NHL players’ union reportedly working on new labor proposal

PHILADELPHIA — There just might be some hope for the hockey season.

While the NHL players’ union has been denying it is not currently preparing a new proposal designed to at least reopen talks with the league, the rumor won’t go away.

In fact, it is growing. The union is quietly working on a proposal and will introduce it at a players meeting to be held early in December, possibly Dec. 6, several sources told the Philadelphia Daily News.

The NHL Players Association has maintained that it already presented the league with its best offer with the proposal it put on the table in early September, and that no new offer is being developed, and that no meeting is set.

Yet a statement issued Tuesday by senior director Ted Saskin didn’t exactly slam the door on the idea.

“The NHLPA has not yet confirmed a date for a player meeting and there are no new proposals planned at the present time,” Saskin said in a statement released by the union late Tuesday, the 69th day of the lockout.

Yet, in almost every corner of the league, the alleged new proposal is being talked about.

And Tuesday afternoon, NHL executive vice president Bill Daly acknowledged that the league is hearing the same thing and is hopeful it is true.

“I have heard, indirectly, that the union is preparing the proposal and will present it to the league at the appropriate time,” Daly told the Philadelphia Daily News.

If that is the case, Daly said it could break the stalemate and bring the two sides to the negotiating table.

“The league would review the proposal and respond at the appropriate time,” he said. “I would hope it would be soon. I don’t know the accuracy of the reports and I don’t know their timetable, but I would hope (negotiations could start) very soon.”

According to some sources, the league knows much more than that and already is working on a counterproposal based on what it thinks is coming.

In most labor disputes, the sides hold to the toughest rhetoric right up until the moment they reach a working deal.

It is also typical of labor negotiations that are stalled for neutral parties to work as ambassadors to try to find the key to nudging the impasse forward.

There have been signs this has been taking place. It better be. For the season to be saved, negotiations will have to begin again by at least mid-December.

I am still not convinced the league and the players are willing to push this to a point where no one wins, where the league loses a significant portion of its fan base and the players end up taking something far worse than they would get now.

Worse, where it ends up in federal court, and picket lines form around arenas while replacement players try to make their way inside.

That is one ugly situation that must be avoided.

Another meeting

The players had a meeting, the agents had one, too, and now it’s the general managers’ turn.

The leagues’ 30 GMs have been invited to a dinner meeting in New York with commissioner Gary Bettman Tuesday, Nov. 30.

Speculation is that Bettman will update them on the lockout and then talk about a deadline that, if reached, would trigger the cancellation of the entire season.

Daly denied that, saying it is just an opportunity to update the GMs and answer questions.

“It’s not true at all,” Daly said about the drop-dead date.

Bettman has denied that such a deadline is necessary, but from a business standpoint, there would seem to be a time when arena managers will want to release their buildings for alternate events because they cannot sell hockey tickets.

Not so, says Peter Luukko, president Comcast-Spectacor Ventures, which manages the operation of the Wachovia Center and Spectrum. The Flyers stand to lose $18 million because of the lockout, and still will have dates available any time the league wants to resume.