The hockey lockout has been going on for two months now and although I paid a lot of attention to the Leafs & Marlies last season, the lockout just doesn’t matter much to me this year. I think the worst parts of the lockout for me has been: 1) My hockey-related Twitter feed has been filled with NFL news, and 2) the hockey blogs I follow have been filled with OT comments. So yeah, I don’t really care that there’s no hockey to follow!

One of the reasons for this is because I’m not expecting that there will be hockey any time soon so I’m not going to get my hopes up and wait for it. While a lot of people characterize the lockout as millionaires arguing with billionaires, I think that a lot of the non-superstar players are getting railroaded in the process because while they make a lot more money than you or me, they only get to do it for a few years.

So I sympathize with the players, but I also know that they have very little negotiating power since the owners have a monopoly on the hockey teams in the Western world. Because of this, I think the rumor where the owners are following a script and waiting until the very last minute they can (which is when they must cancel the season) before making a deal is plausible. Which means they wouldn’t be negotiating in good faith.

At the same time, I think that the union trotting out the players for every single news conference is a lot of posturing and they are not getting any sympathy from me. I’m just not interested in all of this back and forth; and if the lockout prevents me from enjoying hockey as a hobby, then that is perfectly fine because I have other hobbies that I can pursue in my spare time.

Posted by Kevin in Blogs Tags: hockey