The NHL Lockout Gets Personal

I love hockey, which is not exactly breaking news to those who know me.  So it should not be shocking that the latest NHL lockout has been a source of emotional angst for me from the day it was announced.

I know that a preponderance of the American sporting public is yawning and could care less that games are not being played.  Some may even be celebrating that fact.  I understand this with crystal clarity because quite frankly, when the NBA was going through this exact issue a year ago I could have cared less.

This however is personal.  I feel as if something that I love is being forcibly taken away and I am powerless to stop it.   All because some very short-sighted individuals on both sides are letting arrogance, greed, and a feeling of entitlement interfere with common sense.

I’ve tried from the beginning to take a pragmatic approach to this, at least as much as I’m capable.  Alas after last week’s promising talks broke down amidst juvenile sniping and seven figure bruised egos, I officially lost it.  The dueling news conferences held by Betteman and Fehr was the moment the NHL lockout officially jumped the shark.  It was the point where both sides essentially stated, it’s more important for us to WIN the CBA then it is to do what’s best for their sport.  A sport by the way that struggles terribly for mainstream acceptance in most of the United States.

Better yet, the moment Bill Daly uttered his infamous and patently moronic, “this is the hill we will die on” comment, the season was officially in jeopardy. 

I no longer want to make logical arguments even if they are obviously there to be made.  I just want to walk in to a room filled with all of these idiots and scream…DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA HOW STUPID YOU ALL ARE!?!  Remember the age old question, if a tree falls in the woods and nobody is around, does it make a sound?

So yes, I’m emotional.  Much more so than I was during the 2004 lockout and even when they ultimately cancelled the season.   I was devastated (in a strictly sports sense) when that happened but I GRUDGINGLY understood.  Regardless of any revisionist history being painted now, the NHL at that time was a financial calamity with an untenable business model.  It had to be fixed, no matter the cost. 

This time, it simply needs a financial nip and tuck.  That makes it impossible to justify nearly three months of lost hockey.

There is however a far more personal element for me this time, one that goes beyond simply my love for the NHL.  It involves the shared love and passion my wife Emily and I have developed for the sport, a love and passion that is woven in to the very fabric of our relationship.  To wit, four of our first five dates involved NHL hockey games.  Last month we drove to Rosemount in the height of Chicago rush hour traffic to watch a charity hockey game put on by the Blackhawks.  Those facts alone should give some insight to the depth of our commitment but there is more…much, much, more.

When we get a massive snow storm in Chicago most people worry about getting home from work and shoveling their driveway.  Emily’s first thought is that we can probably get a really good price on lower bowl seats at the United Center (she’s 100% right by the way). 

We spent the run-up to our late May wedding more concerned about a Pens/Hawks Stanley Cup final match-up (aka DOOM), then of wedding costs, bad weather or a catering mishap.  We were introduced as a new couple to the Penguins, “Boys of Winter” theme song and we danced to Chelsea Dagger during the ceremony.  Hockey memorabilia was everywhere.

My wife made it a point to purchase two tickets to a March 2009 game at the Igloo so I/we could make one last pilgrimage before they tore down the beloved old barn.  She suggested a weekend road trip to St. Louis so we could see the Haws and Pens both play (and lose to) the Blues on consecutive nights.  Heck she even planned a trip from Orlando to Tampa during our week at Disney just so we could root against the Eastern Pennsylvania Orange and Black Goon Squad.

We have all four episodes of 24/7 Penguins-Capitals on our DVR plus the entire catalog of Blackhawks’ TV episodes.  We have the 2009 and 2010 cup clinching victories for both the Pens and Hawks preserved as well.  These programs have been watched more times than I can remember, most often at Emily’s behest.

Our relationship goes 1,000 levels deeper than hockey and will survive and thrive with or without the NHL.  It does not change the fact that the NHL is an enormous part of our life together, more so than I can do justice to in this forum.  The league and the PA are not just taking hockey away from me or from her.  They are taking it away from us.  It’s yet another element of emotional collateral damage that the billionaires and millionaires ignore while fighting over slices of an enormous pie.

It breaks my heart when Emily laments that her love and passion for the game may be irreparably damaged by this ignorant dispute.  Keep in mind this is coming from a woman who went by herself to watch Blackhawk’s prospect camp this summer, proudly clad in her Antii Niemi jersey.

Certainly I understand and empathize with her disposition which rest assured did not develop overnight.  It started with the cancellation of the Blackhawks Training Camp festival and the associated 5K run.  It continued with the cancellation of the Penguins/Hawks game in November.  It crystalized when for the first time in our relationship we did not see a hockey game in Pittsburgh over thanksgiving.  And there have been countless wasted nights watching reruns of Friends that would otherwise be devoted to the Pens or Hawks.

No matter how much they claim otherwise, Gary Betteman, Don Fehr, and everyone else involved in this moronic conflict do not comprehend the depth of this emotional collateral damage.  They are blind beyond the economics and their selfish need to get the best deal for their side; when a good deal is more than good enough. 

I can accept that Fehr is a hired gun who ultimately could care less about the NHL.  The owners and more so the players however are stunningly ignorant to the reality that their sport and thus their livelihoods rely on the fragile emotional bonds they create with their fans.  Destroy those bonds and the NHL, at least in the United States, could just as soon be Arena Football, nothing more than a winter diversion for parents and their kids. 

It is solely the willing desire of fans to fully vest themselves, emotionally and financially, that allows everyone involved to make the money they do.  Remove that and Jonathan Toews is selling insurance and playing pond hockey in Winnipeg.  No matter how much they claim otherwise, no matter how much they thank us or appear to sympathize with our plight, nobody involved in this dispute truly gets that. 

The NHL and the NHLPA are arrogantly assuming they can survive a second cancelled season if it comes to that.  Their arrogance is rooted in the incorrect assumption that hockey fans are too devoted and passionate about their sport to walk away.  And they could not be more wrong. 

Even the strongest bonds can be broken if enough force is applied.  The same intense devotion and passion that hockey fans are known for could be the explosive instrument that destroys those bonds, if the league is foolish enough to shut down for another season.  There is NOTHING more dangerous in this world than a jilted lover.  Ask Major League Baseball (1995 to 1997) what happens when you overly abuse the trust of your paying customers.  And the NHL today is nowhere near as strong as baseball was when Don Fehr was involved in cancelling the World Series.

I hope both sides wake up to this reality in time to save the season and their sport.  For the first time I’m concerned they may not.

Players are Ultimately to Blame for NHL’s Labor Woes

I have never supported the players in a professional sports labor dispute. And I’m not about to start doing so with the current NHL lockout.

I have read numerous stories about the greedy owners and how they are asking the players to take a pay cut while the league is supposedly growing its revenues by leaps and bounds. Conveniently omitted from most of those stores are two things; the fact that the players’ salaries have nearly doubled since the last lockout and that according to Forbes Magazine, only five NHL teams made a profit last year (defined as positive earnings before interest, taxes, and depreciation).

Somehow the players keep forgetting to mention this when they act the aggrieved party.

I have tremendous respect for players like Sidney Crosby and Jonathan Toews. They are two of the best players, best leaders, and best ambassadors of and for the National Hockey League. And they are extremely well compensated for this. Crosby just signed a deal that will pay him an annual average salary of $8.7 Million for the next dozen years (on an accelerated pay schedule). Toews currently is working at $6.2 Million per over five years with a huge raise certain to come on his next deal. And every dollar of those contracts is fully guaranteed whether or not they perform to expectations.

In the meantime their employers, arguably the two most successful U.S. based teams in the National Hockey League both failed to make a profit last year; in spite of having three home playoff games each.

Toews is one of several players who has been highly critical of the owners for wanting the players to take a 10 to 12% cut from a wage pool that has nearly doubled since 2005 (based on the mid-point of the minimum and maximum cap). That’s when the NHL rolled out a $39 Million salary cap. A mere eight years later, the MINIMUM cap is now $54 Million (the max is over $70 Million), which means the players have gotten more than their fair of the NHL’s growth.

Sorry if I don’t buy Captain Serious' contention that the owners are killing hockey just to prove they are in charge.

I have no problem with players being paid as long as the league can afford to pay them. I define “afford” as follows; the teams in the league can be reasonably profitable and the league maintains competitive balance. Once that stops, I have issue. To me a league where 25 of 30 teams are not profitable is one that cannot “afford” its current wage structure.

And that’s before we consider that NHL revenues are disproportionately driven by ticket revenue. It bothers me as a die-hard fan that I have to pay $75 for a decent seat at the new energy barn so that the Penguins can generate a manageable net operating loss.

Let’s be clear on something, the NHL is not asking its players to work for minimum wage. The current league average salary is about $2.5 Million annually on FULLY GUARANTEED CONTRACTS. Under a realistic concession plan where the players get 50% of hockey related revenue, the same plan the NFL and NBA players agreed to; the league average would be around $2.2 Million and the highest paid players would still be near $10 Million.

I’m guessing that Shea Webber can still pay his mortgage on that.

I am tired beyond belief of hearing about the concessions the players made in the last lockout. Those concessions were necessary for the NHL to be financially viable. Does anybody really think the owners would have cancelled an entire season if they were not for the most part in dire financial straits? Put it this way, did you ever believe for one second the NFL lockout would last in to the season when that league is minting money? They pushed as hard as they could for a better CBA and then got it done before any football, and any revenue was missed.

Owners cancel seasons when it’s more costly for them to play than not to play. And apparently many of the owners feel they are in the same position now. Why they have to threaten to cancel another seasons before millionaire players get that message across is beyond me.

The players should not be complaining about give backs. They should be on their hands and knees thanking the good lord in heaven that they get paid an average of $2.5 Million per year, in a sport that struggles for acceptance in most U.S. markets. If Chicago and Pittsburgh cannot make a profit selling out a hundred plus games in a row, what do you think is happening in New Jersey, Colorado, Dallas, Tampa, and San Jose? There are at least 10 NHL cities (if not more), where the local team is barely noticed and that’s not going to change any time soon.

The salary cap was necessary to create financial stability and cost certainty for the NHL. Now the cap needs to be adjusted to a figure that allows teams to at least break even during the regular season. There is nothing wrong with that. For my money (which is exponentially less than Crosby’s or Toews’), the players need to get on board with this reality.

I am not saying the owners are blameless here; they are not. I’m on record in this blog as taking them to task for their ridiculous cap circumventing contracts that gained popularity over the last four years. It amazes me that these folks canceled an entire season to get cost certainty and then went out of their way to circumvent the rules in place. I also have issue with them signing guys to big money contracts days before the lockout started. Little or no such activity went on in 2004. I will also concede that their initial proposal to the union was off the deep end and that they cannot expect total victory this time around.

And yes, to some degree the owners need protection from themselves. How is that different than passing rules to protect the players from themselves? Critics say the owners should not overspend even though the minimum cap figure basically forces them to. Well Raffi Torres should not elbow players in the head and potentially ruin their careers. He does so anyway.

Sometimes limits are needed for the greater good.

According to Forbes, three of the five profitable teams, Montreal, Toronto, and NY Rangers generated almost all of the league’s overall profit last year. Those three teams and a few others drive the revenue figures that dictate the cap. The rest of the league cannot keep up with that growth. And it’s not a feasible solution to have Toronto subsidize 20 teams so that Scott Gomez can earn $7 Million annually to score 9 goals.

On top of which, high revenue teams like Philadelphia go on predatory (literally) spending sprees to steal players from small market teams. The goon squad throws some insane contract at Shea Webber in the hope that Nashville cannot financially match it. The Preds then have two choices; match a contract they cannot afford or have their two best players walk away in the same offseason. Good luck selling hockey in Nashville if that happens.

I do not want the NHL turning in to Major League Baseball. And the NHL’s financial model is every bit as untenable at 57% of hockey related revenue as it was before the cap.

There is a popular misconception that the players’ union is stronger now than it was in during the last lockout. The union was every bit as obstinate in 2004 and Bob Goodenow was every bit the Don Fehr clone. The owners ultimately prevailed not because the NHLPA was weak but because after one year of not playing hockey, the players finally got the message; that playing hockey under a $39 Million cap was infinitely better than doing just about anything else. Even after the owners spent a year proving their financial convictions, Goodenow was still screaming at the players not to give in. Does that make any sense to you? Does the union seem like it has the league’s best interest at heart?

It’s not about the strength of the union; it’s about how long it takes the players to face reality. In 2004 it took an entire season. Here’s hoping it takes considerably less time in 2012.

Déjà vu all over Again

I love hockey. That’s not exactly breaking news to those who know me well.

In fact one might say I have a cult like devotion to the sport. Die hard hockey fans tend to be that way; a product of both our genuine passion for the game and the constant uphill battle it faces for mainstream acceptance.

I’ve come to grips with hockey’s place in the sports pantheon, which is to say I’ve stopped trying to convert non-believers to the NHL like some kind of skating Jehovah’s Witness. At the same time I am fiercely protective of the game. And yes I will concede that can result in overreactions on my part to short term concerns. However…

There is a fundamental problem that comes with being an NHL fan; one that is nearly impossible to overcome. Simply put, the people who run the sport we love seem hell bent on its destruction. With the possible exception of major league baseball owners, there is no group that consistently works harder to destroy its own product than those who run the National Hockey League.

Every once in awhile, say after a season ending lockout they have an epiphany about doing the right by their game. The epiphany lasts some length of time but eventually the NHL guardians regress back to the mean. The mean in this case is the boring, defensive minded, clutch and grab hockey which caused Mario Lemieux to famously coin the term, “garage league” for the NHL.

And in case you have not been paying attention the league is regressing again.

I noticed last year a shocking decrease in the number of power plays per game. At first I attributed this to players getting comfortable with the post lockout rules and fully adapting their games. Alas, the trend has gone in to overdrive since calendar flipped to 2012. The Penguin stats were posted during their game in Montreal the other night and they were an eye opener; less than 5 power plays per game, TOTAL, between both teams since January 1st. Which means for once Steigy and Errey are not simply blowing homer smoke when they complain about the Pens not getting calls.

Lest you think this is an aberration I’m seeing the same trend in Blackhawks games as well. And it’s starting to affect results such as Anaheim beating Carolina last night after a blatant trip that was not called. I’ve also noticed a subtle increase in the number of sticks around mid-sections that are suddenly being ignored, especially in New Jersey.

In short, the NHL is once again prioritizing grit, tenacity, clutching, and grabbing over skill. That’s wonderful news for the Max Talbot’s of the world but a disaster for the league as a whole.

Lest you think I’m overreacting here are some simple numbers for you:

• In 2003-04, the last year before the lockout the average total goals scored in an NHL game was 5.14.

• In 2005-06, the liberated first year after the lockout the average goals score in an NHL game was 6.16, a 20% increase.

• In 2011-12, through last Sunday the average goals scored have dropped to 5.48 per game; an 11% decrease from the first year post lockout.

That of course is only part of the story; the quantifiable part, which I as a certified numbers geek tend to cling to when presenting an argument. There is also what we see and feel when watching the game. And there is an unmistakable sense that once again offense is slowly being siphoned from the sport.

It’s early of course and the evidence is for now is primarily circumstantial. And yet I feel like I’m having a déjà vu, to the early days of the dead puck era. In those days I found myself apologizing every time I took a non hockey fan to a game. It was a period that chased away all but the most ardent supporters of the NHL.

I understand the league cannot cater solely to the peripheral fans who want 10-8 scores every night. That said, when the NHL threatens to scare me off it has a SEROIUS problem. My memory is not what it used to be but did they not cancel an entire season in part to address this problem?

There may be no better barometer of the NHL’s problem than the Devils who, in spite of breaking the bank for Ilya Kovalchuk are back to destroying any semblance of excitement in the game. Worse yet they now have disciples. After 1,562 NHL games this season, there were four teams whose games feature an average of less than 5 goals, led by Los Angeles at an embarrassing 4.36 goals per game. All four teams, LA, the NY Rangers, Minnesota, and St’Louis are in serious playoff contention right now.

You may also have noticed a bevy of goaltenders once again allowing less than 2 goals per game; lead by such luminaries as Brian Elliott in St’Louis. That’s the same Elliott who was so bad against the Penguins two years ago that Ottawa started the ghost of Pascal Leclaire in two playoff games. Before we start polishing Elliott’s hall of fame bust, let’s remember that the dead puck era was so awful it made Jocelyn Thibault in to a superstar. If that’s not a serious indictment of the game at that time, I don’t know what is.

Thankfully we’re not there…yet. That said, the trend is disconcerting, at least since the refs stopped calling penalties in January. It’s simply too obvious to be an accident or coincidence.

It’s possible the NHL is looking to slow down the game in lieu of the shocking increase in concussions over the last 12 months. If this is the case than the league can at least be somewhat lauded for its motives if not its actions. Addressing the distributing head injury trend is absolutely a necessity; but there has to be a better way than by removing speed and excitement from the sport.

That said, I think there is more to the story. The NHL power base is still dominated by thick minded, “old school” hockey guys whose first love seems to be 4th line grinders and goons. These folks have been decrying the so called “new rules” as an abomination almost from the moment they were introduced. They worship at the altar of Don Cheery, a man who continues to preach this as gospel of “old school” hockey at the expense of skill, excitement or sanity in the sport.

I’m reminded of Tom Barrasso’s famous refusal to have a battle of wits with Cherry because Cherry was unarmed. And yet I still believe the Cherry mentality dominates the NHL’s direction (read Colin Campbell’s mockery of disciplinary action throughout last season). Those who feel different, like for example a certain hall of fame, French Canadian superstar who runs the Penguins get shouted down and decried as whiners when they protest.

Make no mistake; the game is at it best when played with speed, skill, and physicality. I don’t care how great Tim Thomas and Henrik Lundqvist are; something is seriously wrong when goaltenders are approaching a 94% save percentage. Check out how many 1-0 games have been played in the NHL since January 1st, several of which were actually 0 – 0 but for the shootout.

For now there are only signs of distress. Understand though that there were similar such signs in 1998. The league ignored them and tacitly endorsed the horrific clutching and grabbing in some misguided attempt to smooth out economic disparity. Such disparities were supposedly solved after the lockout.

The simple solution is enforce the rules as written. That has always been the solution and it has always worked. The alternative is a gradual decent to another dead puck era. That issue is bad enough at face value, worse with impending labor pains on the horizon.

If you think you can live with that I urge you to go back and watch the 2003 Stanley Cup final between New Jersey and Anaheim. It was the singular low point for NHL hockey in my lifetime; two teams that would just assume the puck never leave the neutral zone playing for the sport's most cherished prize. Compare that to either Pens/Detroit final or the Hawks and Philly. The difference is staggering.

The NHL can stop this trend immediately if they want to. I’m not sure they do.