T1B

NBCSports.com news services
Updated: 7:59 p.m. ET July 14, 2005

It didn't take long for Chris Chelios to get angry at Gary Bettman, again.

Chelios, who made threatening remarks about the NHL commissioner and his family during the NHL's 1994-95 lockout, reportedly told the New York Daily News that Bettman should 'get the gas' following Wednesday's tentative agreement between owners and players to end the 301-day lockout.

Chelios said the commissioner should be fired once the collective bargaining agreement is signed.

"It's not so much the deal," Chelios told the paper. "It's all about the lies and separating the players from the league and making us look bad because we have to defend ourselves."

Then, using language that is certain to offend, especially given Bettman's Jewish heritage, Chelios added: "That alone should be just cause for him to get the gas after this is all done."

There is considerable hostility on the players' side in anticipation of a rank-and-file meeting and ratification vote on a CBA that will reduce their earning power.

Time for Bettman to bow out





Gary Bettman should announce that a deal has been done -- and then follow it up with one more announcement.

His own resignation.

In the best interests of the National Hockey League and its future, Bettman should leave now. His work is done. The collective bargaining agreement will be ratified by mid-week. A new landscape has been paved for hockey owners. The labour wars are over.

Now it's time to build and he is no builder. That much history has proven. Now it is new time for the NHL and it needs a fresh voice, a fresh face, someone to speak for the league, someone the jaded public can believe in, someone the players won't view as destructive, not someone associated with failure.

It won't happen, of course, because Bettman never has understood how badly he projects, how preachy he sounds, how little the public's trusts about him.

It won't happen -- but it should.

THIS AND THAT

Wayne Gretzky may not have officially signed on to coach the Phoenix Coyotes, but he is out there actively looking for assistants to fill out his staff, which tells you he is taking the job ... That was small-time of the Vancouver Canucks not allowing Brian Burke to hire Randy Carlyle out of Winnipeg. You don't prevent minor-league coaches from taking major-league jobs ... Three teams that will pay Gary Roberts more than the Maple Leafs will offer: Anaheim, Florida and the Ottawa Senators ... Keep hearing it, but it's unconfirmed, that Glen Sather and friends lost a last-ditch fight to have 20 teams in the Stanley Cup playoffs. Looks like the old format of 16 -- something that actually works in the NHL -- will remain the same ... Does anybody really care what Rob Ray thinks about anything? ... The worst places for Sidney Crosby to wind up: Nashville, Atlanta or Florida.

Link

Hapday wrote:Bettman and Goodenow should both step down after this. It became quite clear that this was more a battle of egos than trying to fix a game on life support.

MuchoBulls wrote: I find it funny that there isn't more backlash against Bob Goodenow by the media. Bettman ended up getting a much better deal for the owners and, quite frankly, that was his job.

JD wrote:Rack Chelios for being a beaten-down bitterman, is that it, Otis???

I will say Steve Simmons is right on the money, though. Bettman's major accomplishment should be this CBA, but it's pretty obvious the NHL could use a leader with a more positive public image. Bettman will go down in hockey history as "the guy who cancelled a season", whether or not the cancellation of the season ends up being for the best for the sport in the long run.

Maybe this time the Board of Governors could drag someone out of the NFL's front office. :roll:

Otis wrote:
And trying to say that his comments were coming from a beaten-down bitterman would make him any different than Bettman and his group of owners who were beaten-down bittermen for the past 10 years how?