Logo of the Phoenix Coyotes hockey team, used from their first season in 1996 until 2003. The Coyotes were born in the old World Hockey Association as the Winnipeg Jets, and transferred to Phoenix in ’96 despite great fan support in the Canadian city. A combination of the weak Canadian dollar and the smallest arena in the NHL doomed the franchise there. Some star players from the early Phoenix years include Jeremy Roenick, Mike Gartner, Keith Tkachuk and Rick Tocchet.
Liliana Nielsen
January 21, 2011 at 10:27 pm
..Mister Bettman and the NHL executive committee would prefer to keep the ailing Phoenix Coyotes in the desert but for one inconvenient fact No one with deep enough pockets wants to own a hockey team there….It used to be that Mister Bettman insisted the Coyotes were in fine financial shape and that the league had buyers just waiting to pounce. One potential owner Jerry Reinsdorf of Chicago has just renounced whatever interest he had shown while another Ice Edge Holdings is scrambling to find the cash to present a credible offer….For now the NHL owns the Coyotes who will definitely stay in Phoenix for at least the 2010-11 season since the municipal council of Glendale has already placed 25-million in an escrow account to cover the teams anticipated losses for the coming season….That financial silliness cant continue. Either Ice Edge comes up the with money and takes control of the team a quite iffy proposition or the NHL starts again looking for a buyer to keep the team in Phoenix.