There are two types of owners in the NHL. The smart ones and the greedy ones. The smart ones are the ones who have done well in the NHL, the ones who know that you make money by building a winner or by vertically integrating your franchise with state of the art arenas or cable TV networks -- or better yet, both. The greedy ones are the ones who have not been able or willing to do that, or who are not satisfied with what they have (as is the case with a couple of original six owners).
So far in this ruinous lockout, the greedy owners have been able to make the smart ones turn greedy too, with the promise of windfall profits if the league proves successful in capping salaries at a low level. But today, the smart ones won out. After the Board of Governors meeting, the NHL announced that there will be no hockey next fall without a new CBA -- i.e. no replacement players. The smart owners realized that the threat of replacements was no threat at all, that the players had nothing to gain by capitulating now to a system they are sure to get anyway via impasse and implementation, that the players had more to gain by giving replacement hockey a chance to fail than by avoiding it. The smart owners realized that their best hand, short of coming to terms with the players, was to not have any hockey at all, to let the lockout continue.
Jeremy Jacobs, who was solely responsible for the breakdown of talks with the PA on Tuesday, as well as with exposing once and for all for all to see how his agenda has been driving this impasse, finally was not allowed to get his way. The man whom Stan Fischler just yesterday called the top power broker in the NHL has (apparently) had his power broken. With the PA having given in on so many issues, right down to agreeing to a salary cap linked to league-wide revenues, the smart owners realized there was little to be gained by continuing to be greedy. An agreement, somewhere between the PA's idea of revenue linkage and the NHL's already infamous 54%, now appears to be achievable -- as long as the smart owners can carry forth the momentum they gained today.
Ironically, the greedy owners stand to gain so much more by following the lead of the PA and the smart owners, in the form of meaningful revenue sharing, than by following their own scorched earth policies. Except for Jacobs and Wirtz -- no one is going to be sharing revenue with them, they are going to be sharing with other truly needy franchises rather than continuing to line their own pockets at the expense of their loyal fans.
I have been reading Stan Fischler's regular column on MSG for a long time.
Stan might portend to have the inside connections
as far as the labor negotiations are concerned, but in my opinion, he has been nothing but a hawkish, outspoken mouthpiece for the owners.
He jabs at the player's association every chance he gets and his unabashed, biased support of Gary Bettman has become routine.....and boring.
He gives the owners, which also happen to be his employers, blind loyalty and distorts or disregards the facts when it comes to what the fans want and what Bettman has done to the league and the game since he became the NHL's Napolean.
Stan has been around a long time but his allegiance has always switched to the organization putting the bread on his table. For a reporter, that is a Cardinal sin. The Islanders, the Devils and now MSG and the Rangers have all been the pie in Stan's sky when he worked for them.
I believe that his employment at MSG is clouding his judgement when it comes to faulting the player's association for all that is wrong with the game. Aligning himself with the likes of Jeremy Jacobs, Peter Karmanos and the rest of the cheapskate owners that Bettman gave the reins to negotiate the new CBA to is ludicrous at best and shameless at worst.
Stan knows the game as well as anybody. I understand that he works for the owners. He should not allow that to distort the facts and instead, give an honest and fair appraisel of the other side's argument.
Sorry Stan, but if it makes you happy to think the players association will be crushed and replacement players will soon be tooling their way around the NHL rinks, then maybe you should find another sport to write about.
I don't know about you, but as a season ticket holder I would rather watch the best hockey players in the world instead of a bunch of minor league hacks skate on NHL ice.
I think the real power brokers of the game have just insisted on that.
What tune will you be whistling today?
Posted by: Ron | April 21, 2005 at 09:03 AM
Stan Fischler's work in "covering" has been an embarrassment to all of us who cover hockey. He's been nothing more than a shill for the owners , and gives hockey "journalism" a bad name. I'm curious to see if, when this is all over, any players try to exact revenge by not talking to him. I wouldn't blame any of them who did. He's done nothing to help fans understand what's going on; all he's done is parrot the owners' "We have to have a cap or we'll take our pucks and go home" blather.
At least some of the owners got the message that replacements won't fly with enough ticket buyers and media outlets. But in reading Stan's column following Wednesday's meeting, it's great to see that he's still waving his owners' pennant and pom-pons, even though Gary and his buddies blinked.. His efforts at spin control are worthy of the Bush White House.
Posted by: DomK | April 21, 2005 at 10:34 AM
Kudos to both Ron and DomK for calling the Weasel for what he has always been the biggest kissbutt in the NHL.
When he worked for the Fishies, he ripped the heck out of the Rangers but the moment Junior started to pay his salary the Rangers were the greatest of all franchises to be apart of.
His tune doesn't change just the wording to it depending on who signs his check.
Let him go back to writing about the Subways and watch him spin how great a job the MTA is doing these days.
Posted by: Jess | April 21, 2005 at 10:34 PM