Way to Go, NHL!

Good job NHL! You have successfully proved that it is human nature to never see what you have and be content. The grass must always be greener on the other side of the fence, right? Or in your case, the ice must be smoother. Either way, you have proven to be your own worst enemy. I, and my business have owned season tickets to the Minnesota Wild since day 1. We have enjoyed every season, and every game. We have seats right behind the bench and have enjoyed watching, listening and smelling the action up close and personal. Hockey was finally making inroads into mainstream pro sports routine when egos and dollars got in the way. Let's break it down into simplified common sense for you since it obviously has become too complex an issue for you to resolve. First, the NHL is a business. It is an entertainment business which means that your primary customer is us, the fans. Obviously, if you treat your customer like you don't care about them, they in turn will treat you the same way. Next, like any business, it has an owner, boss, supervisor, founder or basically, the person that took the initial risk to start the business. Also, in any business, there are employees, the people in the business that produce the product or service that the customers need or want. These people give their talents and time to the business in return for wages. For the business to be healthy there must be a balance between the revenue that the product brings in and the operating expenses that it takes to produce the product.
Attention Hockey players! Basic economic principals demand that if you, as employees, take more revenue from the business than what the business takes in, the business is not viable and can't stay operational! Also, the last I checked, no active players have taken the risk to own a team and therefore do not have the right to demand that the owner does not have the right to make a profit from his venture.
Last year, the average salary in the NHL was 1.8 million dollars. I'm no financial genius, but if you can't make it on that working an 8-month season, then you are dumber than I thought.
Well, I guess it doesn't matter what anyone thinks. You guys have decided your own fate. So go ahead, hold out for that extra few hundred grand. I'm sure the additional Ferrari will be worth it. But while you're doing that, your customers are leaving, finding other things to do and realizing that watching a bunch of arrogant, overpaid prima donnas slide around on the ice isn't that important anyway.

Educational Cesspool

This is why I got so frustrated with college. I went to college on and off for about 7 years and have nothing to show for it other than a transcript with a bunch of credits in a variety of majors, and the emotional and intellectual scars of being hammered on by demented creeps like Ward Churchill. Granted, I must admit that the main reason I do not have a degree in my junk drawer is that I was an idiot who couldn't focus on one thing long enough to complete it. If I were going to school now, I'm sure I'd be doped up with some kind of psychotropic drug to "help" me. But at the time, I just wasn't interested in concentrating. I went to Bethel, a small Christian college, my first year, then transferred to the University of Minnesota for the rest of my educational efforts. I loved my time at Bethel, although I have to admit, I didn't make the most of it. The professors were great, the kids were nice and the social life was fairly healthy. When I left and went to the U of M, the experience couldn't have been any more different if it were in another language. I did OK in most of the classes, but there was a hollowness and cynicism to the entire experience that tainted the whole environment. As I look back now I realize that my discomfort was primarily caused by the fact that the worldview that permeated the University was diametrically opposed to that of my own. I had professors that were telling me things that I knew were wrong, but yet I had to agree with them or face grade repercussions. It seemed that up was down and down was up. The universities in America were slowly becoming cesspools of intellectual bacteria breeding and reproducing themselves at a rapid rate. Over the past 25 years, this has led to the pathetic state that they are in right now where an anti-American freak like Ward Churchill can become a department head at a major University and be given a highly paid podium from which he can indoctrinate young minds with propaganda. Of course this guy has the right to prove his lunacy by saying anything he wants to, but others who disagree also have the right to vocalize their outrage and call for his removal from the taxpayer funded position he is in. You would think that with the 6-figure income that we pay him he'd at least have the brains and financial means to get a haircut. But then again, He has spent his life in educational institutions and probably never took a class in common sense. Unlike Churchill, when I finally left the university system, I majored in common sense and graduated with honors.