Sean's Blog

Making Hockey Safe

I watched Patrice Cormier's hit on Mikael Tam - sickening is the only word I can use to describe it.  That was a vicious elbow that would make Gordie Howe wince.  That kind of thing must be removed from the game, full stop and Cormier, needs to be made an example of.  I don't think the Q suspending him for the remainder of the year and the playoffs is too harsh at all - I think that's fair.

I think people in the hockey establishment need to look at a few aspects of the game and maybe make some changes to start protecting the overall health of the players:

1. Four on Four - I know it is a big change, but the players are getting so much bigger at the professional level and the NHL refused to move to Olympic size ice fifteen years ago before all the new arenas started popping up, so now few players on the ice is the only way to create more room.  Also, it creates a more entertaining form of the game, less obstruction, more skill.  Change like this is scary, but it needs to happen!
2. Equipment - Shoulder pads and elbow pads are now out of control.  Some players in the NHL look like NFL linebackers their shoulder pads are so big.  More importantly is the materials these things are made out of - space age plastics and foams that have nearly the density of steel without the weight.  I also am not aware of any specific safety advantage that those monster shoulder pads have.  Same with elbow pads, they are huge pieces of foam and plastic fastened with super velcro.  I think they can certainly diminish in size with little impact on player safety.
3. Government Regulation - I don't mean government's making laws about headshots.  I think the Canadian government really needs to give the CSA a mandate to rigourously test all helmets, shoulder pads and elbow pads on the market today.  With helmets, they need to work out if the current designs are protecting players from concussion and maybe the government should fund some research with a few leading universities around the country to potentially come up with a better industrial design for helmets.  Look at everything, materials, design, usability, etc.  With elbow pads and shoulder pads, they should be compared to models from the 80's and work out what, if any the safety advantages are in the newer equipment versus some of the potential dangers.

I'm not against hitting or anything like that.  I think the recent hit Ryan Wilson of Colorado put on Patrik Elias of the Devils was totally clean.  Elias came through the neutral zone at speed and the WHOLE TIME if you look closely he had his head down.  Then as he comes towards the blue line he looks up and it is far too late - he doesn't take a peek up until he's dumped the puck.  Sorry folks, teach your kids to skate with their heads up.

Personally, I'm not hopeful that any of these changes will happen.  I think the biggest opposition would come from equipment manufacturers and strangely, the NHLPA.  The NHLPA would lose membership because in a four on four league, you could reduce the number of players required.  I believe this would get rid of the Colton Orr's and the Derek Boogaard's of the NHL - I'm not saying it would eliminate fighting, but you couldn't carry those kind of players in a faster, more skilled league with a smaller bench.

I think that being the case, the people who should drive it are the three men I reckon are the most powerful people in the game: Bob Nicholson, David Branch and John Gardner.  Nicholson, through Hockey Canada could revolutionise coaching standards that put an emphasis on 4-on-4 player tactically and really focus on player safety.  David Branch could work with the WHL, OHL and QMJHL to move to 4-on-4 straight away and change the NHL's main feeder system.  John Gardner controls the largest minor hockey organisation in the world, an organisation with a $3.5m running cost that gets ZERO government funding, yet for the past 30 years under Gardner's leadership, the GTHL (formerly MTHL) has thrived and grown to develop some of the best players in the world - Rick Nash, Jason Spezza, John Tavares, Sam Gagne, Andrew Cogliano, etc.  If Gardner could find a way to turn the GTHL into a safer, 4-on-4 league, then it would be a fait accomplis that hockey would change.

I believe this revolution in safety must come from below and not from on high.  The NHL doesn't care about the several hundred thousand kids playing the game in small parts of Canada.  Those kids will see on TV and YouTube some of the outlandish cheap shots to the head that have become part of today's game and think that's ok.  Then thousands of those kids will be concussed each year.  That's a price too high to pay so that Easton can sell "cool" shoulder pads and the NHLPA can keep the worst 10% of its players around.

NHL Contraction

This mess in Phoenix must have demonstrated to the NHL owners that there are very few rich people out there wishing to swell their ranks.  Now compound the problem with the Florida Panthers being in trouble (apparently the owners won't sink anymore funds into it) and Tampa Bay already in a position where they have admitted they won't meet their costs and you wonder how reducing the number of franchises in the NHL isn't on the agenda?  The Commish and Board of Govenors have set themselves a precedent where now you must be of strong moral character as well as stupidly rich to own an NHL team - that's going to be a tough one.  What with Kumar and Boots currently serving time and Len Barrie by all accounts having borrowed the money for his share of the Lightning from a fund he was entitled to dip into and the NHL continues to look ridiculous.

Why not do a deal with Basillie, get him to pay the league some silly sum of money, $300m or whatever and let him put an expansion team in Hamilton.  Then the league use its powers to revoke franchises, fold them up and setup a wide ranging expansion/dispersal draft.  Each team protect 17 skaters and 2 goalies, anyone you leave unprotected is immediately bought out and becomes a free-agent if they are not taken in the draft.  If you select a player, you let one off your list go.  Basillie gets to pick twice per round, first and last.

This would do a whole bunch of things for the good of the game.  It would get rid of three lame duck franchises and create one strong one.  It would give the owners a chance to clean up some of their contractual messes without taking a salary cap hit.  Ideally the league would be stronger because the 40 weakest players would now be unemployed - technically, every team would get an upgrade.

I think if you got really ambitious this could be part of re-neogtiated and extended CBA.  The players will complain about losing 40-odd jobs.  You solve that problem by not lowering the cap next year (as it will most certainly do), increase revenue sharing among the teams, reduce that stupid hedge fund the NHL gets by withholding large parts of the players' income and look at doing some more inventive things to generate NEW revenue.  I think the NHL should seriously look at MLB.tv as a model - exploit the long tail of fans around the world who will pay on the internet.  Set it up as a JV with the players, make them put some skin in the game - the NHLPA encourages members to promote and help deliver content for the new online medium and the league and players split the revenue.

It is very sad when you have such an awesome sport destroyed by a stupid people in charge.

NHLPA: Taking Clueless to New Heights

As a Canadian, I'm obligated to love hockey - its simply encoded in our DNA or something.  For my Australian friends, we're a bit like Kiwis with Rugby Union and the All Blacks - some kind of strange voodoo passion overcomes us when it comes to hockey. 

When it comes to hockey, the NHL is really the only game in town.  I know the Russian oligarchs are desperate to waste their money building some pan-European league out of the second rate KHL, but really, the NHL is where it is at.  If I know that and most hockey fans who aren't Russian oligarchs know that, why aren't the NHL players that smart?  The players got absolutely fleeced on their last collective bargaining agreement - well, let me rephrase that, they were fleeced if you consider that they accepted a salary "cap" that put the average player salary at somewhere between US$1.3 and $1.7m per season.  It cost them a whole year's pay to get fleeced that badly.  How do I get ripped off like that?

Since that tragedy occurred the NHLPA has been through two Executive Directors.  The first guy, Bob Goodenow simply misread the situation, went to war with the NHL and half of his constituents blinked.  He had a can tied to him for the player's weakness.  The second guy was Ted Saskin who was Goodenow's lieutenant and personal Brutus.  Saskin was dismissed after organising some spying on internal email of the NHLPA staff.  Oh yeah, Alan Eagleson, the first NHLPA Executive Director was banged up for stealing money from the players.  This mob put the "fun" back in dysfunction.

After the Saskin mess, the NHLPA seemed like it was getting its house in order when they hand picked Paul Kelly.  Everything the guy said publicly made sense.  His view on the whole situation with Phoenix was absolutely the most sensible point of view out there - let's try and fix Phoenix if we can, but if we can't let's move it to a place like Hamilton where the game will benefit.  Clearly, the NHL players couldn't have someone sensible around for too long, so Kelly took the fall yesterday.  No real reason, apparently he was too "close" the NHL Commissioner (he who's name shall not be spoken) and his office staff didn't like him.  Wow.

Enter Buzz Hargrove.  The NHLPA Ombudsman was apparently behind this coup along with Eric Lindros.  Lindros failed to live up to his hype on the ice, then took on the role of NHLPA Ombudsman upon retiring, fell out with Kelly and left, but was somehow strangely involved with picking his successor in Hargrove.  For those who don't know Hargrove, you soon will.  He is the former head of the Canadian Autoworkers union and is best described as a Social Unionist.  Basically, he's a softer, fuzzier more PR friendly kind of union headkicker.  He cloaks his anti-business rhetoric in social justice.

This man will almost assuredly take over for Paul Kelly, I would place a bet on it now.  Since retiring from the CAW, he needs something to make him feel important and taking on the Commish and the owners seems like the right thing to do - I mean certainly there is some form of social injustice going on when employers pay their staff millions of dollars each a year and have no ability to fire them for poor performance without paying them out. 

Its good to see the universe return to its normal balance of having the NHLPA appear loony toons again, I was getting worried for a while there.