My Brilliant Plan To Buy The Coyotes And Keep Them In Phoenix (Humor)

Dear Mr. Bettman,

As a resident of Phoenix, Arizona and as a loyal fan of the Phoenix Coyotes, it pains me to see my team's future more muddled than both the plot of Vanilla Sky and Tom Cruise's face from said movie.  That I would even mention Tom Cruise to you is quite indicative of how terrible I feel about the prospect of losing my favorite team.

I understand that above all, it is your goal to find an owner who will keep the team in Phoenix for the foreseeable future.

Mr. Bettman, I am your man.  I would love to purchase the Phoenix Coyotes, and keep them in Phoenix for many years to come.

I have been saving up several, SEVERAL hundreds of dollars to go towards a down payment on a car, as mine is quite old.  However, seeing as the public transportation system in Phoenix is finally showing more signs of life than its hockey team, I am willing to instead commit these several hundred- nay, few thousand- dollars to a down payment on a hockey team instead.

While this bid may be considerably less than other bids for the team, I can assure you that I am not Canadian, nor do I have any close friends or relatives from Canada.  My friend Matt sometimes tells people he's from Canada as a joke, but if he tries to do this to you, just tell him to identify Darius Kasparitis and I'm certain he'll tell you it's a disease of the lower intestinal region, thereby eliminating the possibility that he is from Canada.

Now clearly, there is a major problem involved with playing games in the city of Glendale.  The new light rails in Phoenix don't go anywhere near Jobing.com Arena, and I don't trust my old car to make it all the way there and back to my place for much more than a quarter of the season.  Also, the lease agreement sucks.  So, playing the games in Glendale will pose a significant problem.  However, I think I have a solution which will appease all parties.

My friend Bill just got a sweet new HDTV, and my other friend Pierre has an Xbox 360.  I could probably arrange it so that we could set up Pierre's Xbox 360 at Bill's house, then we could all team up to buy NHL 10 when it comes out, and we could simulate the home games on the Xbox 360 and watch them on Bill's TV.  I've heard the graphics on that game are supposed to be incredibly realistic, and they'll definitely showcase to the world that Jobing.com Arena is indeed one of the nicest places in the world to play hockey.  Bill's house can fit about 54 people in it to watch the games live, which, by my estimation, will approximately triple the current viewing audience the Coyotes have.  Also, I will charge for parking.

Obviously, there is still a major unresolved issue with simply taking the team from the City of Glendale and moving them into Bill's house.  That issue is, of course, that Pierre doesn't have enough space on his memory card to save the results from the simulated games.  Hence, I would expect the City of Glendale to purchase a 64-MB memory card for Pierre.

It is also my understanding that Wayne Gretzky's contract would not be assumed were I to acquire the team, and I would therefore have to make a difficult decision with regards to naming a coach.  However, again I believe I have a solution which will satisfy all parties.  I'll bring Gretzky back as a player-coach.

The create-a-player feature in NHL 10 will allow Gretzky to be incorporated into the team smoothly.  I could give him stats that will make him like his NHL '94 counterpart, or I could even turn him into our team's top pugilist.  Regardless, I believe that Gretzky's inevitable return to prominence as a player should spark enough local interest in the team and attention from the media to keep the Coyotes in Phoenix for many years to come.

As for other expenditures...

Your decision to have the team ride on charter flights to road games should save a lot of money, and as long as we institute a policy prohibiting our players from purchasing snacks and drinks on those flights, my franchise should be able to afford most of its most expensive players.

I assume, because of his incredible loyalty to the team and the city of Phoenix, that Shane Doan won't mind being a "volunteer player" for a couple years.

I won't have to hire a broadcasting team, as NHL 10 has its own broadcasters.

The money saved from that, plus not having to pay ice maintenance people and other stadium workers, should allow me to afford the contracts of all of the players and training staff.  Also, our mascot, Howler, will stay with the team as both its mascot and top surgical expert.

I will need some security guards to guard Bill's house and Pierre's Xbox, so to afford their salaries, we'll plan on having food sales at Bill's house during games.  His girlfriend makes an amazing chicken parm sandwich, so as long as they don't break up, I should be able to afford security guards.

Rather than hire an entire scouting department, I'll hire one guy to follow as many scouts and professionals as he can on Twitter.  He'll also be our GM.  His Twitter name will not contain the phrase "bettmansucks" like those of 17 of the other 29 NHL GMs.

We'll need to practice in other teams' practice facilities until we can afford our own here in Phoenix, but I'll ask the other owners very nicely if they'd be willing to share.

By my calculations, we won't have enough money to keep Ed Jovanovski or hire any assistant coaches, but we'll simply solve the former problem by contacting the New York Rangers, and solve the latter by having Doaner take extra volunteer positions as power-play specialist and goaltending coach.

The franchise will be operating at a slight loss for the first year, but as soon as the team starts winning and Gretzky becomes an All-Star selection once again, I'm certain that the team will attract a loyal fan base.  Then we'll be able to afford to uproot Jobing.com arena and place it downtown, possibly on top of U.S. Airways Center, and then the team can move back in.  Problem solved.  It'll be just like when the Coyotes first moved to Phoenix... the days that proved that Phoenix is a viable hockey market when the team made the playoffs sometimes and the fans didn't need to syphon each other's gasoline to get them to the stadium.

To summarize, I am not Jim Balsillie.  Please approve me as new owner of the Phoenix Coyotes, and I can promise you success in Phoenix for the long-term.

Sincerely,

Adam Rosenthal

P.S. I cannot stress enough that my name is not Jim Balsillie.