The NHLPA has been locked out by the owners for almost 2 months. The powers that be have gone so far to cancel the Winter Classic (Maple Leafs v. Red Wings at the "Big House" in Ann Arbor). Ti be honest, it doesn't look like there will be a 2012-13 season. The weird thing is that NO ONE seems to care!
When the NFL & NBA had their labor issues, there was a lot of activity. The NFLPA was going to court and getting injunctions. The owners were going to different federal courts trying to undo anything the NFLPA had done. There was also a lot of media coverage as well. You saw players & owners looking forlorn as they walked into a hotel. Hell, baseball took a backseat to the NFL lockout. There was even a story about how Dwayne Wade yelled at David Stern during a NBA Labor negotiation. The NHL & the NHLPA seem to be content with not negotiating at all. The most recent offer was a 50/50 split of the ambiguous hockey related income, which was turned down. There's also very little media coverage about the NHL lockout, which I find even more maddening than the actual lockout itself. It shows me how little everyone seems to care about the NHL. The owners (who were all too happy to let the 2004-05 season be cancelled) don't seem to care, the players are all going over to European leagues, ESPN (who never really cared about hockey even when they used to televise games years ago. On a side note I thought Gary Thorne and Bill Clement were a great pair of announcers) doesn't report anything (of course there's not a lot to report on) and the fans don't seem to care either. About the only person who cover the NHL Lockout is Nicholas J. Cotsonika of Yahoo Sports.
Another weird thing is that since the cancelled 2004-05 season, the NHL has enjoyed a solid 5 year run. The Stanley Cup champions have been Detroit, Pittsburgh, Chicago, Boston and Los Angeles. That's 3 Original Six teams, the team in the 2nd largest TV market and the team with arguably the best player at the time (Sydney Crosby). The league enjoyed record revenues after the 2011-12 season and then disaster. Both sides got out their guns and started shooting themselves in the foot. I won't go into the detail about the issues (they've never really changed since the last labor stoppage), for that you can read Cotsonika's stuff or go here.
Donald Fehr is the head of the NHLPA. If you don't remember him, he was the head of the MLBPA during the 1994 mid-season strike that led to the cancellation of the World Series. Fehr is as hardline as they come and there's a reason why the MLBPA got rid of him. Now he's seeking to ruin hockey the way he nearly ruined baseball. On the other side we have Gary Bettman, a disciple of soon to be retired NBA Commissioner David Stern. Who in his nearly 20 year reign as NHL Commissioner (Bettman came in after the 1992 NHL Strike) has had 1994–95 lockout the which had the season trimmed to 48 games & no inter-conference play. Then there was 2004–05 lockout the which lead to the entire season being cancelled! Now he's in jeopardy of losing another season! He just might be the worst commissioner in the history of professional sports. Make no mistake, there's plenty of blame to go around. The owners always seem to cry poverty and can't control their own spending (this is a key aspect of pro sports where the owners want to control costs but give out ridiculous contracts). The players take the guaranteed money and sometimes have spells of play where their effort may not always be there. Then of course there's 20 years of animosity between the players and the owners (it's true in all professional sports).
The big losers as usual, are the fans. The fans pay high prices for tickets to games (that sometime net uninspired play), they pay high prices for merchandise (yes, I have a Buffalo Sabres pillow cover) and the fans watch the games on tv. But it's the fans that suffer. The owners see the fans as cash registers. The players could probably care less about the fans. Let's not forget Jeremy Roenick's statement from the 2004-05 lockout when said that fans could "kiss his ass" in regards to hockey players being spoiled (with the exception of NFL players, most players of the NHL, NBA and MLB are).
Prior to the lockout there were a lot of things wrong with the NHL; the regular season is too long, there are too many teams (teams in markets that they have no business being in and with too many teams that leads to watered down talent) and they don't have a great television deal (I like Versus which is now the NBCSports Channel but not every cable provider offers it). Plus hockey doesn't seem to have a franchise that can polarize people the way the Yankees do in baseball or the Heat does in basketball (the closest franchise would be the Red Wings but it's not the same thing).
Anyway, the lockout doesn't look like it will end soon and both sides seem content with letting it happen. The powers that be do not seem to understand the the NHL is not the NFL. At best hockey is the 4th sport in the totem pole behind the NHL, MLB and the NBA (NFL football is far and away the best pro team sport. NBA maybe 2nd because it skews to a younger demographic than baseball). I think it's more like 5th if you throw MMA into the mix but for team sports it's 4th and it's indisputable. The NHL is in danger of becoming extinct and both sides are letting it happen. If they do come to an agreement, do they think the fans will just welcome them back with open arms (in Canada they probably will and a few markets in the US)? Doubtful. Both sides overestimated the popularity of the sport unfortunately. It took a few years for the fans to come back after the 2004-05 season was cancelled but I suspect it will take even longer this time. Quite frankly, what's to stop this from happening again when the CBA expires? There have been 2 new CBA's following the 1994-95 lockout between the owners & players and after each one expired, we've had prolonged work stoppages.
If all I have this winter is the NBA (I'm disenfranchised with big time college atheltics and can't get into NCAA hoops until March Madness) then it will be a long, dull and cold winter indeed. I guess I can always read more. Thanks for your time.
When the NFL & NBA had their labor issues, there was a lot of activity. The NFLPA was going to court and getting injunctions. The owners were going to different federal courts trying to undo anything the NFLPA had done. There was also a lot of media coverage as well. You saw players & owners looking forlorn as they walked into a hotel. Hell, baseball took a backseat to the NFL lockout. There was even a story about how Dwayne Wade yelled at David Stern during a NBA Labor negotiation. The NHL & the NHLPA seem to be content with not negotiating at all. The most recent offer was a 50/50 split of the ambiguous hockey related income, which was turned down. There's also very little media coverage about the NHL lockout, which I find even more maddening than the actual lockout itself. It shows me how little everyone seems to care about the NHL. The owners (who were all too happy to let the 2004-05 season be cancelled) don't seem to care, the players are all going over to European leagues, ESPN (who never really cared about hockey even when they used to televise games years ago. On a side note I thought Gary Thorne and Bill Clement were a great pair of announcers) doesn't report anything (of course there's not a lot to report on) and the fans don't seem to care either. About the only person who cover the NHL Lockout is Nicholas J. Cotsonika of Yahoo Sports.
Another weird thing is that since the cancelled 2004-05 season, the NHL has enjoyed a solid 5 year run. The Stanley Cup champions have been Detroit, Pittsburgh, Chicago, Boston and Los Angeles. That's 3 Original Six teams, the team in the 2nd largest TV market and the team with arguably the best player at the time (Sydney Crosby). The league enjoyed record revenues after the 2011-12 season and then disaster. Both sides got out their guns and started shooting themselves in the foot. I won't go into the detail about the issues (they've never really changed since the last labor stoppage), for that you can read Cotsonika's stuff or go here.
Donald Fehr is the head of the NHLPA. If you don't remember him, he was the head of the MLBPA during the 1994 mid-season strike that led to the cancellation of the World Series. Fehr is as hardline as they come and there's a reason why the MLBPA got rid of him. Now he's seeking to ruin hockey the way he nearly ruined baseball. On the other side we have Gary Bettman, a disciple of soon to be retired NBA Commissioner David Stern. Who in his nearly 20 year reign as NHL Commissioner (Bettman came in after the 1992 NHL Strike) has had 1994–95 lockout the which had the season trimmed to 48 games & no inter-conference play. Then there was 2004–05 lockout the which lead to the entire season being cancelled! Now he's in jeopardy of losing another season! He just might be the worst commissioner in the history of professional sports. Make no mistake, there's plenty of blame to go around. The owners always seem to cry poverty and can't control their own spending (this is a key aspect of pro sports where the owners want to control costs but give out ridiculous contracts). The players take the guaranteed money and sometimes have spells of play where their effort may not always be there. Then of course there's 20 years of animosity between the players and the owners (it's true in all professional sports).
The big losers as usual, are the fans. The fans pay high prices for tickets to games (that sometime net uninspired play), they pay high prices for merchandise (yes, I have a Buffalo Sabres pillow cover) and the fans watch the games on tv. But it's the fans that suffer. The owners see the fans as cash registers. The players could probably care less about the fans. Let's not forget Jeremy Roenick's statement from the 2004-05 lockout when said that fans could "kiss his ass" in regards to hockey players being spoiled (with the exception of NFL players, most players of the NHL, NBA and MLB are).
Prior to the lockout there were a lot of things wrong with the NHL; the regular season is too long, there are too many teams (teams in markets that they have no business being in and with too many teams that leads to watered down talent) and they don't have a great television deal (I like Versus which is now the NBCSports Channel but not every cable provider offers it). Plus hockey doesn't seem to have a franchise that can polarize people the way the Yankees do in baseball or the Heat does in basketball (the closest franchise would be the Red Wings but it's not the same thing).
Anyway, the lockout doesn't look like it will end soon and both sides seem content with letting it happen. The powers that be do not seem to understand the the NHL is not the NFL. At best hockey is the 4th sport in the totem pole behind the NHL, MLB and the NBA (NFL football is far and away the best pro team sport. NBA maybe 2nd because it skews to a younger demographic than baseball). I think it's more like 5th if you throw MMA into the mix but for team sports it's 4th and it's indisputable. The NHL is in danger of becoming extinct and both sides are letting it happen. If they do come to an agreement, do they think the fans will just welcome them back with open arms (in Canada they probably will and a few markets in the US)? Doubtful. Both sides overestimated the popularity of the sport unfortunately. It took a few years for the fans to come back after the 2004-05 season was cancelled but I suspect it will take even longer this time. Quite frankly, what's to stop this from happening again when the CBA expires? There have been 2 new CBA's following the 1994-95 lockout between the owners & players and after each one expired, we've had prolonged work stoppages.
If all I have this winter is the NBA (I'm disenfranchised with big time college atheltics and can't get into NCAA hoops until March Madness) then it will be a long, dull and cold winter indeed. I guess I can always read more. Thanks for your time.
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