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Interesting power move !!!!!!!!!!!Players float plan for rival to NHL
League a 'backup' if deal not reached
Move raises stakes in hockey dispute
[size=+0]RICK WESTHEAD
[/size]BUSINESS REPORTER
If the National Hockey League and its players' union fail to reach an agreement on a new contract this summer, former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani and a leading Canadian diplomat may help the game's stars engineer a return to the ice.
The NHL lockout enters its ninth month today and both sides have said talks are progressing toward ending the stalemate. Yet in recent weeks, the players' association, in concert with at least one prominent hockey agent, has considered a plan to start a rival league to the NHL.
Tentatively called the International Hockey Association, the league would rely on Giuliani's New York consulting company to help raise as much as $5 billion (U.S.) in seed money for the upstart league, according to a 71-page business plan reviewed by the Toronto Star and circulated to prospective Wall Street investors including Goldman Sachs & Co. and Allen & Co.
"This is about bargaining power," said Gordon Saint Denis, a sports investment banker with CIT Group Inc. in New York. "It's about the players saying, `We'll show the league we have another option.'"
Giuliani might also act as an emissary to Australian media baron Rupert Murdoch, whose Fox television empire would potentially become an investor and broadcast games, a source said.
"Following the NHL's decision to lock out the players and subsequently cancel the 2004-05 season, the NHLPA has been approached by several different groups proposing alternative options for our members," said Ted Saskin, senior director of the NHLPA.
Full Story :
http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1117577413560&call_pageid=968867503640&col=970081593064&t=TS_Home&DPL=IvsNDS%2f7ChAX&tacodalogin=yes