Bickley: Coyotes not out of the woods – or Glendale – just yet

Robert Sarver believes in the future of basketball and soccer. He's not so certain about hockey in Arizona. His viewpoint will be very important in the coming years.

Don't get him wrong. He's not against the idea. The Suns majority owner says he'd have no problems sharing a multipurpose facility with the Coyotes somewhere down the road. But he's a very successful businessman who didn't get rich buying into pipe dreams, and there are some numbers you might not know.

Sarver says his Suns pay $23 million a year just to play at US Airways Center: $12 million in debt service, $8 million in arena management costs and $3 million in rent. A new arena capable of housing a NBA team and a NHL franchise starts at $500 million, and that's being conservative.

There will be contentious fighting over the levels of public subsidy, guaranteed. Sarver and his people have already studied that subject extensively, from construction tabs to political costs to emotional scars left behind. At the end of it all, it's going to take a partnership and a lot of upfront money to make any new stadium a reality.

After living under sweetheart terms in Glendale, can the Coyotes afford that kind of high-rent neighborhood?

These are fair questions because this much is certain: The idea of Downtown Sports Mecca 2.0 is both romantic and exhilarating, a bustling blueprint where the Coyotes and Suns perform over 80 nights a year, supplemented by rockers, rappers and circus elephants. The logistics are much more difficult.

Start with the stadium game, where the Valley has a pretty good record. The opening of America West Arena in 1992 coincided with the arrival of Charles Barkley and a team that reached the NBA Finals. The construction of Bank One Ballpark was far too ambitious and incendiary, and a Maricopa County Supervisor literally took a bullet for the team. Yet it promptly hosted the greatest World Series ever played, and remains the only plot of land where one of major professional teams have hoisted a championship trophy.

Meanwhile, after barely surviving Proposition 302, the Cardinals have parlayed their football stadium into one of the great franchise turnarounds in American sports. From a civic perspective, the return on that investment has been stunning, changing the Valley sports scene almost overnight.

The Coyotes are a different story. Their migration to Glendale has been a disaster. The team has been in flux since 2009, and their current home might end up as both a white elephant and a warning label to all communities looking to break ground in the near future.

On paper, they seem to be wonderful tenants. They have full support of NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman. They have an excellent general manager (Don Maloney) and a head coach with a great local reputation (Dave Tippett). They have a short history of success in downtown Phoenix, playing in a flawed arena with terrible sightlines for hockey. Most of their problems can be traced to a bad real estate gamble when they moved to Glendale in 2003, betting on the West Valley two decades before its time.

But here's the thing: The small measure of mainstream popularity the Coyotes achieved while playing downtown wasn't just a matter of location. That team had some big names, like Jeremy Roenick, Keith Tkachuk and Rick Tocchet. They had charisma and real star power. They seemed on the brink of something very big.

Those who lived it can attest: from 1997-2000, the Coyotes were part of our daily conversation.

Will we react the same if a house-poor franchise moves downtown with a bad team and a bottom-tier payroll? Does hockey automatically work in the Valley just because it seemed to work in the past?

These are all fair questions because hard questions are necessary. The Coyotes have been talking a good game for years, and they are still struggling for traction. When Andrew Barroway came on as majority owner in January, the transition was said to give the Coyotes enhanced financial stability and flexibility. Until he was no longer the guy in charge.

Along the way, we have learned to never trust the white knights that need long periods of time to complete a transaction.

When the city of Glendale canceled the lease agreement with the Coyotes, team CEO Anthony LeBlanc called it "possibly the most shameful exhibition of government I have ever witnessed," swearing he would never settle out of court. Except six weeks later, that's just what happened.

The team has explanations and positive spin for everything, but in matters of public trust, deeds count more than words. And if they can't afford to fight Glendale in the short term, how can they afford to split costs at US Airways Center for a few years until a new arena is built? How can they afford to be partners in a much bigger enterprise? And in the end, can they get Sarver fully on board?

For now, the Suns owner is finalizing his purchase of Levante, a Spanish soccer club. One of his partners is Steve Nash, who will run the soccer operations. That reunion seems both tantalizing and bittersweet. If they win a championship together on foreign soil, it will come many years too late for Sarver's primary customers on Planet Orange.

"As you get to understand professional sports, you see the power of soccer and basketball," Sarver said. "They are the two sports that everyone is playing all over the world. They're the only sports that both boys and girls are playing, which is why countries like China and India are so interested in them. Long term, it makes sense.

"As for the Suns, I think our younger players are developing nicely. I think we've drafted well. I think we've added a strong leader in Tyson (Chandler). And for the second year in a row, we finished second for the best free agent on the market. So we're getting close."

Will their future include the Coyotes? If not, our hockey franchise could find salvation on an Indian reservation, near the Salt River Fields complex. And if that fails, the city of Seattle seems to be the new threat for relocation, now that Las Vegas and Quebec City have officially applied for an expansion franchise.

Many of us yearn for a happy ending for the Coyotes, a team and a fan base that deserves better. The reality is much harder than the dream.

Reach Bickley at dan.bickley@arizonarepublic.com or 602-444-8253. Follow him at twitter.com/danbickley. Listen to "Bickley and Marotta," weekdays from 12-2 p.m. on Arizona Sports 98.7 FM.