this years stanley cup winning captain?

[centrehice]

Bettman has huge ego problems which is really the thing that's in the way. He has no control over the size of his haed. This was evident from his first threatening move (the lockout) and his multiple successive (final offer) nonsense.

If Bettman had no ego, this thing would have been done months ago.

In terms of not accepting the Cup from him? He will be playing Bottle-Dodge on his way to Centre Ice anyway, he'll see more plastic hurled at him than a recycling plant. The fans will hammer him relentlessly for 5 minutes with Boos.

[mikecole141]

Really, what message does it send? A veiled attempt by the players to curry favor of the fans by embarrassing a man who is the representative of the 30 teams and if he presents it this year is already going to be booed by the fans. Bettman does not set the agenda, he is their [Owners] representative and it was his job to do what what they needed in order to get this done. He didn't lockout the players on the sole fact that there was no CBA, He did it because the PA wasn't negotiating, and when they started to negotiate and claimed they would play the season while they continued, the League was faced with the same thing that happened to MLB in '94 as orchestrated by Fehr where they claimed they would play the season and then striked part way through for leverage.

Have no illusions that this wasn't the rough start date for both the League and the PA. They were both playing from a playbook that called for a Lockout. I don't blame the League or the Players for the Lockout, it sucked but was probably necessary on order to fix some of the screw ups from the last one. I do however blame them for taking the fans for granted.

That said unless a fan is being awarded the Cup from the Commissioner, not accepting sends no message other than a lack of professionalism.

What I said first...

Total Balderdash. He locked them out because he threw a hissy fit and that was his 1st form of action, not because of anything the players did. Make up some more crap......

You are entitled to your opinion as to why you think the whole of this mess resides on one man instead of Him [Bettman], AND the owners, AND the players, AND the Fehrs too... But why are you accusing me of making this up?

The League made its first offer in July, the PA wouldn't respond until August with a counter proposal and even then they were not meeting they were posturing. In the part I have bolded and underlined above I then go on to say that the Lockout was something BOTH sides wanted as they felt it was important leverage, and that both sides were looking at roughly the same point for completion of a deal and start to the season. IF we didn't have the Lockout in September, and they had played you can be sure we would be looking at a Strike in February as that is a play right out of Fehr's playbook.

What did I make up? Yes, my response in regards to the actual causes of the Lockout is simplified above, but as the main point I was trying to respond too was nothing but an attempt to start a thread to bash one man over a mess that a whole lot more people were involved in making I was pretty clear to my intent. If you want to discuss cause and blame for the Lockout go ahead but don't act like a troll accusing me of making stuff up.

Something people often forget is the little gremlin wanted to negotiate last September to avoid this which the players said no. He'll always get hate, but he's trying to make the NHL a well run league and has increased hockey popularity over his reign.

When I said this I got accussed of making up crap, I guess your's got left alone because you still called him a Little Gremlin

Bettman has huge ego problems which is really the thing that's in the way. He has no control over the size of his haed. This was evident from his first threatening move (the lockout) and his multiple successive (final offer) nonsense.

If Bettman had no ego, this thing would have been done months ago.

In terms of not accepting the Cup from him? He will be playing Bottle-Dodge on his way to Centre Ice anyway, he'll see more plastic hurled at him than a recycling plant. The fans will hammer him relentlessly for 5 minutes with Boos.

Once again you are entitled to YOUR opinion, but once again you are placing the blame for ALL of this on one man. We don't have to like him, the owners how ever do like him as he gets them the results that they want.

Even if there was no lockout the man was going to be booed during the Cup presentation...

[RGM81]

I like that nobody's questioned that it's going to be Brian Gionta getting the call to centre ice. Y'all are good people for letting me indulge this.

[centrehice]

Brian Gionta has grace, charm and humility, Bettman could learn a lot by presenting him the cup, then following his example.

[Wickabee]

I like that nobody's questioned that it's going to be Brian Gionta getting the call to centre ice. Y'all are good people for letting me indulge this.

See what happens if I start talking about a Sedin.

[mooneyes]

Dustin Brown will happily accept the Cup from the Employee of the league. I hope not, but they are huge, fast, gritty, talented and have by far, the best goalie in the league imho.