CLARITY NEEDED ON MONEY PIE IN JUNIOR HOCKEY
TEAMS ARGUE PAYING PLAYERS A WAGE COULD LEAD TO FINANCIAL DISASTER FOR MANY
The IIHF confirmed on Friday that the next edition of the World Junior Championship to be played outside Canada will include an outdoor game between the United States and Canada.
The game, at New Era Field in Orchard Park, normally the Buffalo Bills’ sadness factory, could have as many as 70,000 fans in attendance, making massive piles of money for the tournament organizers.
As is custom in junior hockey, none of that will be shared with the players.
News about the latest way to increase the take from the World Juniors comes a week after the Vancouver Sun reported that the B.C. government l ast year exempted the province’s six majorjunior hockey teams from minimum- wage laws after lobbying from the Western Hockey League. That decision comes amid ongoing class- action lawsuits that demand better compensation for junior players who make a small monthly stipend and little else. And in the latest development in that case, an Alberta judge on Friday ruled that the Western Hockey League and Ontario Hockey League must hand over financial details about its franchises, which have long insisted that any attempt to fundamentally change the way its players are compen- sated would bankrupt most of them and cripple the leagues.
The court ruling, which is related to class- action lawsuits that were filed two years ago, has the potential to finally blow open what has been a long stalemate: on one side, those who insist t hat j unior players are exploited by a system that relies on the cheap labour of teenagers pursuing the dream of a hockey career, and on the other, the leagues that insist that only a handful of franchises turn a profit. This has been the defence of the junior leagues at every attempt to force change, whether it’s the potential formation of a players’ union, or arguments that players should be paid a salary or have better post- career education benefits: that so many franchises are barely afloat to begin with that further burdens would send them straight under water. The teams are privately owned, though, so you just have to take their word that they are losing piles of money.
No doubt some of them are, with a cash machine like the London Knights not representative of the average team’s experience. But it sure would be interesting if the court case makes clear just how many junior teams would truly be crippled by having to pay their players some kind of minimum wage.
The argument against paying junior players often includes the suggestion that many teams exist for altruistic reasons — they provide a place for young players to develop, and they give local fans an opportunity to see good hockey at a reasonable price. The owners don’t quite say that they are doing it out of the goodness of their hearts, but the implication is there. Besides, the argument goes, these kids are lucky to be chosen to play at such a high level. Shouldn’t they just enjoy the experience for a couple of seasons and worry about their careers later?
But it wasn’t all that long ago that athletes playing at the highest levels of professional sport were expected to be thankful for the opportunity and not demand much else. They didn’t have pensions, they served at the whim of cantankerous owners, and the idea of a player being able to choose his own team was laughable.
Conn Smythe, as t he owner of the Toronto Maple Leafs in the early 1950s, demoted two players to the minor leagues because they had the temerity to get married without his permission. NHL players often t ook second jobs in the off- season, and it wasn’t unusual for them to work for their team owner’s other businesses, driving a truck or working in construction.
That kind of stuff seems ridiculous now, but before unions f orced change in pro leagues, there were the same kinds of arguments being made against better compensating professionals — that they should be grateful to just be in the league since it’s a dream job — that are made against compensating amateurs today.
Junior hockey is hardly the only holdout. The NCAA makes billions off its athletes, and wouldn’t hesitate to ban a player who sells an autographed photo for $ 10. Major League Baseball makes huge revenues and pays its players accordingly, but its minor- league affiliates are stocked with prospects living in poverty, even though the majors are totally reliant on the minors to feed talent up through the system. There are ongoing court efforts to force teams to pay minimum wages there, too, and the defence is much the same: if small teams had to pay l arger salaries, the whole system would collapse.
Would it, though? When Conn Smythe and James Norris and the other old, rich men of hockey were trying to stave off the formation of a players association in the late 1950s, they warned that granting their players rights that were common to workers in other professions would destroy the sport.
It seems to have turned out OK.
NHL PLAYERS OFTEN TOOK SECOND JOBS IN OFF-SEASON.