I'm going to rant for a minute here, please forgive me.
I don't understand why the NHL owners would even come back to the negotiating table at this point.
This was embarrassing.
There are dozens of debatable issues on the table, but the NHL gave three points that they made sure everyone understood they aren't willing to move on. They'll give and give and give, but on those three key points, they are NON-NEGOTIABLE.
The PA in return, of course tried to negotiate on those three points.
If I was an owner, I would be infuriated.
This is their business. They have every right to run their business the way they want to.
The NHLPA are employees, not the brand. The customers are loyal to the jersey, not the bodies wearing them. The league turns these individuals into stars and pays them millions. When a player is traded, he becomes an enemy we no longer cheer, and we pick right up where we left off, cheering on our teams on any given night.
When this all starts up again, we won't cheer every Saturday night because we're happy to have these players back on the ice, we'll cheer because our franchises that we love and are invested in, are back and ready for us to celebrate.
The players think they ARE the game. This delusional perspective is punishing all of us, forcing us to be without something we all love so deeply.
I'm at the point where I actually believe that the NHL needs to cancel not only the season, but shutdown the league as a whole. Start from scratch. Pay these players the average working salary of 50K a year, lower the prices of an average ticket so a man with a wife and three kids can take his family to a hockey game without having to take out a second mortgage on his house. Stop sharing revenue and profits with it's employees, pay them a wage and be done with it.
They aren't entitled to anything, and if they cannot realize this, then the NHL needs to rise from the ashes as something else, and the entitled millionaire whiner players of today, can become fast food workers, architects, bartenders or whatever else they have the skills to pull off, or they can continue playing the game they apparently love so dearly, at a fraction of what they could have, if they hadn't thrown it all away while being blinded by their blatant GREED.
Well, they won't ever see another penny out of me. I'll cheer for my team on the radio, or on TV, or online, but I'm done going to games and buying jerseys, keychains and videogames when I know that 50% of my hard-earned purchase is going into the pockets of this group of players.
Give me 20 years when these clowns have all retired, maybe I'll feel comfortable coming back.
Signed,
A lifelong hockey fan.
