Av-onomics: looking up.

• Author: Schley, Stewart
• Position: SPORTS biz

FOR COLORADO AVALANCHE FANS, THE BEST thing about the new National Hockey League season is that it's just that: new.

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After closing the books on a forgettable year, the Avalanche returned to the ice with a legend in the coach's box and a much-improved vibe among the fan base, if anecdotal chatter means anything. I know this because the guy at the neighborhood liquor store was practically salivating the other clay about going to the Oct. 4 home opener against Nashville, and my Face-book friends are ga-ga over the Avs early in the campaign. If those aren't valid indicators, I'll eat my puck.

For a more nuanced opinion on Av-onomics, we'll have to wait until later this month when the Forbes NHL team valuation estimates For 2013 are published. But the smart guessing is they'll show Kroenke Sports Enterprises hasn't exactly busted the bank with its investment in the Avalanche.

Last year, early on, in the misery of a lockout-shortened, cellar-destined, 12-21-5 season, Forbes pegged the Avalanche's enterprise value at $210 million, barely more than the $202 million that Forbes says boss Stan Kroenke paid to acquire the team in 2000. With estimated revenue of $91 million, a player payroll of $54 million and operating income of just $4.3 million, the Avalanche ranked 18 among 30 NHL teams for overall value. (The Toronto Maple Leafs topped the charts at $1 billion.)

Chances are the updated numbers won't look much better after a 2012-2013 season in which average home attendance was 15,444--well below the roughly 18,000 the Avalanche routinely hit at Pepsi Center during the heyday of the longest sell-out run in NHL history. That 487-game streak started at McNichols Sports Arena in 1995 and continued through Oct. 2006. Attendance has hovered around the 15,000 mark for the last three years, and with the Avalanche missing the playoffs last spring for the fifth time in seven seasons, the prospects for a revival seemed weak during the off-season.

But this year's early sentiment may tilt in Kroenke's favor, especially after the Avalanche began the season with a 3-0 record and a new coach whose early penchant for histrionics from the bench seemed destined to elevate the entertainment level all by...