NHL: Parched Ice

By Noah Davis UsFANS.com Managing Editor

Almost five years ago - after an often bitter, often humiliating public debate - the Winnipeg Jets NHL franchise was pried loose from the Manitoba capital and relocated to the Arizona desert.

The powers that be assured us that this was the best thing for the franchise because the Phoenix Coyotes would have every advantage the poor, old Jets never had. The Coyotes, simply put, were the face of the new NHL. And it was suntanned, not frost-bitten. The desert air would be good for the constitution.

Winnipeg is half-laughing now. Up on the frozen tundra they know that on their worst day, the Jets didn't look half as mismanaged or misdirected as the ensemble from Phoenix which is stumbling now like Gerald Ford down a flight of stairs.

The Coyotes are losing money like they were an Internet start-up. They would have been sold to Paul Allen and Portland last year had Gary Bettman, who has so much invested in this franchise, not arranged a marriage of convenience between Richard Ellman and Wayne Gretzky, who are about to take over ownership of the ‘Yotes.

The team's sale has taken longer to negotiate than NAFTA, leaving current general manager Bobby Smith in an awkward, lame duck position and creating a toxic relationship between the outgoing regime and the Ellman-Gretzky axis.

"I find myself saying the same things I was saying six years ago," said defenseman Teppo Numminen, an 11-year veteran of the Jets/Coyotes - a stint that should qualify him for NHL sainthood. "It's interesting. We talk about the things we can control. What else can you do?"

What else, indeed.

The whole situation is funnier than Robin Williams.

Five years ago, while the sale of the Jets was going through, Coyotes owner Richard Burke was given free and unfettered access to the hockey operation by outgoing Winnipeg owner Barry Shenkarow. This led to a huge new contract for Keith Tkachuk, which was underwritten by the citizens of Winnipeg and Manitoba, and the trading of Teemu Selanne.

The rules, however, are a little different this time around. Burke and Smith have effectively barred Gretzky, et al, from the Coyotes' corridors while Ellman tries to raise the money to close the deal. Thus, Claude Lemieux works out at a Phoenix rink, waiting for the sale to be concluded so he can sign as a free agent.

Smith, meanwhile, was given a two-year contract extension by Burke, which means Ellman and friends will be eating some serious dough once the sale goes through. And Smith wasn't the only member of the hockey department to receive an extension – extensions that the new ownership will have to live with, for better or worse.

This sale, in fact, would be deader than Roseanne's career if Bettman hadn't made it his sworn duty to keep the NHL alive in Phoenix. Which is understandable, as Phoenix represents everything that is supposed to be Bettman's NHL. You wouldn't expect him to admit defeat that easily.

Bettman has contorted himself into knots trying to make this thing fly. When Burke, who lost $15 million US on the Coyotes last season, was playing footsie with Portland, Bettman introduced Gretzky to Ellman. Gretzky's participation has since cost him his business relationship with longtime agent Mike Barnett - although there's a school of thought that says Barnett eventually will quit the agent biz and reunite with the Great One. It's also cost Gretzky some $10 million of his own money when he wasn't supposed to put a dime into the deal.

The shadowy Ellman, for his part, continues to knock on doors and Bettman continues to bend over backward for him. This off-season a couple of teams were sniffing around a Coyotes' front-office type when the call went out that Gretzky wanted to keep the guy. Both teams suddenly lost interest.

In the end, one supposes, the combined efforts of Gretzky, Bettman and the rest of the desert’s unholy alliance will pull this deal through. Phoenix is simply too valuable a market for the NHL to lose, on a practical and a symbolic level.

It has the desired location and the desired demographics. With those givens, the league eventually can make it work.

All Winnipeg had to offer was fans that loved the game. The poor saps never had a chance.

Article courtesy of wwwusFans.com