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Hello! I am so excited to be writing for Columbus Sports! While most of my entries here will be about the Blue Jackets, my first blog here is actually about the Phoenix Coyotes. I’ll admit it’s a strange topic for my first entry, but it is a hot issue right now, and I feel the need to address it. Every once in a while I will talk about other things going on in the league or in the sports world, but I do promise that most of what I talk about will be about the Jackets.

One of the biggest debates in the National Hockey League world right now has little to do with the game being played on the ice, but rather, where exactly that ice should be.

The Phoenix Coyotes organization is in a heap of trouble. The ownership group who owned the Coyotes filed for bankruptcy this past spring. The NHL season is starting later this week, and the Coyotes still have no owner. In addition to having no financially stable owner, the season ticket base has fallen below 3,000 (to put that in perspective, the Columbus Blue Jackets season ticket base for this coming season is over 10,000). In a desperate attempt to sell out the Coyotes home opener, all lower bowl tickets for the game are priced at $25, and all upper bowl tickets are a mere $15. The Jackets were selling two tickets for the cost of four 12-packs of Pepsi , and people thought THAT was indicative of a struggling franchise.

Jim Balsillie, co-CEO of Research In Motion (the company who developed the BlackBerry smartphone) has put in multiple bids to buy the Coyotes.  This isn’t the first time Balsillie has tried to buy an NHL franchise. In 2006, he wanted to purchase the struggling Pittsburgh Penguins franchise. After that fell through, Balsillie was at it again less than a year later; this time, he was after the Nashville Predators. So why haven’t the Coyotes jumped all over Basillie’s offer? Because Balsillie wants to move the team to Hamilton, Ontario.

Would a move to Hamilton be the best outcome for the Coyotes? Not really. I know, I know. You’re thinking to yourself, “Kayleigh, you’ve just told us that Phoenix is in the crapper and has no owner. They need one!” No argument there. However, there is a major flaw in the plan to move to Hamilton.

For those of you who don’t know your Canadian geography, Hamilton is located on the far western edge of Lake Ontario, and is less than an hour from Toronto. Putting a new team so close to one of the most beloved teams in the NHL doesn’t exactly seem like the greatest plan. That’s not to say that I think the people of Hamilton wouldn’t go to the games – on the contrary, I believe they would be near capacity for every game, just as all the other Canadian teams are. What I foresee happening, though, is people buying tickets to go watch the games in Hamilton because it’s so difficult and pricey to get tickets to see the Leafs play in the Air Canada Centre. What I do not see happening is the people of southern Ontario trading in their Leafs jerseys for Hamilton jerseys. The alliances that Canadian fans have for their hockey teams is deep-rooted, and no self-respecting fan of any sport would give up their alliance to their favorite team because a more accessible option became available to them.

So what, then, do I think would be the best option? Well, in a perfect world, I would love for the people of Phoenix to realize how awesome hockey is and for the support to grow in the southern part of the United States. I really feel for those who are hardcore Coyotes fans – I would be miserable if the Blue Jackets were relocated. However, the likelihood of that happening is slim to none. So the next best alternative in my mind is relocating to Kansas City. Kansas City has the facilities to put a team in right away, and the city is just aching to have a team to support (you know, other than the Royals and Chiefs). Relocating within the United States instead of going to Canada has the added bonus of the potential to gain more hockey fans. If you move the team to a Canadian city, you don’t really have the opportunity to expose more people to the sport, since hockey is Canada’s national winter sport. However, if the Coyotes were going to relocate to a Canadian city, I believe it would be more prudent for them to move to either Winnipeg or Saskatoon. Both of these cities could support an NHL franchise, and I would predict the odds of the team becoming the favorite team of the people there are higher than they would be if the team moved to a city that is less than an hour’s drive from one of the most fan supported teams in the league.

Only time will tell who in this story will get the happy ending.

Tags: jim basillie, phoenix coyotes