As long as there are Tom Wilsons in the world, there will be NHL Emergency Assistance Fund - The Boston Globe
The NHL Players’ Emergency Assistance Fund creates no headlines, even when it receives contributions such as the tidy $311,782 in salary Capitals winger Tom Wilson was forced to surrender after his menacing hit to Brandon Carlo’s head a week ago Friday brought him a seven-game suspension.
Wilson, of course, is the PEFA gift that keeps on giving, a veritable currency printing press for the fund. His varying degrees of bad behavior now have cost him just a tick under $1.3 million in forfeited salary, funneled into a pot that routinely has some $8 million-$10 million in working capital, be it cash on hand or investments.
“That [figure] remains fairly constant from year to year,” Bill Daly, the NHL’s deputy commissioner, said last week in a phone interview. “That sounds right in the zone.”
Established some 75 years ago as a financial safety net for ex-players, PEFA is funded solely by fines and suspensions to the current working help, as meted the last couple of decades by the Department of Player Safety. It’s there if needed, and scores of ex-players have been helped through the years, albeit through the unintended largesse of the bad characters who continue to make their donations.
If bad behavior weren’t as certain as water freezing at zero degrees centigrade, the fund might have to look for other means of filling the till. For now, PEAF isn’t faced with holding any bean suppers.
As long as there are the Wilsons of the world, and a fan appreciation for violence, there’s little chance of a funding shortage. Some years just yield bigger bounties than others.
“The fund — which pre-dates me by many years — has been instrumental in helping a lot of players,” Daly said. “I think since 1990 we’ve had in excess of 400 players, or player families, or people from the NHL family, who have received assistance from the fund.”
Ex-NHL executive, and for years the league’s one-man disciplinary committee, Brian O’Neill oversaw PEAF long into his retirement from his day-to-day administrative duties. His successor, Hall-of-Fame center Pat LaFontaine, now 56, is now president and runs the fund with six other board members — three each from the league and player union sides.
“Pat is perfect for this job,” Daly said. “First of all, he stays in touch with the all the players. He has it deep down in his heart, the right and wrong, and he’s very sensitive and sympathetic to issues that players go through. He’s been fantastic so far. And … he’s lived it.”
Rarely, noted Daly, is it the player himself who raises his hand. A referral can be made from anyone — family member, friend, or anyone in the hockey community — and then the fund can connect with the player and, if he’s agreeable, the due diligence around a formal application process can be performed and vetted by the board’s executive committee.
“Some of that is reluctance to ask for help, for sure,” Daly said. “But sometimes it’s just because they don’t know they need help. Everybody knows when they’re in a financial crunch, I suppose, but this fund deals with issues beyond that — whether it be mental health, or whether it be substance abuse, or whether it be a number of different issues. Those cases get referred to the emergency assistance fund quite often.”
The NHL Players’ Emergency Assistance Fund creates no headlines, even when it receives contributions such as the tidy $311,782 in salary Capitals winger Tom Wilson was forced to surrender after his menacing hit to Brandon Carlo’s head a week ago Friday brought him a seven-game suspension.
Wilson, of course, is the PEFA gift that keeps on giving, a veritable currency printing press for the fund. His varying degrees of bad behavior now have cost him just a tick under $1.3 million in forfeited salary, funneled into a pot that routinely has some $8 million-$10 million in working capital, be it cash on hand or investments.
“That [figure] remains fairly constant from year to year,” Bill Daly, the NHL’s deputy commissioner, said last week in a phone interview. “That sounds right in the zone.”
Established some 75 years ago as a financial safety net for ex-players, PEFA is funded solely by fines and suspensions to the current working help, as meted the last couple of decades by the Department of Player Safety. It’s there if needed, and scores of ex-players have been helped through the years, albeit through the unintended largesse of the bad characters who continue to make their donations.
If bad behavior weren’t as certain as water freezing at zero degrees centigrade, the fund might have to look for other means of filling the till. For now, PEAF isn’t faced with holding any bean suppers.
As long as there are the Wilsons of the world, and a fan appreciation for violence, there’s little chance of a funding shortage. Some years just yield bigger bounties than others.
“The fund — which pre-dates me by many years — has been instrumental in helping a lot of players,” Daly said. “I think since 1990 we’ve had in excess of 400 players, or player families, or people from the NHL family, who have received assistance from the fund.”
Ex-NHL executive, and for years the league’s one-man disciplinary committee, Brian O’Neill oversaw PEAF long into his retirement from his day-to-day administrative duties. His successor, Hall-of-Fame center Pat LaFontaine, now 56, is now president and runs the fund with six other board members — three each from the league and player union sides.
“Pat is perfect for this job,” Daly said. “First of all, he stays in touch with the all the players. He has it deep down in his heart, the right and wrong, and he’s very sensitive and sympathetic to issues that players go through. He’s been fantastic so far. And … he’s lived it.”
Rarely, noted Daly, is it the player himself who raises his hand. A referral can be made from anyone — family member, friend, or anyone in the hockey community — and then the fund can connect with the player and, if he’s agreeable, the due diligence around a formal application process can be performed and vetted by the board’s executive committee.
“Some of that is reluctance to ask for help, for sure,” Daly said. “But sometimes it’s just because they don’t know they need help. Everybody knows when they’re in a financial crunch, I suppose, but this fund deals with issues beyond that — whether it be mental health, or whether it be substance abuse, or whether it be a number of different issues. Those cases get referred to the emergency assistance fund quite often.”
