Friday is an interesting day on the NHL calendar — one where progress is good for the game, and that same progress can be criticized for not respecting the tradition of the game.
Friday is draft day. The official location of the draft is Los Angeles, with a fraction of the pomp and circumstance that we have witnessed for years at the annual draft. This was a decision made more than a year ago, in a vote of the member clubs, to try to save money by reducing the travelling contingents of 20 to 25 people to a draft city. Now, those people are still travelling, but to the 32 cities that have NHL teams.
Gone is the feeling of a hockey festival or a political convention with everyone who is anyone in hockey under one roof. It was the only time every year when that occurred.
We will miss commissioner Gary Bettman being booed, miss general managers conferring on the side, concocting trades, and miss the raw emotion of families celebrating the draftees in front of 18,000 people. Let’s hope this draft is a one-hit wonder and we return to the tradition of what past drafts have delivered for years.
Friday is also the day when, quietly and peacefully, the NHL and the players’ union have agreed on a new collective bargaining agreement that guarantees labour peace into the next decade. The new agreement, which, once ratified, will come into effect a year from now, demonstrates a new, strong relationship between players and owners. It reflects a partnership that can only help make the game stronger.
Never in the history of the game have both sides made peace this early in negotiations, a full year before a new CBA is required. This was a deal done in less than three months, truly out of the spotlight of the media, and reflects the desire of both sides to share in the growth of the game, like the World Cup of Hockey, and protecting the competitive balance of the game by eliminating those loopholes in the long-term injury reserve for teams with salary cap issues.
So on this last Friday in June, enjoy the positive progress of the players and owners, and hope the progress of this year’s player draft becomes an admission of failure, and simply a return to tradition.