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Post by jets4life on Dec 22, 2004 15:18:41 GMT -5
breaking news from TSN.ca:
NHL Board of Governors to meet Jan. 14
Canadian Press
12/22/2004
The NHL has called a Board of Governors meeting for Jan. 14 when it's expected commissioner Gary Bettman will get the stamp of approval from owners to cancel the 2004-05 season because of the ongoing lockout.
"Yes, I can confirm a Board of Governors meeting will take place Jan. 14," an NHL spokeswoman said Wednesday from New York.
Bettman does not actually need a vote or the approval of the Board of Governors to cancel the season, just as he didn't need it in September when he triggered the lockout. But it appears the commissioner will nevertheless check in with the league's 30 owners before officially wiping out the entire season.
The NHL would be the first of the so-called Big Four pro leagues in North America to not have a single game played from beginning to finish. The last time the Stanley Cup wasn't awarded was in 1919 when the Spanish flu cancelled the Montreal-Seattle final. The Cup was still played for during the Second World War.
There's still time, however, for the NHL and NHL Players' Association to reach an agreement. But no talks are planned. The two sides haven't met since Dec. 14 in Toronto when the NHL rejected the union's proposal and the NHLPA in turn rejected the league's counter-proposal.
Bettman and his counterpart, NHLPA executive director Bob Goodenow, have left little wiggle room in their respective positions. Bettman insists he will never accept a payroll tax system, while Goodenow has forever maintained a salary cap will always be unacceptable to the union.
The lockout reached 98 days Wednesday, with 470 of the season's 1,230 games gone by the wayside. By Jan. 14, when the Board of Governors meet, 627 games will have been scrapped.
The NHL salvaged a 48-game season during the last lockout 10 years ago after both sides reached an agreement on Jan. 11.
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Post by Ducky on Dec 22, 2004 23:14:43 GMT -5
let the season end, hence the beginning of a new era.
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Post by Yar on Dec 24, 2004 1:30:32 GMT -5
hence the return of our beloved jets ;D ;D ;D ;D
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Post by vivianmb on Dec 24, 2004 9:59:17 GMT -5
DOOMSDAY.good ,now who wants to move their team to a REAL HOCKEY CITY...WINNIPEG!!!!
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Post by greengiant on Dec 27, 2004 0:56:03 GMT -5
i hope the owners stay strong and lock out the players until they get what they want. im fine without nhl hockey if when it returns, it will be a better game, and we get the jets back!
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jets07
Veteran Member
Posts: 144
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Post by jets07 on Dec 27, 2004 11:53:13 GMT -5
Let the owners lockout the players for the rest of the season. Once the union accepts that there will be a salary cap, they can fight to make sure there are proper levels of revenue sharing amongst the owners. As we know, owners are not keen on revenue sharing. This could be how the players save face. Let the lockout continue..........
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Post by Ducky on Dec 28, 2004 20:04:41 GMT -5
Let the owners lockout the players for the rest of the season. Once the union accepts that there will be a salary cap, they can fight to make sure there are proper levels of revenue sharing amongst the owners. As we know, owners are not keen on revenue sharing. This could be how the players save face. Let the lockout continue.......... I agree all owners should should share more of the television revenue generated by the big markets. They should have revenue sharing model that goes according to the average a visiting team draws on television revenue. I don't see it beeing fair that a top notch team from small market from lets say the ottawa visits a big market team with a huge tv contract like the NY Islanders and rangers are able to draw big money when a small market team would give them automatic revenue but at the same time the big market team isn't regarded as a great team like the senators
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A Fan Since The Begining
Guest
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Post by A Fan Since The Begining on Dec 29, 2004 11:37:24 GMT -5
Well I think that both sides should try a half season with the salary cap and profit sharing idea.Because then they would see either the gains or losses from it.A new system on either side for the league to work,the owners or players need to be tested first.Nothing ever works unless a trial run is done,especially when it comes to dealing with money.A 48 game season under the proposed owners deal could show possibilities or faults into the idea where then the players could have thier input to make it work.Give a little take a little in actuality that s how big business works.But for the owners who are business men this shouldn t be something new.
And for the record I believe that nobody is worth more then 4 mill to play the game.Profit sharing is the way to go.Just look at the NFL.
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Post by jets4life on Dec 29, 2004 18:51:43 GMT -5
Fire Goodenaw, and all will be forgiven.......
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Doolox
Rookie Member
Posts: 28
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Post by Doolox on Dec 30, 2004 15:57:32 GMT -5
The longer this lockout goes, the more damage will be done to the American markets. Which I believe increases the chances of the NHL returning. I'd sacrifice a season to get the NHL ship back on track. I am not interested when the Predators, Ducks or some other Mickey Mouse team comes to town where nobody gives a s#it about them.
GO OWNERS!
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Post by Ducky on Dec 30, 2004 20:00:19 GMT -5
The longer this lockout goes, the more damage will be done to the American markets. Which I believe increases the chances of the NHL returning. I'd sacrifice a season to get the NHL ship back on track. I am not interested when the Predators, Ducks or some other Mickey Mouse team comes to town where nobody gives a s#it about them. GO OWNERS! Thats right, its the only way.
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Post by Ducky on Jan 4, 2005 0:04:10 GMT -5
Mon, January 3, 2005
Bring back NHL or pay: Gretzky
By TERRY KOSHAN, Sun Media
GRAND FORKS, N.D. -- Wayne Gretzky has a simple message for the NHL and NHL Players' Association: Get a new collective bargaining agreement done in the next few weeks or prepare to suffer long-lasting consequences. "I am scared that we could be looking at a year and a half, or two years," Gretzky said, referring to the NHL lockout. "That is what is more alarming about this than anything. I can't see us coming to an agreement in August or September. So we are going to be back to where we were last Sept. 15 come this Sept. 15. If we don't figure out a way to make everyone who is part of this happy, we could be looking at a long, long time before hockey is played in the NHL again."
Gretzky arrived in Grand Forks, N.D., a couple of days ago to catch the world junior championship and yesterday held a press conference because, well, he's Wayne Gretzky. He discussed a number of issues but did not offer what he thought could be a solution to the lockout.
"I hope over the next couple of weeks we can come to an agreement," Gretzky, part owner of the Phoenix Coyotes, said. "The commissioner (Gary Bettman) has made it clear he is not going to accept anything that is not cost certainty and that's the bottom line. We are behind him 100%."
The players have equated cost certainty with a salary cap, which they won't accept. Despite Gretzky's warning, don't expect an agreement soon. The NHL's board of governors are to meet Jan. 14 in New York, where they are expected to either announce a drop-dead date or decide upon one.
Gretzky, who has not been involved in negotiations and indicated he probably won't get involved, said the Coyotes are losing less money this season than they would have had they been playing, and steadfastly denied the club is for sale.
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Post by dreamcatcher on Jan 4, 2005 14:14:06 GMT -5
It is a rule of thumb. When Gretzky speaks, people listen. The intention of the NHL is to break the union. This is no longer simply a matter of cat and mouse, or what is best for the League as a whole regarding cost certainty.
This is really all about what can be done, to shift the balance of power back to the owners and make this business the most profitable for them. It is likely that Bettmans true mandate, is to give the players little choice other than to accept an economic system based on a Hard Salary Cap, that puts a real dollar amount on spending, limits this, and maximizes all other revenues for ownership.
If it was anything else, then negotiations would include a system whereby the owners agreed fully to share all sources of revenue with the Association and the players.
Under any other circumstances, I would say this was incredibly unfair to the players, since no one twisted the arms of the GM'S and owners whom paid these players the incredible amounts of money they freely chose to, thus driving up the value of contracts for similar players in the NHL market place. This, despite my believes that $9 million a year, paid out to a players such as Bobby Holik is incredibly stupid just to obtain his services.
However, because we all want the NHL back in Winnipeg, the system being pushed for, is one that I fully support, since it will not work without it in small markets.
I see the players having absolutely no choice, but to buy into what the owners are doing, and we will see the end of some careers along the way as well, since some players stubbornly will NOT give in to a Salary Cap in any form.
Unwise, since if it becomes a choice of whether you have a job or not, I'd take the job everytime. I do not forsee the league playing next year either, thus my believe that there will be no less than 4 to 6 clubs either looking to re-locate, or fold. I will maintain my position on every point I have put forward, since my believe at the start of all this, was the NHL intends to break the union once and for all. Goodenow will lose his job, or resign first.
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Post by Ducky on Jan 4, 2005 23:53:24 GMT -5
Tue, January 4, 2005
Lockout tough on aging vets
Prolonged stoppage threat to careers
By Steve Simmons
TORONTO -- Gary Roberts and Joe Nieuwendyk went for a morning workout yesterday and afterwards began to do the math. It wasn't encouraging.
They weren't calculating the amount of money that each has relinquished in this extended National Hockey League lockout. But they were adding up how much -- or how little -- time each may have left in their professional careers.
"If we're talking about no hockey until next January, and that's what some people are saying, I turn 40 in '06 and Joe does in September and you think, 'That last half a season, that could be it for us,' " said Roberts in a rare interview yesterday.
"Both of our contracts are up at the end of this season. Who knows what that means. There's no way we want our careers to end this way.
"We'd love to come back and play in Toronto but we don't know what the Leafs plans would be for the future. Hopefully we're in their plans but we don't know. We can't possibly know.
"All I know is I'm coming back. I haven't played my last game. Not a chance. It's the same with Joe. Neither one of us are ready to quit. We still feel we can play at the highest level and contribute. We hope somebody else feels the same way."
Gary Roberts and Joe Nieuwendyk are both 38 years old and running daily, a treadmill running out of time.
They grew up together, won a Stanley Cup together in Calgary, looked as though they would end their careers together at home, as Maple Leafs. Now there's no game to play, no league to play in, not much hope of any kind of season. If even the optimists like Wayne Gretzky are talking a season off -- maybe two -- the biological clocks of Roberts and Nieuwendyk are ticking rapidly.
"I've had my career ended once," said Roberts, who temporarily retired in the '90s with a neck injury. "I wasn't very good at retirement the first time. This time, I'd like to decide for myself. I've already had the game taken from me, I'm not about to let that happen again.
"If we're out a year (or) two years, I'm coming back. I can tell you that right now. I'm not going to let this stop me. I love to train. I know I'll be in shape. I'm not going let them do this to me."
You might think that someone like Roberts, who had to fight his way back, who has little time left, who may be kissing his last contract goodbye, wouldn't be such an advocate of the NHL Players' Association stance against salary caps. But, in fact, the opposite is true.
He is thankful for the past 10 seasons in which players, in his words, "Have been overpaid." He talks about the 70 or so players who lost their jobs after the last work stoppage.
"It would be pretty selfish of me to sell out those guys now. What angers me is the owners' stance. We offer a 24% rollback and give them a chance to start all over again. But they're not willing to make a deal.
"People say Glen Sather is one of the smartest hockey men out there and he had a $70 million US payroll and couldn't make the playoffs. You can't blame us if people mismanage their business. We're not asking anybody to spend $65 million or anything close to what they've spent before. We're just asking for them to be fair."
Roberts does have another concern that has not been readily addressed in this financial fight. And that is the quality of play once hockey returns.
"I can tell you for certain the game will suffer dramatically," he said. "I look a year and a half off and know how long it took me to get my timing back. Even if you're training, it's not the same as playing.
"It's going to be unfortunate for everyone. The game won't be the same. If they don't like the game now, just wait to see what it looks like after a layoff. You won't be happy."
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Post by Ducky on Jan 5, 2005 10:44:29 GMT -5
Wed, January 5, 2005
NHL keeps busy watching juniors
By TERRY KOSHAN, Sun Media GRAND FORKS, N.D. -- Doom and gloom was not the prevailing sentiment among NHL general managers gathered at the World Junior Hockey Championship, but there was an underlying sense of urgency as the window to end the lockout diminishes with each passing hour. "It's already January so I don't think anybody can be in optimistic mode," New York Islanders GM Mike Milbury said. "But I don't think anybody has given up hope. We are hopeful that something can be done, but someone is going to have to come up with a master plan in a hurry. We had enough preparation so we should have seen this coming."
DROP-DEAD DATE
NHL commissioner Gary Bettman and NHL chief legal officer Bill Daly arrived at the tournament here in Grand Forks, N.D., but neither addressed the media. The NHL's board of governors is to meet Jan. 14 in New York, when it is expected a drop-dead date will be announced or decided upon. There also is the odd whisper that the board will announce the cancellation of the season that day. Anaheim Mighty Ducks player rep Steve Rucchin told the Los Angeles Times the NHL Players' Association will not make a last-minute proposal, and there may not be a new pitch from the owners, either.
If there is any chance for a resolution, it has to happen during the next couple of weeks. People have been talking of the fact there will be a major letdown for hockey fans with the conclusion of the world junior. For some NHL teams, it's much different, as scouting of the junior leagues and minor leagues will continue.
Toronto Maple Leafs GM John Ferguson Jr. said earlier in the tournament that Toronto plans to keep scouting as it normally would, and that's a plan Dallas Stars GM Doug Armstrong intends to follow as well.
"The future of our game is still going to be the young players, and when the new (bargaining agreement) is finalized we're going to need a book on the players," Armstrong said. "We'll just move ahead with our scouting staff and get ready for when we start again. I just hope we don't kill the golden goose."
There's a fear that fans simply won't come back to places such as Raleigh, N.C., Phoenix, Atlanta and Anaheim when the league resumes. Thrashers GM Don Waddell is not wringing his hands with worry but realizes the lockout could have long-term negative effects on his organization.
"The longer it goes on, you are going to lose some people, no doubt about it," Waddell said. "You hope that when we come back, we can win some games right away and create some excitement in Atlanta. We have done what we think is pretty good damage control, offering other opportunities for our season-ticket holders, where they can pick other events in our building. It has been well-received.
"But I don't think you will find anybody who does not miss hockey."
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Post by jamiebez on Jan 5, 2005 11:42:39 GMT -5
Bring on the scabs in September!
For me, this is the best possible outcome as it relates to getting the Jets back: a lost season combined with the prospect of having to watch replacement players will certainly kill off the questionable markets in the southern US once and for all. Combined with the momentum this campaign has created AND the new arena, Winnipeg becomes the only logical choice for franchise relocation.
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