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BREAKING… Another new TV sports season, yet another labor squabble. The National Hockey League locked out players one minute after their union pact expired at midnight ET time, the AP reported. The clock struck midnight, and the NHL turned into another sports league closed for business. So much for NBC last year signing the largest TV deal in the history of the NHL, with the NBC Sports Group paying $2 billion over the next 10-years to retain the rights to hockey on American television. It’s in effect until the 2020-2021 season but who knows if there’ll even be this season. Because the two sides were so far apart in their bargaining that they didn’t even meet face-to-face today. This is the 3rd major pro sport to impose a work stoppage in the last 18 months, behind the NFL and NBA, and the 4th shutdown for the NHL since 1992 - including a year-long dispute that forced the cancellation of the entire 2004-2005 season when the league successfully held out for a salary cap. This time there was a reported $3.3 billion pot of revenue to split.
Editor-in-Chief Nikki Finke - tip her here.
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Bettmans gotta go – I’ve been in his corner before but this has gotten out of hand.
If it ain’t football, who cares. Even tennis gets better numbers than hockey. Sucks to be dead last, huh?
They’ll have to pay me to come back.
How the hell does hockey generate 3.3 billion in revenue? Are tickets five grand each?
they might as well just move this sport full time to europe and canada, hell, soccer is more popular in this country than hockey.
1. no minorities
2. few americans
3. can’t be played in your backyard
we’ve had presidents into every sport, basketball, football, golf, baseball, even boxing but no president would ever even admit into liking hockey and risk looking un-american.
let it go and never return.
No minorities? Wrong. Few Americans? Lots of Americans. Have you watched NHL games in the last two years at all? Or are you too busy watching all those boring sports you say presidents enjoy, like golf.
Liking hockey is un-American? Wow, you have an open mind there…
This lockout is nothing like the lockout they had in the 2004-2005 season. While they are far apart there is only one key issue this time while in 04 there were many big issues. Both sides are to blame. People like to blame Bettman solely but they have no idea what they are talking about. The players share just as much blame for not getting this done months ago so the fans don’t have to suffer yet again.
Mark my words this could(if there is no season at all) be the final nail in the coffin for the National Hockey League.
Considering most major labor unions have experienced a strike or lockout over the past 4 to 5 years, it’s not surprising to see the NHL and the NHLPA in this situation once again. Of course, this time, it’s all about money, while in 2004, it was about money (salary cap) and rules changes (eliminating tie games, to start with).
This lockout is a waste for the NHL. They can’t afford to lose the season, let alone the Winter Classic. You’re talking about a game that is in Michigan Stadium, and will likely be the largest atteneded hockey game of all time. They can’t cancel that.
I’d like to know how much of a hit NBC is taking this year. No doubt they’re paying money out to the NHL, just like the NFL was going to get paid last year whether they played a game or not. It also makes me wonder that since NBC made the new contract last year, do they have some kind of clause where they see some money back if the Winter Classic is canceled, where the season is canceled? Do they have an out in the contract if the NHL cancels the season?
These are questions that should be looked into.
after the league worked so hard to get the fans excited again, they were bringing in pretty solid numbers last season. now this. they sure know how to shoot themselves in the foot. or maybe it’s just nbc …
NBC feels precisely how they are told to feel by their parent company Comcast which owns Flyers
I Just feel sorry for all the loyal hockey fan who will miss the hockey game.All the worker in the hockey arena will be unemployed line. NBC give hockey team all that money for the television right. It will be interested to see how many fan will return to the game when the hockey return.
More time to devote to baseballs post season… This sounds like a win!
Guess Jerry B will have some time on his hands… Maybe he’ll actually give notes?
Wouldn’t it be funny if all of the league’s season ticketholders demanded their money back plus interest and filed lawuits for breach of contract – or the league was hit with felony fraud charges?
After all, the way the NHL totally avoided any meaningful attempts to work out a new CBA over the last year (let alone the last three months, when there wasn’t even a handful of meaningful negotiation sessions), there could be made a credible case that they (the owners) were planning this lockout as much as eighteen months ago.
The NHLPA (players) have made attempts to get something meaningful going, but have been stonewalled, so clearly, this isn’t about anything other breaking the union and not being willing to share the 50% – that’s 5-0-per-cent – increase of revenues over the last year. (Has any other professional sports league increased its revenues by 50% in the last year?)
Besides ticketholders, every company that has contracted to advertise on NHL games, and every TV outlet that airs games (and has paid heavily for the right to do so) should sue the league for breach of contract.
Unlike Major League Baseball (which is exempt from antitrust laws by act of government), or the NFL (which is way too big to be plagued by such petty problems), the NHL is vulnerable to such a possibility – and while the owners are (mostly) so well off that they can lock out the players for a year without seriously damaging their wealth, they certainly would be hurt by a massive series of lawsuits (think maybe 10 THOUSAND angry ticketholders per city, on average, and hundreds of pi$$ed-off advertisers, as well as however many sports networks and local TV stations – each filing suit), especially if even one judge or jury decided in favour of punitive damages!
But, of course, none of this will happen and we fans will go elsewhere for our sports entertainment over the winter – the NBA’s still got a season; the AHL plays a pretty good brand of hockey; the NLL (lacrosse) product is entertaining; there’s juniour and college hockey (where the love of the game still flourishes), and who knows, maybe we’ll get to see some KHL (European/Russian) hockey. Gods know that enough of the better NHL players will plying their trade in that league very soon!
After two lockouts in eight years, the NHL brass is virtually daring us to stay away from the game. Maybe we should just that.
Whew! Vent much? But I do feel better now…
And Nikki, this is going to last a while as both sides are not budging this time around. It’s time to get rid of that Buttgoblin of a commissioner as he is destroying the league with his assinine ideas of expansion into markets like Phoenix and such and they still haven’t solved that issue as of yet. This could last maybe past the Winter Classic. NBC should be worried and rightfully so as they signed a huge deal with the NHL last year but maybe they got a little too over-anxious in the process when signing the deal.
Let’s go Blues!