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The term “poverty franchise” is frequently used to describe sports teams who are unwilling to splurge to stay competitive, and while it’s usually used figuratively, it may have literally applied to the Arizona Coyotes based on a story chronicling their demise.
The Arizona Coyotes spent the vast majority of their existence grappling with the financial issues that plagued a franchise that struggled to find its footing after setting up shop in Phoenix in 1996. The NHL did what it could to set the team up for success, but the situation eventually became unsustainable.
It was hard not to joke about Goodwill inking a deal to become Arizona’s helmet sponsor in 2022 when you consider that development transpired around a year after the Coyotes were almost locked out of their own arena for failing to pay rent. That ultimately led to the venue declining to extend the team’s lease, and they subsequently set up shop in Mullett Arena, the 4,500-seat building that was built with Arizona State’s hockey team in mind.
In 2023, voters rejected a ballot measure that would’ve led to the construction of a new barn in Tempe, and while Coyotes owner Alex Meruelo eventually set his sights on another property, he failed to secure it by the time the NHL decided to bring its Arizona experiment to an end after close to three decades with a deal that resulted in the franchise moving to Salt Lake City ahead of next season.
On Tuesday, ESPN published an article where Emily Kaplan and Greg Wyshynski broke down the series of events that led to the Coyotes being sold to Utah Jazz owner Ryan Smith.
It’s filled with some eye-opening revelations, but I’m not sure if anything stood out more than some of the strategies the Coyotes harnessed in an attempt to pinch pennies—like allegedly crossing out the numbers on the hotel bills they received before paying a lesser sum:
The Coyotes would try to stay at lesser hotels than the collective bargaining agreement stipulates. Ownership tried cutting corners when they could, like removing the printer and copying machine from the coaches’ room.
Multiple sources told ESPN that the Coyotes were either late paying their hotel bills or sometimes just crossed out the total and paid a different amount.
It was a bold strategy—and one that apparently did not pay off for them.