I have said this before, the NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman is a pompous, condescending and lastly, a smug jerk... So much for the nice and civil negotiations eh? Make no mistake about it the owners, in my opinion, are trying to weaken the NHLPA. Yeah, I blame the owners in this dispute because they're the ones that created this mess by signing players to these ridiculous contracts. Donald Fehr head of the NHLPA confirmed that the players union will send a counter-proposal to the National Hockey League on Tuesday. There are 37 days left until the current CBA expires that's a little over a month for the two sides to get an agreement done between the two sides.
TSN.CA --- National Hockey League commissioner Gary Bettman told reporters on Thursday that the NHL will lock out its players if there is no new collective bargaining agreement by the time the old agreement expires on Sept. 15.
"We reiterated to the union that the owners will not play another year under the current agreement," he told a scrum of reporters in New York after the latest talks.
"I re-confirmed something that the union has been told multiple times over the last nine to 12 months. Namely, that the time is getting short and the owners are not prepared to operate under this collective bargaining agreement for another season so we need to get to making a deal and doing it soon. And we believe there's ample time for the parties to get together and make a deal and that's what we're going to be working towards."
Reports indicate that NHLPA executive director Donald Fehr, who just returned from a player information session overseas, is expected to make a counter-proposal on Tuesday. He mentioned earlier this summer that the players were willing to keep working past Sept. 15 as long as solid progress was being made in the negotiations.
