Coyotes relocating to Salt Lake City

[2014olympicgold]

New Per Seravelli:

BREAKING: Sources tell @DailyFaceoff- NHL, Arizona Coyotes & Smith Entertain. Grp have made significant progress on the framework of an agreement to relocate #Yotes    to Salt Lake City, Utah.
#NHL memo updated Governors today.
NOT done. Many layers and lawyers. Much work to do.

[pmorrow]

Not sure if this has been mentioned but I heard on the Chris Johnston show that the team is going to be called Utah something not Salt Lake.

[pmorrow]

Frank Seravalli
@frank_seravalli
·
3m
BREAKING: Sources tell
@DailyFaceoff
- NHL, Arizona Coyotes & Smith Entertain. Grp have made significant progress on the framework of an agreement to relocate #Yotes to Salt Lake City, Utah.

#NHL memo updated Governors today.

NOT done. Many layers and lawyers. Much work to do.


https://twitter.com/frank_seravalli/...32841622057025

[2014olympicgold]

Utah Mormons, "Have you heard the good word of hockey our love and passion?"

[Axeman33]

And if they leave Arizona (which seems likely at this point) the next expansion team awarded will be right back in Arizona again.

[2014olympicgold]

The Coyotes players have been informed about a verbal agreement to move to Utah.

[TrailerParkFlyers]

Once they move maybe they will use their salary cap to actually ice players rather than tie it up on contracts with Shea Weber etc.

[Pengwin7]

It would be interesting - if anybody is internet domain savvy - to see what "utah_________.com" domain names have been bought/reserved in the last year.
I'd guess the team name is among them somewhere.

Only one home game left for Arizona then...
EDM on April 17th.
Edmonton's plays home Mon Apr15 vs SJ...
Depending on their spot in standings... I'd be curious to see who travels for the Apr17 @ARI and Apr18 @COL games.
They seem like they are pretty likely to be 2nd in Pacific... (though they do have a few "games-in-hand" and home-ice vs COL/WPG is still in the air)
https://www.espn.com/nhl/team/schedu...rizona-coyotes
https://www.espn.com/nhl/team/schedu...dmonton-oilers

Shane Doan... first season with Winnipeg - all the rest... Arizona
Josh Doan... first season with Arizona...

[LawMan]

https://twitter.com/wyshynski/status...HuHimaAiApftFA

NEWS: If @ArizonaCoyotes relocate to Utah, an NHL source says that Coyotes owner could sell team to the league for $1 billion; and the NHL would sell the franchise to Jazz owner Ryan Smith for $1.3B. Owners would split $300M.

Just a hair under $10mil per owner and the Coyotes owner makes $1BIL!
Not a bad move, what did he buy the Coyotes for???

[rataylor22]

IMO this is all but sewn up now. The next intriguing piece is if they get any benefits/perks/concessions to improve the team quicker. Guaranteed draft slot, compliance buyouts, etc. Obviously Winnipeg did not but the current expansion process was not in place at that time, and I don't believe Atlanta had the same type of burdens on their books as Phoenix has (although I admittedly do not remember). Even something like clearing the cap charges of their LTIR and buyout history could be pretty beneficial (IE Weber, Kassian, Nemeth get their money but the cap charges go away). Kinda find it hard to believe Ryan Smith would get nothing more than the current in place team for $1.3B. Winnipeg paid $230M lol ($170M sale price, $60M relocation fee).

To answer LawMan, the reported sale price to Merulo was $300M, so he's making roughly $700M (and I still believe he will opt out of future NHL ownership)

[LawMan]

IMO this is all but sewn up now. The next intriguing piece is if they get any benefits/perks/concessions to improve the team quicker. Guaranteed draft slot, compliance buyouts, etc. Obviously Winnipeg did not but the current expansion process was not in place at that time, and I don't believe Atlanta had the same type of burdens on their books as Phoenix has (although I admittedly do not remember). Even something like clearing the cap charges of their LTIR and buyout history could be pretty beneficial (IE Weber, Kassian, Nemeth get their money but the cap charges go away). Kinda find it hard to believe Ryan Smith would get nothing more than the current in place team for $1.3B. Winnipeg paid $230M lol ($170M sale price, $60M relocation fee).

To answer LawMan, the reported sale price to Merulo was $300M, so he's making roughly $700M (and I still believe he will opt out of future NHL ownership)

WOWSERS! He bought them in 2019, so even if he sustained $20million losses per year (definitely the high end) that puts him into the team for $400million!

[rataylor22]

WOWSERS! He bought them in 2019, so even if he sustained $20million losses per year (definitely the high end) that puts him into the team for $400million!

Even in a league as dysfunctional as the NHL, sports ownership is good business.

[2014olympicgold]

Arizona's operating income the last few years:
https://www.statista.com/statistics/...rating-income/

They've had positive income the last 2 yrs for the first time in 20yrs, and averaged -$10.58m operating income since 2005-06.

Since Merulo bought the team (2019), they've had had -$25.2m operating income total, or -$6.3m/yr.

Bought for $300m, loss $25.2m (probably more), then tax write off everything (that's the point of owning a team), then sold for $1B....Guy made out like a bandit.

[2014olympicgold]

I like how no one is pointing out that Salt Lake City has no population (205,000) and very low corporate business there for season tickets/ads.

If Arizona moves to Salt Lake, it likely will fail too. Especially when you move a team from Arizona where the players only thing that's going good for them was the environment and off-ice stuff. And you take them from golf and sun 24/7 during the season to a ski resort town. How many won't want to move and will want a trade out? There's already been smoke around Keller.

Burlington ON has a higher population than Salt Lake. Freaking Lincoln Nebraska has a higher population. Augusta Georgia almost has a bigger population.

The lowest population for an NHL city is Winnipeg with 774,000.

[random-d]

I like how no one is pointing out that Salt Lake City has no population (205,000) and very low corporate business there for season tickets/ads.

Accurate but 90% of the states 3 million residents live in the cities and municipalities sorrounding it, most of which are within 50 miles. Not saying this is guaranteed to succeed but it's not nearly as dire as that number would have one believe.