Crash

I don't think anyone here is really attacking the fanbase when they want the Coyotes to be moved, but maybe I'm wrong. I think it's a mix of frustration with the stubbornness the NHL has shown in trying to make the team work, despite it very clearly not working, and the idea that it's kind of likely that their continued existence has literally killed people through what Glendale has had to cut to keep them. And I don't mean figuratively when I say literally. I mean literally.

This made me curious, so I did some mathematical jiggery-pokery to help normalize small total attendance against smaller buildings. In a nutshell, if you draw 15k a night at 100% capacity, that counts against you less than drawing 15.5 at 85.5%. Obviously, there are some problems with this, but here's a table I'm getting all hoity-toity about and calling the NHL Relocatometer: .

no Intercourse, Pennsylvania sounds better. For Satan's Kingdom, Massachusetts we can move the Devils there. What about Hell, Michigan? I'd suggest French Lick, Indiana, but we all know the NHL hates anything French.

I went to a Spokane Chiefs game this weekend. They're a major junior team in the Western Hockey League (same league and division as the WinterHawks that keep coming up). Granted, they're generally near the top of the league in attendance but here's some fun facts: A Saturday night game between the Spokane Chiefs and a division rival (the Tri-City Americans) had 10,122 in attendance. The previous Saturday night, they drew 9,079. A Saturday night game between the Phoenix Coyotes and a division rival (the L.A. Kings) had 14,780 in attendance. The next Saturday night, they drew 12,151. For every ONE person in the Spokane area, there are NINE in the Phoenix area.

First there have to be no bailouts or extensions (or successful investor finding, but who are we kidding?) before Jan 31. Then there needs to be no bailouts or extensions for a good while longer. Then Bettman and the owners have to allow TALK of relocation. Then the QC group will be put through an unreasonable amount of scrutiny, considering how little Glendale scrutiny there has been. If that's before whatever the relocation and rebranding deadlines are, then maybe it will happen. I would guess that we get one more year of hockey in the desert due to newly invented barriers to relocation.

If ever there was a way to ensure that the NHL is never taken seriously by people who aren't already intensely into hockey, it would be another year off and proving your minor league status with a contraction. The less hardcore hockey people (which is almost everyone) don't give a crap if it's some political ploy to get what he wants; Contraction = Minor League.

Chełm One popular humorous tradition from Eastern Europe involved tales of the people of Chełm, a town reputed in these jokes to be inhabited by fools. The jokes were almost always centred on silly solutions to problems. Some of these solutions display "foolish wisdom" (reaching the correct answer by the wrong train of reasoning), while others are simply wrong. Chełm tales were told by authors like Sholom Aleichem, Isaac Bashevis Singer and Solomon Simon. A typical Chełm story might begin, "It is said that after God made the world, he filled it with people. He sent off an angel with two sacks, one full of wisdom and one full of foolishness. The second sack was of course much heavier. So after a time it started to drag. Soon it got caught on a mountaintop and so all the foolishness spilled out and fell into Chełm." The short animated film Village of Idiots is based upon classic Chełm tales. Here are a few examples of a Chełm tale: Or, Or, Link!

Does it really make the league more money? On the one hand, we have a $200M expansion fee. On the other, a $60M relocation fee. But in this case, the NHL also pockets the purchase price of the team, which adds another $170M to the party. So they could let les Quebequois buy the Coyotes (and move 'em) for somewhere around $230M, or they could go through all the trouble of folding the team, dispersing the players, re-working the schedule for an odd number of clubs, holding an expansion draft in two years, and after all that only collect $200M for a new franchise. It says they'll try to collect the $200M from both Quebec City and Seattle, but that doesn't seem to work, either. Setting aside that such a plan still leaves the league with an odd number of teams, adding two new franchises doesn't do anything about leaving $30M on the table from the Coyotes; they could move that team to QC and expand to Seattle and maximize their revenues. What am I missing? Or is this just another OITGDNHL moment? Not to mention that the only reason the selling price for the Coyotes has been so low is that they wanted someone to keep them in Glendale. If they open up the bidding with everyone knowing that relocation is acceptable, they will almost definitely get much more than the $170M.

How is she still in office? Someone should tell her that there are more than three Canadians. There are at least four of them.

I just figured, if we were going to start pulling out Futurama references... They need to elect the first supervillain mayor who is willing to steal all the world's monuments and move them to Glendale.

I thought of setting up an organized crime ring in their city first. Own a hockey team. No money down. No returns expected.

So Camelback Ranch is actually a success in comparison because they don't have an even bigger failing complex?

Glendale watched "Field of Dreams" too many times and thought it would all be self-sufficient? I'm pretty sure the idea was to break even and get complexes for "free," counting on automatic money. Oooh. They should trot out Kevin Costner as the new Coyotes owner.

One more franchise moving to Canada is all that's really reasonable at this point. We know that population isn't everything in the NHL, but it still counts. The GTA could probably support three teams, but that's just cannibalizing success. Quebec City is the only reasonable Canadian market right now. Unless I misunderstood and you meant that the Jets are his limit. In which case, yes, he would be a turd.

Advocating for an entire city and all of its government services over a sports team that has failed to find self-sufficiency is not hating. Discarding logical or ethical arguments by labeling those that disagree with you "haters" only reveals your own willful blindness and/or ignorance. If this were any other business asking to be subsidized by a city without the money for the subsidies so that they can be purchased by a group that has no money, everyone but that group would be giving that business the finger and showing them the door. But because it's a sports franchise, it becomes emotional to the point of nonsense. I love sports as much as most of you and love my teams at least as much, but face it: Odds are that the Coyotes Experiment is killing people and sapping a city. This is why I want to see the Coyotes move. I'd much, much rather have them be a profitable and well-loved pride of Glendale and stay right where they are for a long, long time. They're not profitable. They're not a point of pride. They are a money drain. They need to go. Go Coyotes.