TORONTO — The Arizona Coyotes insist they are committed to building a new arena in Arizona, hinting that they’ll have some “exciting news” soon. NHL commissioner Gary Bettman said on Friday that Coyotes owner Alex Meruelo told him he was “certain he will get this done,” adding — with a pregnant pause — that he was “reasonably confident (Meruelo) is going to do what he says.”
Marty Walsh, the executive director of the NHL Players Association, isn’t buying it.
Walsh blasted Coyotes ownership on Friday for failing to meet multiple deadlines to build an NHL-worthy arena in the greater Phoenix area, and also for declining to meet with player representatives to discuss the team’s future in the Valley. He said he had “serious concerns” about the franchise. Walsh suggested that the Coyotes should be moved to another location — Utah being the likeliest candidate — should they not have an arena deal in place by the end of this season.
“The next deadline for me is tomorrow. It’s now. It’s right now,” Walsh said. “The last conversation I had with the commissioner was that the owner was looking at a piece of land in the Arizona area. I’m not sure where that stands. I have my personal concerns about that ever happening. There was a piece of land in Mesa. There was a piece of land in Phoenix. There were three ballot questions in Tempe. None of that came to fruition.”
We are fully committed to Arizona & hope to share exciting news with all of you soon. Arizona is home & the future is incredibly bright here. https://t.co/aGemICtfxG
— Arizona Coyotes (@ArizonaCoyotes) February 2, 2024
The Coyotes are playing their second season at Arizona State’s Mullett Arena, which seats about 4,600 for NHL games. The team has spent millions of dollars to create an annex that houses home and visitor locker rooms that are closer to NHL standards, but the rink has about 10,000 fewer seats than the league’s second-smallest arena, Winnipeg’s Canada Life Centre. After last year’s referendum on a new arena in Tempe was shot down by voters, the Coyotes have been in limbo. It can take more than three years to build a new arena, which could mean more than five total years at Mullett Arena.
Walsh was particularly frustrated with the Coyotes’ unwillingness to talk to the NHLPA about potential solutions.
“I’m extremely disappointed in the ownership of Arizona and the president of Arizona,” Walsh said. “They have not reached out to the PA to talk to us about what the situation in Arizona is. Since I’ve been here, we’ve been working very closely with the league, we’ve been working to grow hockey and grow the sport of hockey. We had great announcements today (about Olympic participation in 2026 and 2030 and more international tournaments) that’s going to increase viewership and fans in hockey and we have the team in Arizona that doesn’t seem interested in having conversations with the union who represents the players that play on that team. So, it’s a wait-and-see approach.
“Unfortunately, we’ve had two unofficial deadlines to come up with some movement and we’ve gone past both of those. So I’m interested to see what the ownership of Arizona has in mind. They want to buy land, and it’s not just about buying a piece of land. OK, you can buy a piece of land. How long will it take you to permit the land? Do you need a referendum? Is there hazardous waste; do you need to remediate the land? There’s lots of questions. So you can talk about buying land in Arizona and it can be 10 years before a shovel goes in the ground. As far as I’m concerned, that’s unacceptable on behalf of the players on that team and it should be unacceptable for the league.”
Expansion speculation has reached a fever pitch lately, with Utah Jazz owner Ryan Smith making a play for a new NHL team. Bettman said Friday that while there is no active push to expand beyond 32 teams, considerable interest exists. Bettman listed Utah, Atlanta, Houston, Kansas City and Cincinnati as cities that have reached out.
“I actually had an email from Omaha,” Bettman mused.
But Walsh was more aggressive, saying that if the Coyotes don’t have a concrete arena plan in place by the end of the season, a move to Utah would be “absolutely” supported by the players — even the ones who would be uprooted mid-contract. He said a Utah franchise could “be another Golden Knights or Seattle Kraken.”
“The players want to play in a National Hockey League arena,” Walsh said. “I’ve had more than several conversations now with them, and I have conversations almost on a monthly basis — somebody from the PA talks to somebody from the team. And they’re very interested in what the future is.”
Walsh said that the all-important hockey-related revenue split hasn’t been negatively affected by the Coyotes’ move to Mullett Arena, but pointed to the lost potential for growth that a new and larger building would offer.
“The league feels that Arizona is a good market for hockey, and I can understand that,” Walsh said. “The issue I have and the players have is how long do you wait to get a home? They’re playing in a college arena, they’re the second tenant in that arena. I’m not criticizing the league for this, this is the team. This is not the way to run a business. (Look) at what happened with (the Oakland) A’s moving allegedly to Vegas. Leagues are making sure that teams are investing in their facilities. And in this particular case, we have a 5,100-seat college arena that doesn’t sell out every night.”
(Photo of Mullett Arena: Christian Petersen/Getty Images)
