Mammoth GM Bill Armstrong delivers savage burn on Coyotes

The Utah Mammoth are making noise in the standings, and GM Bill Armstrong made even more by taking a playful swipe at his former club.

While his team prepares to face the Canadiens in Montreal on Saturday, Armstrong took a moment to reflect on Utah’s fast rise and, more hilariously, his former life with the Arizona Coyotes.

Armstrong became Coyotes GM in 2020, overseeing a franchise that constantly fought uphill battles on and off the ice. Fast-forward to 2024, when the team relocated to Salt Lake City and was reborn as the Utah Hockey Club. One year later, they rebranded again as the Mammoth and promptly vaulted into contender territory. After an impressive jump from 77 to 89 points last season, Utah has started 2025-26 at 9-5-0, sitting third in a viciously competitive Central Division.

Asked about watching a rebuild finally come together in a stable environment, Armstrong couldn’t resist dropping one of the sharpest one-liners of the season to Chris Johnston.

“We have a TV set in the video room where the players meet every morning that is probably worth more than our entire facility was in Arizona.”

That’s a full-on roasting of the Coyotes’ notorious facility issues, and Armstrong delivered it with the ease of a man who has lived both extremes: the budget-basement chaos of Tempe and the state-of-the-art investment of Utah’s new ownership.

No franchise in the NHL has transformed more dramatically than the former Coyotes. The Mammoth have become a brand-new organization with a fan base exploding in size, resources pouring in, and a roster showing its teeth.

And if their GM keeps this energy, Utah won’t just stay competitive. They’ll stay entertaining.