Ruling just the latest ego showdown
Items that may grow up to be columns, Vol. XVIII, Chapter 5:
Partners, my eye The Dennis Wideman Affair is further proof that every interaction between the National Hockey League and its players association eventually boils down to a territorial clash of egos.
The league hands the Calgary Flames defenceman a 20- game suspension for cross-checking lines man Don Henderson from behind. Commissioner Gary Bettman, not surprisingly, upholds it on appeal, the NHLPA takes it to a neutral discipline arbitrator ( NDA), who reduces the sentence to 10 games (after 19 have been served) … and now the NHL, peeved at being overruled, is making vague noises about “reviewing the opinion in detail to determine what next steps may be appropriate.” More billable hours This promises to keep the lawyers hopping over at Bettman’s old firm, Proskauer Rose, but the collective bargaining agreement specifically states: “The NDA’s ruling shall be final and binding in all respects and not subject to review.” So what is the league actually contemplating?
Meanwhile, it has to refund half of the $564,516 Wideman would have forfeited under his original suspension. Apropos of something Bettman, in his lengthy appeal ruling, had cited a text message Wideman sent “to a teammate” as a smoking gun to demonstrate Wideman’s disrespect for officials and a lack of remorse.
Turns out, the recipient wasn’t a teammate, but rather Gregory Campbell, son of Colin, the NHL VP whose office issued the original suspension. Curiouser and curiouser. Seeing isn’t believing You do wonder if the NDA, James Oldham, actually watched the video of the incident, though. It pretty clearly shows a frustrated, angry player en route to his team’s bench, encountering a linesman and delivering a classic “Get the bleep out of my way” cross-check to the official, Don Henderson, who was hospitalized with concussion symptoms and, six weeks later, has not worked another game. Un- appealing Good luck to the Canadian Football League trying to keep games under four hours if it adopts recommendations from its rules committee to expand coaches’ challenges and empower an “eye in the sky” official to review all controversial calls, even those not normally subject to challenge.
In the CFL that would be, oh, about every third play.
Offsides, no yards infractions, illegal blocks on kick plays, contacting/ roughing the kicker or passer … they could all go to review. Whoopee. More thumb-twiddling time between plays. Upon further review The NHL can lose those coaches’ challenges for goalie interference and offside calls on goals, too, and it won’t hurt anyone’s feelings. They often take an absurd amount of time to resolve, and in the case of interference, are frequently eye- of- the- beholder calls. New Jordan rules Suddenly, nothing is coming easy for the kid who dominated the PGA Tour in 2015. Since his win at t he Hyundai Tournament of Champions two months ago, Jordan Spieth has a tie for 21st at Pebble Beach, a missed cut at Riviera (where he opened with a 79), a T -17 at Doral and was scrambling Friday to recover from a firstround 76, hoping to play the weekend at the Valspar Championship, which he won a year ago.
Compared ( ridiculously) to Tiger Woods after his 2015 season, Spieth’s current struggles merely underline how otherworldly Woods was when he went more than seven full years (February 1998 to May 2005) with- out missing a cut, a span of 142 tournaments.
Even while earning $ 22 million l ast year, Spieth missed four cuts, so he’s human in that respect, and in a few others that Woods wasn’t. He’s still pretty good at golf, though, and he’s 22 years old — the same age Woods was when he began that seven-year cut streak. Goose eats crow A day after a profane rant about Jose Bautista’s playoff bat flip, calling the Blue Jays slugger a “f-- king disgrace” to baseball and all Latino players who came before him, Hall of Fame closer Goose Gossage was called into the principal’s office and told to put a sock in it by New York Yankees GM Brian Cashman and manager Joe Girardi.
It was a chastened Gossage who emerged from the meeting saying: “Everything is good; I just kind of lost my mind there for a minute.” Their cheatin’ hearts The latest figures from the World Anti-Doping Agency indicate 99 athletes, including tennis star Maria Sharapova, have tested positive for meldonium since the Latvian-invented blood-flow enhancer, developed as a heart medication, became a banned substance on Jan. 1.
That’s a l ot of missed memos. They’d better check those email spam filters.