The candian press recently got NHLPA executive director Bob Goodenow and NHL commish Gary Bettman together and a fight didn't break out. Of course there won't be any pucks being dropped anytime soon either.
The people running were certaily harsher on Goodenow than Bettman.
Here are some of the highlights: (I put my thoughts in Italics)
``We've tried to find a common ground and tried to find a fair solution but the only response we've got from Gary Bettman and the owners so far is that it has to be a cap, it has to be a cap, and as long as that's the stance,unfortunately, this lockout is going to continue,'' said Goodenow.
HMMM...what about the NFL, they have a cap with tons more money coming in and they aren't starving on the streets.
Andrew Stelmack, in the studio audience, said he had no empathy for theplayers, who make $1.8 million US on average now and who would still get $1.3million US on average if the NHL had its way.``Hockey players are highly paid and they deserve to be highly paid,'' saidGoodenow. ``It is a marketplace and it has worked for many, many decades and webelieve that some type of marketplace going forward is the ultimate fair kind of system for fans, players and owners.
Um...the markeplace has worked terribly in the last few years. Over half a dozen teams have almost gone belly up in front of our eyes. Small market teams have had to give away star players for buckets of pucks.
Rob Van Wallegham, speaking from Calgary, said ``the union appears to beperpetuating the greed of the players.''
Goodenow didn't like that.
``The players are not greedy, not at all,'' he said. Some people might be jealous of their wealth, he suggested.``Sometimes people say, `I'm mad at the players,''' he said. `
`The reality is,what we're trying to do is to make sure the public knows: one, the players arelocked out; two, that they want to play; three, that their salaries have beenset by the owners, and salaries go up and down based on their performance.``
It's not the players triggering these problems. The problems are complex and dynamic. It's important for the public to understand . . . that the players are not asking for more. The players are asking for just a fair share and a marketplace system.''
Shouldn't the accept the good with the bad? They are sharing a shrinking market. There will be no market if players aren't back on the ice ASAP. Americans have short attention spans. I think more people are jealous of their talent then their wealth. We are mad at the players because many of them don't seem to give a damn about the game. Goodenow I guess forgets who pays their salary. How cocky of him to boil the anger down to simple jealousy. Clearly, his side doesn't give a damn about the fans or was in a coma during the baseball lockout which damaged the game for years.
Cut to a youngster in Ottawa saying he can't understand why players arecomplaining.``The players aren't complaining,'' said Goodenow. ``They want to play but they've been locked out.
Very cute there Bob-o. They like to call it a lockout so it looks like the players are sobbing shaking locks on the doors of the rinks. In reality when asked if they could just work under the previous agreement while they worked out their differences.
``What Gary Bettman and the owners have done is that they want a fight with the players and that's what a lockout is all about - to put pressure on the playersto succumb to a salary cap, which they've known all along is a type of systemthe players aren't at all interested in considering.''
Wait, hasn't he said several times they did everything they could to avoid a lockout? Well, they didn't even consider the main point of the agreement. They keep talking about the players deserve to get the money they want. Well, the owners deserve to make a profit. The owners own the league not the players. Players don't even have to live up to their salary, they get paid are bought our either way. Almost all their other demands the NHL was likely going to bow to. Less games..etc
Goodenow said "there is no correlation between ticket prices andplayers' salaries. Supply and demand determines ticket prices and not teampayrolls, he said".
Supply and Demand?!!?!? WOW. Is he that out of touch? The Flyers who have one of the biggest fanbases in the NHL had to beg people to fill the seats last season. The Stanley Cup Champs last year tried an all you can drink night (wisely it was nixed) to sell out seats during the Flyers/bolts Series last season. Who could he actually think that is true? So, many rinks were simply not selling out last season. WOW.
I can't imagine that all the NHL players buy into this mindset. PLease won't someone break the union line. PLease.
NOTE TO READERS:
If you want a complete verision of the article I was using drop me an email!
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3 comments:
It's possible, and I'm talking outside chance here, that Goodenow calls it a lockout because it's a lockout. I mean, he could call it a strike, but then he'd be lying, because it's a lockout. These things matter.
Why should the players have to take a half-million dollar pay-cut because the owners can't run their teams. It's not the players' job to make a profit. It's the players' job to make play hockey. The players aren't the ones who overexpanded the league. The owners fucked up, they know it, and they think they're strong enough to make the players pay. They may be right, but that's no reason for the players to bend over and lube themselves up.
TV ratings have gotten worse.
Okay the owners can get some flak for that for expanded into markets that are less cup crazy, but shouldnt the players be the ones that get people watching?
People don't become fans because of the owners, the do because the players make them fans.
So less TV money means less money to go around. A huge problem in the NHL. Instead of putting their heads together to make a plan to get money pumped back intot he league. The NHLPA is telling the owners to go suck an elf and poo-poo to you for wanting to make that crazy thing called a "profit" that they keep going on about.
The TV ratings have gone down because the product has gone down. The product has gone down because there are players in the league who have no right playing in the NHL. There are too many bad players because there are too many teams. There are too many teams becuase the owners over expanded, and moved teams from hockey hotbeds (Canada) to places where people could give two shits (the south). Keith you are blindly standing behind the owners. Both are at fault. The players and the owners are greedy fuck pigs.
J
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