Players' proposal blasted
Labour maverick calls it `terrible'
KEN CAMPBELL
SPORTS REPORTER
The most influential union leader in the history of professional sports said he was shocked when he opened his New York Times yesterday morning and learned of the lengths the players are willing to go to end the NHL lockout.
Marvin Miller, who was hired by the Major League Baseball Players' Association in 1966 and made groundbreaking and legendary gains for baseball players during his 18-year tenure, called the NHL Players' Association's 24 per cent rollback on salaries "irresponsible" and said it sets a bad precedent, not only for hockey, but for other professional sports.
"It means either a terrible weakness on the part of the union and its members or terrible foolishness," said the 87-year-old Miller. "It's nothing in between."
Miller, who made a career out of overmatching baseball owners both at the bargaining table and in the courts, said the players should have either made their drastic proposal early in the process or not at all.
"There's nothing more disastrous for the future of a labour organization and its members than enduring a long stoppage, then folding," Miller said.
"You can take almost anything except that because you lose on both fronts."
Miller said the proposal is "ominous for the future," particularly in basketball where the players face the possibility of a lockout next season.
"I feel it's irresponsible to do that in terms of your own members' interests," Miller said, "to say nothing of the derivative effects when the owners in the other sports take a look at this."
