Admiral Tootoo and the Evil NHL

Well I definitely look forward to meeting the returning blogger; hopefully a trip back to Nashville and some hockey in the GEC will be a great refresher weekend for you.

Due to money and scheduling, I am not purchasing my ticket until I get there for the game. It is in no danger of selling out, and I just don' t have a preference as to where I sit. But that means I am unable to post my seat number or section, but surely we'll all find a way to hook up. I'm going with Kevin, and I know Chris was wanting to go--I assume he's going with you. If that's the case, I'll just call him between periods and find out where you guys are sitting. (Chris, if you were planning to go with us, give me a call between now and the game to coordinate our efforts).

At any rate, I'm excited about going. I'm banking on some crushing blows from Tootoo and solid D from my man Hammy. But I worry about the same problem so many are having watching these "classic Preds games" on FSN: that it's a nice treat, but really serves only to remind you of the glaring absence of real NHL hockey with all the team's stars. I hope that doesn't happen.


I have to say that the fact that these two sides on the labor issue haven't even spoken makes me upset. No calls, no e-mails, no letters, no nothing. Just ignoring each other like a couple of bratty kids. And that's the fundamental problem, the fact that they really and truly are being selfish. Not selfish because of money--I'm not willing to call both sides 100% greedy. But selfish in the sense that they are acting on priorities that place themselves as more important than the other side, and more important than the greater good of saving hockey.

It's a lot like the two-party political system we have now in America. In both cases, the two sides have fundamental disagreement issues. Both sides pretend to want to work together, but really don't want to. Both sides talk about bipartisan ideas and compromise, but only engage in such behavior if it serves their purpose. And in both cases, it is the mass of little guys that get completely ignored...us.

Democrats and Republicans spend so much time trying to get elected and stay elected and beat the other guy that they almost never do anything purely to help us citizens--even the moves they make to help us citizens are only made so they'll get elected again or have a good record to run on in that election. They have lost sight and lost track of the people they serve and the purpose of government. They would preserve their next election victory before actually trying to preserve the government (or government's pure purposes).

Well in hockey, it's the same. I am coming out officially with the opinion that neither the players nor the owners really care about us fans. They have completely lost sight of the big picture. Sports are about teamwork...ask anybody on a good team in any sport and they'll tell you that true teamwork demands the sacrifice of self and the sacrifice of one's own personal desires. And hockey players are among the world's best at demonstrating teamwork (take a hit or make a check instead of going after the puck, and you might free up a teammate for a breakaway, and a thousand other examples). But they've been blinded by self. Because right now, they don't care about us, they only care about themselves. I'll take any quote from player or owner saying they care about the fans and flush it down my toilet with the rest of the crap, because the players don't care about you. The players don't care about me either. Neither do the owners.

Most importantly, the players don't care about hockey anymore. If they did, they'd understand that the league and the players need each other...just like teamwork. Without one, the other cannot exist. A house divided against itself cannot stand. To save the sport, they have to take a hit. Both sides need to sacrifice in a personal way to make this sport last a long time. Hockey is on its deathbed and these two sides are fighting over who gets the most of the inheritance that's left after the funeral...fueding like they're both frat boys after the same cheerleader. The sum is greater than the parts...but we're headed at a sum of zero. These two sides refuse to combine and work in the area of compromise, which is effectively pulling the plug on the sport altogether.

Take Kevin's recent post at our Preds Blog. He's one of the biggest and most loyal hockey/Preds fans I know...and yet he's already talking about how much less money he'll give them when they return. I'm feeling the same way. Depending on the lockout's length, I may turn my back on the sport altogether. How many situations can you think of in business or in education or in your family when it would be tolerated for two people who disagree to just ignore each other as their solution? None is the answer, by the way. None at all. In the real world, those of us without ownership stake in a professional sports team, those of us without large cushions of cash from playing a game for a living have to work out our differences. We have to sit down in the conference room, sit down in the principal's office or the family living room, and hash it out. Because we haven't been spoiled rotten by good fortune and great wealth we know that we have to take a hit, give up some stuff we care about and make it work because...we have to keep working/studying/living together. The owners and players' act like they don't know that...when in truth...they just forgot. The owners forgot about the compromise and partnership they had to employ in earlier business ventures...now clouded by their power and wealth. The players have forgotten why they even started playing, now clouded by their power and wealth. Heck, the players have already forgotten how they got to the playoffs last year: teamwork.

Neither side is showing any maturity or teamwork...and that makes me want to leave them all behind me in a cloud of dust, and search out on the horizon the next great pure sport of excitement and teamwork. Kevin's looking into lacross (apparently it's football and hockey combined, with plenty of scoring). Right now, as I type this, I can't see myself supporting an NHL financially that returns with these same owners, this same commisioner, and these same players. If they wait too long, they may lose peolple with more patience and more tolerance for people who "take their ball and go home" when the game isn't going their way.

Gentlemen, this sport's very future is resting in the hands of grudge-holding rich people with an over-inflated notion of self. The inmates are most definitely running this asylum--heck right now they're more like crack babies than inmates.

It's the second day of the ghost season that won't be...and they've already lost me, maybe for good.