A lack of transparency and trust plagued the former Arizona Coyotes. Will it travel to Utah, too?
It's not often I ask this question, but as a fan, I have to:
"What happened to all the news with the Utah NHL team?"
Just recently, it seemed Utah made their biggest move by snapping up Chris Armstrong as their alternate governor and lead of hockey operations to oversee general manager Bill Armstrong.
Outside of that announcement, Ryan Smith has played everything very close to the vest.
The fact that Ryan Smith and his wife are keeping all of the fans in the dark on his next move, hockey-wise, shouldn't worry anyone.
(I mean, after all, it's not like the Coyotes did the same thing for close to 30 years with their revolving door of owners — including the NHL, right?)
But what should be worrying us fans is the "close to the vest" strategy didn't work in Arizona — and it appears Utah is following the same playbook.
After all, it was only a month ago when the NHL shocked the sports world with the Coyotes' relocation and deactivation announcements that had been swept under the rug for months, even years.
(It didn't help they flew their general manager to Edmonton and told the team to basically pack up and leave within two weeks.)
If it's Ryan Smith's intention to keep his next hockey-related move a surprise, I'm okay with it.
The only thing that concerns me is if the organization drops a bombshell on some form of off-ice issues — arena problems, tax issues, etc., that we don't know about for months, then the whole fanbase could see a repeat of the Arizona mess.
Trust takes time to build, and that requires transparency and commitment from all parties involved.
The owners' groups in Arizona never had that, and the way the relocation process was handled makes building trust all the more difficult.
And that, in a nutshell, is why everyone should be concerned with the current lack of transparency from the Smiths and the Utah front office — for now.