Mullett Arena experience more fun than a horrible haircut

Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 28/10/2022 (691 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

TEMPE, Ariz. – There’s no argument that watching a National Hockey League game at Mullett Arena, the brand new and temporary hockey home of the Arizona Coyotes, is a surreal and fun experience.

There is no other venue in the NHL that offers such an intimate setting or feel, with all 5,026 seats providing a premier view of the action, and the kind of energy the team’s former rink in Glendale – Gila River Arena, an 18,000-seat venue that barely averaged half capacity – only wished it could have duplicated the last 20 years. It’s like watching a headliner band do a show in a small cabaret, but with way more violence.

Over the course of a 41-game home schedule, not including playoffs – which, to be clear, is a pipedream for this Coyotes club and one that, given their roster, is so clearly tanking for the hope of landing future 2023 No.1 pick Connor Bedard – fans will get a chance to watch NHL stars like Edmonton’s Connor McDavid and Toronto’s Auston Matthews in a way never seen before. Picture a college vibe with better, bigger and faster talent on the ice, and a game-day experience that includes a drum line, cheerleaders, creative and constant chants, as well as bench seating reserved for a raucous student section.

For Friday’s home-opener – a 3-2 overtime loss to the Winnipeg Jets – the Coyotes leaned into their unusual and unintentionally hilarious title, which is named after the Mullett family, specifically Donald “Donze” and Barbara Mullett, longtime benefactors of Arizona State University. Fans showed up to the arena with mullet wigs – equipped with long blonde hair held together by a black headband with the words “Go Coyotes Go” and “You Do You” emblazoned on the front and back – hanging off their seat, so you know they like to have fun.

Now that we’ve got most of the positives out of the way, it’s time for this column to take a stark turn.

What’s happening with the Coyotes is a massive black eye on the NHL. As distinctive the experience is, the good is heavily outweighed by the bad, even if some will try to convince you otherwise.

Where to begin.

Let’s start with how we got here and how long the Coyotes will continue to play in a facility that would never fly with any of the other three major sports leagues. I can’t even imagine the NFL, NBA or MLB slumming it the way the Coyotes are right now, and that’s no offence to Mullett Arena, which is so new you can still smell the paint on the walls, and is a terrific venue for a U.S. college team.

It wasn’t supposed to be this way for the Coyotes, who, up until August of 2021, still had a lease agreement with the city of Glendale. But as the team’s outstanding bills on the arena continued to add up, eclipsing more than $1 million, which only added strain to an already strenuous relationship, the City ultimately booted the Coyotes out of Gila River Arena.

That forced the Coyotes to find a new place to play, all while simultaneously pushing forward plans to build a new arena in the city of Tempe, just miles from where they’re currently playing. The team worked with Tempe and Arizona State University, leading to a deal that would see the Coyotes and Sun Devils, ASU’s men’s hockey team and main occupants of Mullett Arena, share the same facility.

Coyotes owner Alex Meruelo agreed to invest US$30 million as part of the deal, the money used to construct an annex to Mullett Arena consisting of home and visitor locker rooms, offices for Coyotes brass, among other facilities. But while they’ve tried hard to bring the home of the Sun Devils up to NHL standards, much has fallen short, with delays in construction only adding insult to injury.

Because media beef is the least tasty, I’ll keep this part brief. There is no formal press box as of yet, with reporters scrunched together on seats in an area normally used for standing room only, their view obstructed any time an exciting play develops that forces fans seated directly below to stand up. The home and away broadcasts are set up in a corporate suite with the best view, positioned at centre ice, though to accommodate all cameras, they’re also taking up space on the concourse.

The locker rooms still aren’t completed, so for the first four regular-season games, the Coyotes are using ASU’s visitors locker room, which are four rooms separated by what look like metal garage doors. What’s more – and worse – is that for the first four teams lucky enough to visit Mullett Arena (Jets, Rangers, Panthers and Stars), the Coyotes have built a dressing room on a neighbouring community rink, with rubber floors covering the ice and black curtains for privacy.

Jets rookie forward Cole Perfetti, who, by all accounts, seemed to actually enjoy the overall experience, noted that because the room was built above an ice surface, the floors were cold to walk on, even when wearing heavy socks. Others used words like “unique” or “different” to describe the experience, though you knew if they had been injected with truth serum the language would be far less diplomatic.

No one on the Jets was willing to add fuel to the fire. Perhaps it was a team objective led by club owner Mark Chipman, who is cozy with NHL commissioner Gary Bettman, who has spent years trying to breathe life into a Coyotes organization that has spent its entire existence on life support and appears dead set on making this his lasting legacy. Or maybe they were just too embarrassed or cautious to comment; after all, hockey players aren’t known to speak out against the establishment, another fact that separates them from the rest of the Big Four.

That could very well change over time, though, given the current plan is to have the Coyotes call Mullett Arena home for the foreseeable future, with the seemingly best-case scenario being three years. It could be even longer, as Meruelo’s vision of a 16,000-seat arena, surrounded by hotels, retail shops, restaurants and residential housing, is still a ways away from being a done deal.

A lot can happen over that time. And as we’ve witnessed the last few years, even the best-laid plans can sometimes go awry.

What happens if a year or two down the road, the Coyotes dip in interest, or what if fans, despite incredible sight lines and atmosphere, aren’t willing to shell out the high price tag of tickets, which for a majority range between US$165 and US$230, with the best seats in the house coming in as high as US$650. And while the watching experience is up there with the best in the NHL, that doesn’t prevent the concourse from being incredibly congested and the lines for the bathroom uncomfortably long during intermission.

Winning can often cure all that ails, but the Coyotes will be hard pressed to make the playoffs anytime soon. They’ll also be in tough to attract quality talent through free agency or acquire players that are protected by various trade and no-movement clauses, so long as they’re providing a substandard environment.

The Coyotes are unlikely to generate much of a profit, if any, under their current conditions.

Their main forms of revenue are limited to ticket and merchandise sales, a secret percentage of concessions during their games, and ad sales on the ribbon boards wrapped around the arena that are still waiting to be completed. As for money generated from the arena’s naming rights, sponsorships that line the boards and other parts, and events held at the arena, such as concerts, all that goes to Oak View Group, who is responsible for running the arena.

It’s no secret NHL players are quietly angered by how much less they make compared to other pro athletes, which is a direct result of their league’s bottom line, which in turn determines important things like the salary cap and how much players pay into escrow each year.

I can’t imagine watching what’s unfolding in Arizona is an easy pill to swallow, and with no clear remedy in sight, they’ll just have to stomach it with the hope things improve over time. If they ever do.

Jeff.Hamilton@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @jeffkhamilton