Max Domi: How A Recall Could Help The Coyotes

Max Domi making an appearance could be good for the Coyotes

If you’re an Arizona Coyotes fan, you’ve probably got the London Knights schedule bookmarked.

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At the World Junior Championships, 19-year-old Domi — son of former Toronto Maple Leafs bruiser Tie — lit it up for Team Canada en route to the nation’s first World Juniors gold medal. He’s on pace to easily break 2 PPG this season in the OHL (with ten games on hand from the WJC), and he’s making it look easy to score fancy goals. OHL Goalies are begging him to buy them drinks before he wrecks them, and he’s learning to be a leader as this season’s captain in London.

So calling him up seems like the way to save the season, right?

Well, according to the 2013 CBA, the team can’t call him up quite yet — and they’ll almost certainly have to wait until the London Knights are eliminated from the Memorial Cup. In the instance that the Knights manage to advance to the Memorial Cup itself, he won’t be able to come around at all — the competition, hosted by the Quebec Remparts, is being held from May 21-31 this year.

Calling him up once he’s finished playing for the London Knights, though — assuming the team has time following the Knights’ Memorial Cup run — would mean more than just salvation for the season. It could grow the fanbase and get new Coyotes fans to look at showing up for games next season.

Is the fan growth worth it?

Absolutely.

We all say that hockey is about the game, but — as with any form of professional entertainment — hockey is a business.

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According to the CBA, Domi has extended his entry-level contract by two seasons; based on this, he’s not eligible to enter into contract negotiations until the end of the 2017-2018 season.

Players who are eligible within the next couple of seasons, though? Keith Yandle (who becomes a UFA next summer, and will undoubtedly want a raise), Connor Murphy, Brandon Gormley, Michael Stone, Tobias Rieder, Lucas Lessio… the list goes on and on.

One of the biggest controversies this spring has been whether the Coyotes can afford to extend pending UFAs Zbnyek Michalek and Antoine Vermette. The team’s budget doesn’t currently have room for many high-profile players — and although the salary cap is bound to go up this summer (raising the cap floor with it and forcing teams to increase player spending), Arizona won’t be able to remain sustainably competitive without increased fan attendance and viewership.

We joke that ‘winning teams bring fans’, but it’s not just a winning culture that brings views — it’s exciting hockey.

Think about it — teams that win don’t always bring fans, because they aren’t wowing the crowds. Die hard hockey fans will come to games no matter what, and casual hockey fans will pay for tickets when their team is winning.

In a non-traditional hockey market, though, you need someone who’s going to draw you in by providing entertainment that hesitant fans can’t get anywhere else. This isn’t saying the Coyotes need to bring in Nikita Gusev or hire Cirque du Soleil to send them ice girls — but if your new, young goal scorer sticks his tongue out like Miley Cyrus every time he nets a goal, and flips the puck over goalies to score a couple showy points a month, it’s a lot easier to convince people to shell out the money for a ticket. Hockey is growing in Arizona, but you need a reason for it to grow beyond the people who would already come to a hockey game — and Max Domi’s a great way to do that.

General Manager Don Maloney suggested that Domi could be headed to Arizona before the end of the season — and while the team doesn’t need the spare change worth of goals he could provide, they certainly could benefit from giving the Glendale community a taste of what they’re in for.

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