NHL Players’ Association Executive Director Ted Saskin posted most of the side agreements to the new NHL collective bargaining agreement on a players Web site last week, even as a player petition drive demanding an investigation of his administration gathered steam.
The existence of what some critics say were secret side deals between the union and the NHL is the latest issue troubling Saskin, who was appointed the head of the NHLPA last summer after former executive director Bob Goodenow was forced out.
Detroit Red Wings player Chris Chelios said that NHL players on four teams, the Columbus Blue Jackets, the New York Islanders, the Chicago Blackhawks and the Red Wings, had all voted in favor of spending union money to hire a lawyer to investigate whether the union constitution was violated by Saskin’s hiring and Goodenow’s firing.
Chelios said those four teams are the only ones that have returned the petitions. Three teams were unanimously in favor of an investigation, he said, while one player on the Red Wings voted against it.
Saskin, in an e-mail, wrote, “I know the majority of our members don’t see the point behind these petitions.”
But Chelios, in an interview, said the group opposing Saskin has grown to the point that it has fractured the union. “It’s divided,” Chelios said, “and the numbers are huge and it’s because of him.”
Since Saskin’s appointment as head of the players association, a group of players has challenged his hiring, saying it was conducted in violation of the NHLPA constitution and U.S. labor law. The U.S. Department of Labor recently announced that it would not investigate the players’ complaints because it does not have jurisdiction over the NHLPA, which is based in Toronto, Canada.
The National Labor Relations Board, meanwhile, has conducted an investigation of the complaints and forwarded the results of that investigation to the NLRB’s general counsel, who will decide whether to pursue charges, said Elbert Tellem, assistant to the regional director of the New York NLRB office.
Saskin, meanwhile, has said that only a small group of players and agents are behind the petition effort, including agents Ritch Winter and Neil Sheehy.
“It is disappointing but not surprising that Chris Chelios, Neil Sheehy and Ritch Winter are spearheading yet another petition to investigate the same claims they have been unsuccessful with at the NLRB and the [Labor Department],” Saskin said in an e-mail.
Winter denied that he is involved in Chelios’ petition drive.
Sheehy said he is not involved in Chelios’ petition effort, but has been involved in and very concerned about a side letter to the NHL collective-bargaining agreement that pledges union money to the NHL if player escrow money is not sufficient to bring the percentage of NHL revenue paid to players to 54 percent.
Saskin has previously told SportsBusiness Journal that the chance that union money would be used to repay any overage paid to players is remote. But Sheehy contends that the side letter “could potentially put the NHLPA into bankruptcy,” and that “at the time of ratification [Saskin] did not disclose it to players or agents.”
“I don’t believe that any hockey player would agree to commit NHLPA dues to the NHL,” said Sheehy, “and that is what Ted Saskin has done.”
Saskin maintains that the players were made aware of “the significant elements of these side letters” during the CBA review and ratification process.
