This morning I read about 15 articles that all basically said the same thing . . . no progress was made at the CBA negotiations. Is anyone surprised by this?
After two days of speculating that Bob Goodenow might play some hardball for a while, the only report of anyone causing problems was someone from the owners' side. Boston Bruins owner Jeremy Jacobs supposedly sparked a heated exchange when he said that the NHLPA's concept did not deliver the linkage that the owners were looking for, namely that player costs would not take up more than 54% of the revenue. What??!!? We are back to that?? I thought the league had moved off linkage.
I can only hope that Jacobs is scolded and shouted down at the Board of Governors meeting today. I can only hope that some of the big market clubs in this league start to play hardball themselves. I hope that room divides right in half and completely destroys any unity Gary Bettman claims to have had.
Keep in mind, I had sympathized with the owners through most of this. I had defended this lockout, and argued in favor of a salary cap. What a waste of time. I cannot understand how anyone out there can defend the owners and their misguided, narrow-minded objective. They have given nothing in these negotiations. They cancelled a season, and expect us to come running back when they put decoys in NHL jerseys on the ice. I can only hope that there are some heated exchanges in that room today, and that Gary Bettman has to crawl back to the players to cut a deal ASAP.
The only positive thing, and I am not sure it IS a positive, is that the sides agreed to meet more frequently in the immediate future.
Bruce Garrioch says it is the same old song and dance in this debacle.
Here is Larry Brooks. Pretty short article from him today.
Alan Hahn over at Newsday talks about revenue sharing.
Sorry I didn't comment on those last few articles, but I am too disgusted from the main story.
HDH
Posted by Jim at April 20, 2005 09:08 AMeMail this entry!
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