"What happens when the wife gets sick of you?" - Ulmer

[Digger12]

http://www.canoe.ca/NewsStand/EdmontonSun/Sports/2004/10/31/694497.html

Click to read more...

 

[struckmatch]

I agree with the sentiment that the players should just try and save face, and get the best deal they can as soon as possible. They aren't going to win this fight, and they should be meeting about what types of real concessions they can make that will get the negotiations rolling.

I just hope the meeting with the players reps isn't about blind union support, and maintaining the union's outlooks, but thats probably the point of the meeting.

 

[thinkwild]

a union that forgets they lost the last war, the 1994 lockout, but won the peace. Last time, owners landed a contract that included a hard cap for rookies and pegged free agency at 31, but some sharp work by the NHLPA prompted a decade of unparalleled salary escalation

Last time they lost the war but won the peace. Heh, never looked at it like that before.

But far more likely a cause of the unparalleled salary escalation was the uparalleled revenue explosion.

It is natural that salaries would have risen. Some point to the fact that salaries have risen as a sign the system failed but it was to be expected they would rise. It would be expected they would rise at a faster pace then revenues too, because fixed costs were already covered, so more and more of this money would go to players.

OK some fair points from Ulmer, but this isnt about saving face, its about finding a system that that can work for both. All these people saying it doesnt matter who is to blame, are to blame for they are not allowing focusing on exactly what the problems are need to fix them. Just that the owners are incompetent so the players must accept the one thing they dont want to accept.

Perhaps if Bettman came on bended knee to the players and said look, we know its our fault, we are incorrigible, we need your help, we cant handle a free market. Maybe then we could start to find solutions.

That is no more reasonable than saying the players need to save face.

Then again, maybe the unions insistence that it doesnt need to sell its values and ideals is going to come back and bite them now. Perhaps that was a miscalculation

 

[handtrick]

you gotta admit...one of the more thought provoking articles out there right now...