In honour of the upcoming Coyotes-Kings match-up, I thought it was only fitting to highlight a few of the reasons why we should all seriously question the existence of this franchise. When I first had the idea for this article I debated whether it was a good idea to write it, after all I didn’t want to anger a bunch of my readers, but then I remembered the Coyotes only have about 5000 fans so I figured it was a risk worth taking.

Phoenix has given us so much ammunition to work with in an article like this, but I did my best to narrow it down to the top ten. Without further adieu…

10. Let’s face it, we’re all tired of hearing about their ownership situation

The debacle that is the Phoenix ownership situation has been raging on for more than 3 years now and I for one have grown tired of hearing about it. The constant parade of potential owners backing out of the sale or being denied by the NHL has been draining enough to watch, but seeing the lack of support that the team has been given by the city of Glendale and their city council has been even more ridiculous. If we as fans are tired of hearing about all of this, just think how the players feel.

9. A Tribute to RIM and Jim Balsillie

As BlackBerry continues to produce inferior products and RIM’s stock prices continue to plummet, one has to think that Jim Balsillie has had a rough few years. What better way for the Coyotes to show their support for the only man who has ever wanted to own this team, than to go down with him as his company inevitably goes under. I think it would be a wonderful tribute to a man who fought tooth and nail to move this team to a market that would actually care about hockey and support the franchise.

8. Any team that has that much love for Jeremy Roenick should be shut down

How does a team come to love and support Jeremy Roenick? I mean come on, the Jets/Coyotes have had so many greats play for them: Selanne, Tkachuk, Hawerchuck, Hull; It is a real shame to see the likes of Jeremy Roenick honoured with those players.

Now I know what you’re thinking: “Well the Kings signed Roenick to a contract once”. It’s true, they did. But the difference there is they only kept him around for one season and pretty much every Kings fan now hates his guts.

7. Paul Bissonnette has only played 16 games this season

The Coyotes should be ashamed for depriving the hockey world of the famed BizNasty. While his hockey skills might not live up to his Twitter skills, his 224,000 followers would like to see a whole lot more of BizNasty than they are currently seeing. The Coyotes are depriving the NHL of one of its greats, and for that they should be ashamed.

6. No one wants to play there anyways

In the past two seasons alone the Coyotes have watched some of their bigger names walk out on the franchise. Bryzgalov took a plane to Philly and signed a monster contract the Coyotes would have never matched, Turris decided he had no interest in re-signing as an RFA and made it clear that it wasn’t about the money (he eventually signed, only to be traded to Ottawa a few weeks later), and now the possibility exists that Doan may be on his way out as well, sighting continuing ownership problems as a main factor. This franchise has become toxic for both the NHL and its players and I think everyone needs a fresh start. Sorry Glendale, but it’s just not working out.

5. Have you heard Tyson Nash’s colour commentary?

It’s awful. Like actually the worst in the NHL. I have the NHL Centre Ice package so I see broadcasts from all over the NHL; there are a lot of homer announcers out there, but Nash definitely takes the cake. I once watched an entire Kings game on mute just so I wouldn’t have to listen to him talk about how dirty the Kings were and how unfairly the referees were treating the Coyotes. I sometimes wonder if he is one of the reasons no one watches the Coyotes play…

4. They hired Tyson Nash.

See #5.

3. What is that???

There are some bad ones out there, but this jersey takes the cake as one of the worst all-time:

, via Wikimedia Commons”]

By Supertoff (Subway Restaurant) [GFDL (www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html) or CC-BY-SA-3.0-2.5-2.0-1.0 (www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)

Last I heard, the NHL and the Phoenix Coyotes still owe Wayne Gretzky about $8 million dollars. The debacle with the Coyotes ownership situation has helped contribute to a rift between the Great One and the NHL and the Coyotes are at least partly to blame for the continued absence of Gretzky from the game. Wayne is the NHL’s greatest ambassador and right now he is noticeably absent; I blame Phoenix.

1. Shane Doan

As any of my good friends will tell you, I have an unbridled, irrational hatred for Shane Doan. I hate him so much that I would buy a Roenick jersey before I’d buy a Doan jersey (for evidence of how much I hate Roenick, see #8). With each year that Doan is a Coyote, my disgust for the team continues to grow and with his time in Phoenix possibly drawing to a close I may come to hate the Coyotes a little less, but I will hate Doan all the same. Maybe he’ll sign with Anaheim, then I could hate him even more…

So there you have it, 10 entirely legitimate reasons to question the continued existence of the Coyotes. With any luck, the NHL will have mercy on us all soon and allow the team to move to a city that cares. Until then, I can continue creating asinine lists such as this one to channel my ire. Feel free to post your reasons for questioning the Coyotes existence below!