NHLPA in Turmoil, Knock it Off

In case you hadn’t heard Paul Kelly was ousted as head of the NHLPA (players’ union) over the summer and the fallout from that has been remarkable; and when I say remarkable I mean a bit of a disaster. An interim director has yet to be selected, people are resigning left and right from many parts of the players’ union from player reps to lawyers and yet games go on. So what exactly does this mean for we the fans? At the moment it doesn’t mean a whole lot but in time it can have a major impact on the state of the league generally. I understand there are many considerations to be made and transitions like this happen from time to time in large organizations that have both a lot of power and a lot of personalities contained within it. But from the fan perspective quite frankly nobody has much sympathy or patience for any problems either side of the bargaining table (NHL or NHLPA) may be having just get it together. There have been two lockouts—including one that killed an entire season—in the past 15 years so the any problems that might come from this disarray within the union will draw nothing but frustration from fans if it starts to affect what happens on the ice. The people at the top of the union (or who will be there shortly) make a lot of money to do their jobs and do them will so it is not unfair to ask that they get the problems solved and get the job done. So enough of the drama, get your ducks in a row and get things figured out internally so that the problems the league is facing can be tackled and figured out before any sort of lockout has to occur again anytime soon.