NHL season hinges on new talks

By next Friday we should have a good idea as to whether the NHL will play this year or if we are to see the entire season lost.

On Thursday the players association invited the NHL to meet next week for a bargaining session. There have been no talks in three months, during which time the league has locked out the players.

Between now and next Thursday’s meeting there will be leaks, and perhaps a full presentation, to the public about what is in the new proposal by the players.

Nothing has changed in three months. The NHL wants “cost certainty” and the players view that as a salary cap that they refuse to consider.

The union agrees that salaries have become excessive to income earned on a leaguewide basis, but want the market to control prices. While the league wants salary controls, it has not been willing to consider luxury taxes on teams that exceed certain salary limits, a direction players are willing to consider.

In 1994-95, the NHL did not start until Jan. 19 because of a labor dispute. They played 48 regular-season games and extended the Stanley Cup Finals into the third week of June.

There is time to get a half season in this year, but it will be dicey getting there.

This week the players’ chief negotiator, Ted Saskin, said NHL commissioner Gary Bettman was the wrong man to be heading the league and did not have the respect of the players.

Bettman said the comments reflected “desperate words” from a union that “isn’t getting what it wants.”

Language usually gets ratcheted up before a deal gets done.

Is this union effort sincere? Probably yes, but that does not mean it will move to a position acceptable to the league. If the owners intend to bust the season, claim a bargaining impasse in the spring and open next year with court approval and replacement players, the league must show good-faith bargaining.

The players association may feel it needs to show it tried to open the bargaining door and the league slammed it shut, thus negating any future league good-faith bargaining claim.

On the flip side, the league may have no stomach for the new players’ proposal, but may believe it must accept the invitation to the table in order to build a case to take to court showing it tried to strike a deal.

We will have some of the answers to these questions by next Friday when the league will have had a chance to review and discuss the new proposal.

Some within the ownership group already feel the union tried to grandstand Bettman by publicly asking for the negotiating session Thursday morning, the day Bettman had a planned evening meeting with the GMs of the teams in New York.

There is no doubt about one thing: A lot of people are being really hurt financially. The ticket takers and vendors, building workers and program sellers won’t care a whole lot about what is in the players’ proposal so long as both sides find a way to end up with a package that has signatures on the bottom line.

Christmas is coming and that is a gift those folks really need.

Old Town native Gary Thorne is an ESPN and ABC sportscaster.