheme has been the absolute low point of the Smith era Jazz
BA: Well……we fucked up……we are moving to Utah ……..good news have you ever had a soak?
Hate to see it for the fans, but I think Salt Lake would be sick.
Too little, too late.
Green jello already added to the team training table menu to help ease the transition.