Columbus Blue Jackets News Clips June 5-8, 2020

Columbus Blue Jackets PAGE 02: Columbus Dispatch: NHL says Phase 2 voluntary workouts will begin Monday PAGE 04: Associated Press: After best-of-five ’play-in’ round, NHL plans usual seven-game playoff series PAGE 06: The Athletic: Q&A: Blue Jackets’ Seth Jones on his ankle, his next contract, protests and more PAGE 11: Columbus Dispatch: Blue Jackets hope they get in game shape quickly PAGE 13: Columbus Dispatch: Blue Jackets set to begin small-group workouts PAGE 14: Columbus Dispatch: NHL plan may leave players feeling isolated

Cleveland Monsters/Prospects

NHL/Websites PAGE 16: The Athletic: After 10 days of posting and protesting, athletes consider what comes next PAGE 21: The Athletic: Mirtle: Why the NHL’s summer playoff schedule may become hockey’s new normal PAGE 24: Sportsnet.ca: 31 Thoughts: NHL, NHLPA hard at work on CBA extension PAGE 30: Sportsnet.ca: How the NHL's playoff could be better, and is a return worth it? PAGE 33: Tech Xplore: Broadcasters face screen test in coronavirus age PAGE 35: The Athletic: Duhatschek Notebook: Inside HHOF’s 2020 selection plan and playoff peculiarities PAGE 41: The Athletic: LeBrun: What to expect from each of the 24 teams as they enter Phase 2 PAGE 45: The Athletic: Q&A: NHL’s Kim Davis says this is ‘a moment for us to really accelerate’ PAGE 50: Sportsnet.ca: Quick Shifts: NHL community taking critical steps in fighting racism

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Columbus Dispatch / NHL says Phase 2 voluntary workouts will begin Monday By Brian Hedger – June 5, 2020

Issues remain before the NHL’s return to action is finalized, but the league took two more strides Thursday toward resuming its paused 2019-20 season. After first releasing additional details with its 24-team return format in the afternoon, the league announced later Thursday that “Phase 2” of its plan will begin Monday with team facilities re-opening for voluntary small-group workouts. The workouts, on-ice and off-ice, will be limited to no more than six players at a time and each team must meet extensive procedural requirements contained within a 20-page summary of “Phase 2” protocols released last month. “All necessary preparations for Phase 2, including those that require Player participation (education, diagnostic testing, scheduling for medicals, etc.), can begin immediately,” the league said in a press release. “The NHL and the NHLPA continue to negotiate over an agreement on the resumption of play.” Players who opt to participate in Phase 2 will be subjected to regular coronavirus testing, fever checks and have limited contact with a select group of team staff members that includes athletic trainers, equipment managers and strength-and-conditioning coaches. They will also have no contact with other players at the team facility other than those designated to be in their group. Each team must also designate at Facility Hygiene Officer to oversee the league’s protocols. Getting players back from their offseason homes could require extended time and self-quarantine measures upon re-entering the U.S. and Canada, which is why Phase 2 will precede full training camps. The is to allow players to get back on the ice of conditioning skates and skill work prior to the start of training camps, which is targeted for sometime in July. Training camps are expected to be split between two hub cities that have yet to be designated and will host games. Columbus is among the cities being considered. “Combining the Phase 2 and Phase 3 (training camps), there’s going to be plenty of time to get (players) ready, so I don’t have a lot of concern over that,” Blue Jackets general manager Jarmo Kekalainen said last week on a teleconference. “That’s why the league’s done it the way it’s done it, so there will be adequate time for everybody’s preparation.” Officially starting Phase 2 is a big step for a league that’s been paused since Mar. 12 for the COVID-19 pandemic. It allows players to get back into their regular practice facilities and sharpen skills that have likely dulled in nearly three months off ice. Goalies may benefit most. They will not be allowed to work with the team’s goaltending coaches during Phase 2, just as skaters can’t work with team skill coaches, but goalies are allowed to hire independent goaltending coaches and will get more ice access than skaters. “Goaltending is obviously one of those positions that are a little more delicate than the others,” Kekalainen said. “They will need that preparation time, for sure.”

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Earlier Thursday, the league announced further format details that were hammered out in talks between the NHL and its players association, including the decision to use best-of-5 series in only the qualifying round and best-of-7 series in all other rounds. The league also announced that seeding rather than brackets will determine matchups once the qualifying round is complete. Methods to determine “home” and “away” teams within each series were also revealed, even though the use of hub cities renders that more for presentation than any home-ice advantage. In the qualifying round through the conference finals, higher-seeded teams will get the majority of “home” games, while the team with a higher points percentage in the regular season will get more “home” games in the Stanley Cup Final. The Blue Jackets, seeded ninth in the Eastern Conference, will be the “road” team in Games 1, 2 and 5 (if necessary) against the eighth-seeded Maple Leafs. They will be the “home” team in Games 3 and 4 (if necessary).

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Associated Press / After best-of-five ’play-in’ round, NHL plans usual seven- game playoff series By Stephen Whyno – June 5, 2020

The NHL announced Thursday that after the initial best-of-five play-in round every playoff series will be a best-of-seven format and teams will be reseeded throughout if the league is able to return with its 24- team plan later this summer. The announcement came at nearly the same time the revealed one of their players had tested positive for the coronavirus. The team said the unidentified player was not in Pittsburgh, was isolated after experiencing symptoms and has recovered. So far, nine NHL players are known to have tested positive: five from Ottawa, three from Colorado and one from Pittsburgh. The league is expected to test players daily if games resume. The NHL is still assessing health and safety protocols for what it has said could be 24 teams playing each other in two hub cities. "We still have a lot of things to figure out, namely the safety of the players," captain Blake Wheeler said this week. "We've got to make sure that our safety is at the top of that list. Because we're a few months into this pandemic, we don't know what the long term effects are going to be. A lot of questions to be answered." The NHL has not announced the start of voluntary workouts or a firm timeline for training camps and the resumption of games. But the final details of the format answered one question: Players preferred re-seeding throughout a 24-team playoff as a means of fairness, though the league likes the brackets that have been in place since 2014. "We prefer as a general matter brackets for a whole host of reasons," commissioner Gary Bettman said last week. "We've told the players who have been debating it internally if they have a preference, we're happy to abide by it." The top four teams in the Eastern and Western Conferences will play separate round-robin tournaments to determine seeding. Re-seeding each round puts more value on the seeding tournaments between Boston, Tampa Bay, Washington and Philadelphia in the East and St. Louis, Colorado, Vegas and Dallas in the West. "Those games are going to be competitive," Capitals general manager Brian MacLellan said. Toronto captain , a member of the NHL/NHLPA Return to Play committee, said he preferred the traditional seven-game series once the playoffs were down to the more traditional 16 teams. A majority of players agreed. "Everybody is used to a best of seven," Pittsburgh player representative Kris Letang said. "You know how it's structured. You know how it feels if you lose the first two or you win the first two. You kind of know all the scenarios that can go through a best of seven." Having each series be best of seven will add several days to the schedule to award the Stanley Cup as late as October. But players felt it worth it to maintain the integrity of the playoffs.

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"Any team that is going to win five rounds, four rounds of best of seven ... I think it will be a very worthy Stanley Cup champion and they'll be as worthy as any team or players that won it before them," Tavares said.

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The Athletic / Q&A: Blue Jackets’ Seth Jones on his ankle, his next contract, protests and more By Aaron Portzline – June 5, 2020

COLUMBUS, Ohio — The 2019-20 Blue Jackets survived the well-publicized departures of Artemi Panarin, Sergei Bobrovsky and Matt Duchene. They moved on well without firebrand forward Brandon Dubinsky in the lineup. Even when Cam Atkinson, Joonas Korpisalo, Ryan Murray and Zach Werenski went down with injuries, they kept chugging along. But Seth Jones — a heralded player, to be sure — has never been more appreciated in Columbus than in the weeks after he fractured his ankle in mid-February. The Jackets missed his obvious talents, of course, but everybody gained more appreciation for the smart, subtle plays Jones makes that rarely show up in highlights. The Athletic caught up with Jones to discuss his ankle, the NHL’s return to play plan, the play-in round match-up with Toronto, his not-too-far-away free agency, and the current protests in cities around the world. Here’s what he had to say: It’s been almost three months since the NHL hit the pause button on the 2019-20 season. Is this possible? Catch us up on what’s going on with you these days. I’ve spent most of that time here in Columbus, going to the rink to skate and for rehab (on his fractured ankle) most days. I spent a couple of weeks in Texas, but I’ve been back for a couple of weeks now. It’s been the longest and shortest three months of my life, it’s really weird. When we chatted at the trade deadline, just after your surgery, you were in full-speed-ahead mode with your ankle, with the stated goal of making it back before the end of the regular season, which then was in early April. What effect has the pause had on the rehabilitation? We didn’t completely change it, but we definitely slowed down the process of making it better, which is — at the end of the day — probably a good thing. Ankles are so important in hockey. It sucks for all of this (the pandemic) to have happened, but it’s also a blessing in disguise a bit. I think this is week (16) since the surgery. We didn’t rush it. The swelling is always an issue with surgeries, and we’ve managed that. But the time off has been big. If something feels wrong one day, like if I get up and it doesn’t feel great, I don’t skate. We’ve been able to play around with it pretty good. We’ve been taking it slow. If the puck dropped tomorrow … Yeah, I’ve been skating on it just fine. Me and Bjorky (Oliver Bjorkstrand) have been skating together. It feels pretty good. There are some padding issues and things like that, the hardware. But nothing would stop me from playing tomorrow at 100 percent. Hanging with Bjorkstrand … I see a buddy-cop script in the making. Two Portland Winterhawks, both with broken ankles, one a 6-foot-4 defenseman from the U.S., the other a 5-foot-9 forward from Denmark …

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(Laughs). Yep, we’ve seen each other pretty much every day at the rink. For a bit (Dean) Kukan was there and Tex (Alexandre Texier) was there, but they ended up going home when they found a place to do their rehab. So it’s just been me and Bjorky ever since. It’s nice because we’re kind of going through the same thing. He’s probably 10-14 days behind me in terms of when his surgery was, but his calf (muscles) might be stronger than mine right now. We’ve been dealing with different things, different set-backs with each of our ankles. But we’re both on good paths. You’ve been allowed at Nationwide Arena this whole time because of the injury rehabilitation. What’s the building like right now, other than mostly empty? It’s definitely strange. It’s just weird with nobody in there but the trainers. We have our masks on during all of our training. The only time we don’t is on the ice. I don’t know what’s going to happen when we’re all back together skating, if we’re going to have to full bubble (headgear) like the college kids? I know that idea was getting thrown around a bit. The small-group sessions could start as soon as next week, so the traffic will pick up then, right? Yep. Cam (Atkinson) is here (in Columbus), the Sherwoods (Kole and Kiefer) are here. Elvis (Merzlikins) stayed. A couple of guys are coming in this weekend. I think (Andrew) Peeke said he was coming in this weekend, and Pierre-Luc (Dubois) is coming in within a week. A lot more guys, I think, are waiting for an official date (for the start of training camp), because you don’t know how long the small groups could last. It could be August 1. It could be the last week of July. Guys don’t want to get stuck here. So the good news for you is the Blue Jackets made the post-season cut, but what do you think of the 24-team format that’s been agreed upon by both the NHL and the players? I don’t think it’s going to be perfect for everybody. A few teams were kind of complaining about it, but these are uncertain times and everybody has to change what they’re doing. You can’t please everybody. There were five players on that committee who were really in touch with the league almost every day about how to return, how to go about it. I thought they did a great job with the circumstances involved. The hub cities and some other stuff hasn’t been figured out, but it’s a step in the right direction. We’re one step closer to playing. My understanding is that you and Nick Foligno have stepped up with David Savard, the Blue Jackets’ player rep. True? Yes. We jump in on all the calls, usually the three of us. Any player can get on, so we’ll send a text out to the group chat, telling guys they can jump on or we’ll fill them in afterward. Usually, we get five to eight guys, I would say. Pretty good numbers. We’re keeping the guys informed, for sure. Over the last month, there were a lot of votes that needed to happen, a lot of decisions that needed to be made. It’s kind of died down a little bit since the 24-team plan came out. You guys draw Toronto in the first round. We’re still a ways off, but early thoughts on that matchup? They’re obviously a great team. Training camps — the two weeks we have, or whatever it will be — are going to be dedicated toward systems and the opponent. I’m sure our coaches are looking at video already, trying to decipher stuff to show us during camp. Teams will be more prepared than ever, in my opinion. Usually, when you go to the playoffs, you have about four days to prepare for who you’re playing. Now you have … 10 weeks? We’ll see teams really prepared. I think it’ll be great hockey.

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It’s such a contrast of styles between you guys and the Leafs. They’re high-octane offense and you guys are a hard- and tight-checking team. It’s a short series, best-of-five. Does anybody have an early advantage given your styles? Man, I don’t know. I’m sure the first week of camp is going to be used to get us back into hockey shape. Then we’ll really focus on systems. Based on Toronto’s style, in my opinion, it’s going to be similar to last year against Tampa. The offensive firepower they have … they love scoring goals. Hopefully, we can take some of that away like we did last year against the Lightning. It should be interesting. Defense is going to be our main thing, which is really what it’s been since Torts got here. Offense really comes naturally to guys; it’s just reading and reacting and being creative. You don’t need to teach a guy how to put the puck in the net. I can’t believe it’s been almost four years (June 29, 2016) since you signed your six-year deal with the Blue Jackets, but here we are in 2020, and your current contract expires after the 2021-22 season. So you’ve got the rest of this season and two more. Is that starting to show up on your thought horizon, if you know what I mean? It is coming up. Six years seemed at the time like … it seems like I’ve only been here for a couple of years like I’d have four or five more years on my deal. It’s gone by quickly. I don’t feel like I’m even thinking about it at all yet. I don’t really want to at the moment. But we’ll see where it goes. I love it here in Columbus, but there’s a long time ahead for us to still have that discussion. Too early for specifics, sure, but what is your priority with the next deal, which could be the last long- term deal of your career? I’ve definitely thought about that. I love it here in Columbus. The group of guys, the leadership group, the young guys we have … it’s been awesome, it really has. Really, to witness how it’s changed from the time I got here and when Torts (coach John Tortorella) got here … where we came from back in 2015-16 and to see what we’ve built here. It just makes you feel good, and it shows the hard work and the effort that we’ve put toward becoming a respected organization. Since I’ve been here we’ve been working the whole time for that. We’re still building and we’re not completely there, but I think we definitely have the pieces. Did you watch how Artemi Panarin and Sergei Bobrovsky handled their last year before UFA status, and in turn, how the team handled Panarin and Bobrovsky in their last seasons? Were you taking notes? Not really. I was still three years out at that . It was definitely a distraction in the room, but it was easily dealt with. We did a great job of it, actually, both the team and Torts recognizing the situation and just going out and playing hockey. Really, that’s what everybody wants to do, right? You just want to know that … I don’t have a problem with guys leaving. I don’t. It’s part of the game. You see it in other sports all the time. It’s not as popular in our game, but you see players doing it constantly in other sports. In my opinion, you have to sacrifice happiness for winning sometimes, too. The grass isn’t always greener on the other side. Winning is my main priority and wherever I can do that is going to be the best fit. Guys get into the league when they’re 19 years old and they play until they’re 27 to pick where they want to play. They grind and they grow … there’s a lot of different reasons why a guy would want to play somewhere. It’s hard to hold a grudge. If the guy is hesitating to sign, you just want to know that when they’re on the ice they’re giving it 100 percent of their effort to win. That’s all you can ask.

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You do recognize, correct, that your willingness to sign with the Blue Jackets is going to be a huge deal? It will be seen by many as a commentary on the organization, either way. I think I do, I’m just not thinking about it yet. I definitely feel like I’m growing into a leader for the organization. Obviously Nick (Foligno) takes a lot of the bulk along with guys like Cam (Atkinson) and Booner (Boone Jenner). Savvy (David Savard), too. I’ve been able to grow into a leadership role here and be a stepping stone for the organization, help create a winning culture. And nothing else matters, really. What’s life like for you in Columbus now? You live in the Arena District, so it’s a pretty sweet set-up. You can walk to and from work, you’re close to everything. As an All-Star player, a perennial Norris Trophy candidate, and a highly marketable player, are you able to go about your daily life as before or do you get recognized more and more? A little bit more in the past six months, actually, which is a little crazy to me. Going to the grocery store or walking down High St. … it’s definitely more than three or four years ago. What’s changed is we started winning, I think. That’s usually how it goes. You start winning, people start caring a little bit more, they start getting more fans in the seats, more buzz. Making it to the playoffs and being a contender every year is huge. Hometown pride, right? I had a conversation with Rick Nash years ago where he noted something that took him a little time to realize. His first few years in Columbus it was often said that he was anonymous, nobody recognized him. But he later figured out that people in Columbus recognized him more than he realized, that they just didn’t want to impose by saying something. I’ve heard other players say that, too. I would agree with that, yes. People recognize you, but you get the feeling that they recognize you and don’t want to say anything. Sometimes they say something, but it’s usually very brief. They may ask for a picture, but most of the time they don’t want to bother you. What are your thoughts about what’s going on in the world right now, the protests in Columbus and all over the country, in the wake of George Floyd’s murder at the hands of police in Minneapolis? Man, add it to the list of things in 2020, right? It’s been pretty insane. Being down here in the Arena District, I hear the protestors every night. I think they were down here (in the Arena District on Monday) night. It was pretty peaceful, but there were sirens and everything. I’m all for … obviously it’s awful what happened to the guy (George Floyd) in Minnesota). It’s completely unacceptable and we definitely need to see change. I appreciate the protestors going out and doing what they’re doing. I would say the violent part of it — breaking windows and destroying local businesses — probably wouldn’t be the way I’d go about it. I don’t believe that’s helping anybody by destroying your own city. But I do recognize and appreciate the protests. And it’s not just me, but everybody who wants to see change. It’s just gone on for too long. Many, many athletes have made statements on social media in recent days. Evander Kane and Anthony Duclair have been particularly strong. What is the responsibility and what is the obligation of a player in times like this? I think everybody — whether you’re an athlete or not — should feel just fine with saying whatever you want to say. You’re allowed to believe whatever you want to believe, or say whatever you want to say, whether it’s right or wrong. We see a lot of athletes talking about this situation right now because that’s what we’re focused on. And I know there’s been talk in the NHL the last few years, especially after the Akim Aliu thing came out this year. I’ve seen a bunch of NHL players comment, and it’s definitely

9 appreciated. The more you can talk about it, the more awareness it creates, and awareness can lead to change. Does the societal response seem different this time? It may be compounded because everybody’s been locked up in quarantine, maybe. I’m sure you saw the video (of Floyd’s murder). That video was obviously horrific. The way it happened may have sparked a bigger outrage than in the past. Just the way the cop went about that. It was pretty gruesome and gross. That may spark it a little bit. I can understand the anger and frustration.

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Columbus Dispatch / Blue Jackets hope they get in game shape quickly By Brian Hedger – June 7, 2020

The last time the Blue Jackets were together, they assembled at Nationwide Arena for a morning skate on a day they were scheduled to host the Pittsburgh Penguins. They didn’t even get to their team meeting before the NHL decided to pause the season because of the coronavirus pandemic. “At that point you’re just like, ‘Well, we’re done,’ ” Blue Jackets captain Nick Foligno said, recalling one of the strangest moments in his 13-year NHL career. “You’re sitting there ready for the coach to come in and talk, and five minutes before that they come in and tell us, ‘Listen guys, we just got told that we have to send everyone home. No one’s allowed to be at the rinks.’ It was just a weird feeling.” That was March 12, and a lot has transpired since. As NHL players scattered to their offseason residences to wait out the league’s pause, nearly 1.9 million people have become infected and almost 110,000 have died from COVID-19 in the United States. Keeping a close eye on those numbers while trying to stay in shape, most without access to ice, players have muddled through an extended period of uncertainty that finally is starting to gain clarity. The league announced last week that it will use a 24-team format to conclude the season, and on Thursday revealed its next step. “Phase 2” voluntary workouts in small groups will begin Monday at team facilities across the league. The next step, Phase 3, will commence with the start of training camps at some point in July, followed by the restart of the season with a qualifying round decided in best-of-five series pitting the bottom eight teams in each conference. The Blue Jackets, seeded ninth in the Eastern Conference, will play the eighth-seeded in that round for the right to advance to the usual 16-team Stanley Cup playoff rounds, which will be determined by best-of-seven series and be held in two yet-to-be-named hub cities. Seeding, as opposed to a bracket format, will determine matchups and which team gets more “home” games in all but the Stanley Cup finals, when regular-season point percentage will decide which team wears its “home” uniform the most and gets the last shift change. It will be a two-month sprint to finish the season, especially for teams in the qualifying round. Finding top gear as quickly as possible will be essential. “For any team that’s going to jump into the play-in round, it’s going to be, ‘Who can get to their game the fastest?’ ” Foligno said. “That’s going to be the main focus. What’s made you successful this season and how quickly can you get your team wrapped around that? The team that gets off to a quick start is going to have a real advantage because of how short the series is.” That applies to all 24 teams, but the Blue Jackets might be among the most impacted. Their play-in opponent, the Maple Leafs, are a high-powered team with elite skill that also might be susceptible to bogging down against a physical, disciplined team such as the Jackets.

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Columbus stayed afloat this season — after losing a raft of key free agents last summer and then half the active roster to injuries — with a stringent defensive style. The Jackets’ approach requires dedication from all players in the lineup, a willingness to block shooting lanes and a strong line of communication between the goalie and his defensemen. In other words, the Jackets have a lot of moving parts in their engine, and there won’t be a lot of time to get them all in sync. The good news is how they played before the pause, moving themselves into the East’s second wild-card spot and benefiting from the break by healing. All injured players but one are expected to be ready, including key contributors Seth Jones, Cam Atkinson and Oliver Bjorkstrand. The one who’s questionable, Josh Anderson, will be entering the tail end of a four- to six-month recovery from shoulder surgery. “I don’t have a lot of concerns, because I think we have adequate time here for everybody to get ready,” Blue Jackets general manager Jarmo Kekalainen said. “They’re all professional athletes, so even if they didn’t have their gear (during the pause), they’re preparing themselves to be physically ready. Everything will be fine.” Goaltending, however, could be trickier. Without ice access during the break, goalies were forced to work on their reflexes and timing in other ways. The Blue Jackets’ Joonas Korpisalo and Elvis Merzlikins, for example, worked on hand-eye coordination using tennis balls ― Korpisalo in Finland and Merzlikins in Columbus. “It’s a little bit different,” Korpisalo said. “Being a (skater), you can go out and shoot pucks and stuff like that, but there’s not a lot you can do (as a goalie). How can I mimic the goaltending stuff without ice?” Merzlikins has tried by purchasing a machine that shoots tennis balls at various speeds, as well as using a slide board to work on his leg motions. “I think it depends from player to player,” he said of staying sharp. “It may take maybe a week or two, but still … you have to feel well, your body, you have to feel (good handling) the puck. I’ve never had this kind of experience in my life, so I think it’s a first time for everybody. But I think it should be fine (after) maybe two weeks.” If not, the Jackets or the Maple Leafs could be in trouble. “It’s a great team we’re playing against,” Foligno said. “There’s a reason it’s going to make for an exciting format when we do get back to playing. The team that can get to their game quickest is going to have success.”

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Columbus Dispatch / Blue Jackets set to begin small-group workouts By Brian Hedger – June 8, 2020

The NHL’s second phase in its return plan is set to begin. Starting Monday, players who wish to participate in the NHL’s Phase 2 voluntary small-group workout period will undergo physical exams and be tested for COVID-19 at team facilities, with workouts allowed following the return of negative test results. Those rehabbing injuries can continue those measures Monday, on and off the ice, but will also undergo the physicals and coronavirus testing. Once players are cleared medically, they can get back on the ice at their team facilities and return to their team’s weight room, all while working in groups no larger than six players. According to a team spokesman, the Blue Jackets expect to have some rehabbing players working at Nationwide Arena and the OhioHealth Ice Haus on Monday, joined by a group of nonrehabbing players later in the week. Those expected to participate in workouts this week include defensemen Seth Jones, Scott Harrington and Andrew Peeke, forwards Gustav Nyquist, Riley Nash, Oliver Bjorkstrand and Liam Foudy, and goalies Elvis Merzlikins and Matiss Kivlenieks. Jones and Bjorkstrand are rehabbing from ankle fractures and sprains that required surgeries prior to the NHL pausing the regular season March 12 because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The virus has proven to be highly contagious, as professional and collegiate sports teams and leagues have already learned firsthand. Multiple college football programs are now dealing with infections as teams begin to regather on campuses for voluntary workouts that can start Monday, including five Alabama players and three from Oklahoma State. Likewise, the Associated Press reported last week that a Ukranian soccer team, Karpaty Lviv, had 25 positive tests return among 65 players and staff who were tested. That’s why the NHL’s list of health protocols, revealed in a 22-page memo May 25, are so stringent. They include testing players and those with access to players twice a week, if possible, without affecting the number of tests available publicly, mandatory wearing of masks or face-coverings when not working out in team facilities, and daily temperature checks administered both at home and before entering team facilities. Additionally, players returning from their offseason residences via commercial travel will be required to self-quarantine for 14 days prior to joining Phase 2 workouts, along with players returning from places deemed “high risk” for COVID-19.

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Columbus Dispatch / NHL plan may leave players feeling isolated By Brian Hedger – June 8, 2020

The NHL and the players’ union have cleared a couple of big hurdles on the path toward concluding the 2019-20 season, but some tall ones still lie ahead. One of them, regarding protocols the league will use to maintain the health of its players, coaches and others during the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, reportedly has players roiling. “The biggest issue is just the conditions if we come back,” Blue Jackets center Pierre-Luc Dubois told The Dispatch. “I want it to be safe as much as possible, of course, but at the same time, I don’t know how I’d fare being six weeks or eight weeks or 12 weeks inside a hotel room, locked in there by myself. I don’t think it’s in anybody’s best interest.” The notion of keeping players isolated inside a bio-bubble, of sorts, in “hub” cities was part of the league’s restart discussions all along. Following recommendations of health experts, the goal would be to limit the odds of those inside the bubble contracting COVID-19 by simply cutting off their access to the outside. It’s not a novel approach. The NBA and have fashioned similar plans for the conclusion of their seasons this summer, both using one “bubble” location at a controlled Disney resort in Orlando, Florida. But the NHL isn’t going to Disneyland — or Disney World. Instead, the league plans to host its 24-team return in two hub cities with 12 teams in each. There are 10 cities under consideration, including Columbus, and decisions about which two are chosen are being delayed to assess infection rates in each market. The bigger issue for players, however, is the idea of extended isolation. Some foresee a potential isolation period of two-plus months away from their families and feel that’s excessive. Others, including Dubois, simply shudder to think about life inside a bio-bubble, being shuttled only between hotels and hockey rinks. “I’m a single guy, a young guy, and I don’t really want to (do it),” said Dubois, who will turn 22 later this month. “I don’t want to at all, so I can’t even imagine guys with kids. I don’t know how they’d feel being locked away from them for the two months or something like that.” That scenario applies to several of Dubois’ teammates, including veterans David Savard, Cam Atkinson and Nick Foligno. All three have families that include their wives and multiple young children, and Foligno has additional health concerns to weigh in relation to the pandemic. His 6-year old daughter, Milana, has a congenital heart condition that has required two open-heart surgeries. And his youngest son, 2-year old Hudson, overcame a bout of pneumonia in March 2019 that caused one of his lungs to collapse. “I don’t think anyone’s happy about the situation,” Foligno said. “A big part of the NHL world is the focus on family. It’s a hard thing to wrap your head around that it could be different.

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“Our understanding is there is going to be a different version of the NHL in this next little go-round, just with everything going on. I think you have to be mature enough to accept that, within reason.” Those last two words are key. “We don’t just go away from our families without an understanding of how we’re going to do it and the safety aspect. But I think the league is really diligent on that, from what I hear, and making sure that everything comes down to, ‘Are we comfortable as players?’ ” Foligno said. “When you know they have that in mind, you can respect that.” Players, however, don’t have to accept it. There are still sticking points to negotiate, including the placement of teams within the chosen hub cities. Will teams from those cities be allowed to compete in those markets, and if so, will players from those teams be allowed access to their families nearby? “If a team happens to be in its own market, the players, I don’t think, should be planning on going home,” NHL commissioner Gary Bettman told reporters on a recent conference call to discuss the return format. “They’ll be staying in the same conditions that everybody else is.” Unless, of course, that changes with ongoing talks. “You can’t really police somebody that hard when it comes to families,” Foligno said. “If somebody’s going to tell me I can’t see my family, there’s going to be a fight, at some point, in that kind of setting. … (But) if that’s what’s needed to play, there are sacrifices everybody’s got to make. And I completely respect that because I’d probably be in the same boat.”

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The Athletic / After 10 days of posting and protesting, athletes consider what comes next By Lindsay Jones – June 5, 2020

In a time without sports, athletes have found their voices more powerful than ever. The 10 days since George Floyd was killed in Minneapolis, with videos showing the weight of a police officer’s knee on Floyd’s neck circulating widely on social media, have become a new flashpoint in athlete activism in a post-Colin Kaepernick sports landscape. Athletes across sports have reacted swiftly and strongly to an undeniable act of police brutality, flooding Twitter and Instagram with statements and calls to action. “I think a big reason why everybody is able to focus in right now on the issue at hand and say, ‘Hey, we need to make a change in our country around how black people are being treated,’ is because there is nothing going on. Nobody’s allowed to be distracted,” Saints linebacker Demario Davis said. “I just hope that when everything does resume that we don’t just pick back up and start moving on and get distracted, that we’re using our resources and our voices collectively (as) athletes.” Now, with protests in cities across the country reaching the one-week mark, athletes are asking themselves: What comes next? What can they do to keep this conversation going when they go back to work? How will they continue to use their voices and their platforms once games resume? And how many athletes, teams and leagues who felt compelled to post messages on Twitter or Instagram, who blacked out their social media feeds on Tuesday, will feel equally compelled to have the hard conversations in person and do the work to effect lasting change when sports resume? “I still support the kneeling. I’m all for the guys that have taken a knee. I think they have tremendous courage,” Denver Broncos safety Justin Simmons said. “I think now, moving forward, who knows what that looks like. I don’t want to distract people from the actual problem at hand, which is police brutality.” Modern black athletes have been speaking about and protesting police brutality even before Kaepernick, the former 49ers quarterback, began his demonstrations during the national anthem in 2016. LeBron James and teammates from the Miami Heat wore hoodies as a statement of solidarity after Trayvon Martin was killed in 2012. In December 2014, five St. Louis Rams players performed the “Hands up, don’t shoot” gesture during pregame introductions in response to the killing of teenager Michael Brown by a police officer in nearby Ferguson, Mo. That same month, then-Cleveland Browns wide receiver Andrew Hawkins wore a T-shirt calling for “Justice for Tamir Rice and John Crawford,” and NBA players, including James, wore shirts that read “I can’t breathe” following the killing of Eric Garner. WNBA players have consistently taken an active role in social justice issues, especially around police brutality. In 2016, players from the Minnesota Lynx wore shirts that read “Black Lives Matter” along with

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the names of victims of police killings, and in 2018, the WNBA launched a league-wide social justice initiative called “Take a Seat, Take a Stand.” Kaepernick began his peaceful protest in 2016, not just in response to police brutality, but deep-rooted systemic issues that lead to unjust treatment for people of color. In 2017, after President Trump labeled Kaepernick and other protesting NFL players “sons of bitches” during a September rally in Alabama, more than 200 NFL players engaged in some form of protest the following Sunday, with many taking a knee during the anthem like Kaepernick had done. Kaepernick became a pariah in the NFL — he hasn’t played since 2016, sued the league for collusion (and settled) and awaits a chance to return to football. But his protests sparked a new era of player activism and showed athletes the power of their words and actions. “Here are the facts. The way our culture here in the United States of America is communicated and broadcast to the world, the main drivers have always been sport and entertainment and art. That is how the world is exposed to our culture here in America,” said Isiah Thomas, the Detroit Pistons great. “So what the athlete’s responsibility has always been is to educate yourself in all these areas so if you ever do get the platform, now you get to be a voice and speak for the voiceless. That’s what I was taught.” That’s why Champ Bailey, when given a massive platform to speak as he was enshrined in the Pro Football Hall of Fame in August, issued a plea to white athletes to listen to their African American peers. Tears were in Bailey’s eyes and his voice caught as he issued a call to action. “When we tell you about our fears, please listen. When we tell you we’re afraid for our kids, please listen. When we tell you there are many challenges we face because of the color of our skin, please listen. And please don’t get caught up in how the message is delivered,” Bailey said in his speech. “Yes, most of us are athletes, but we are black men first. Understand this. Things that make us great on the field, like our size and our aggression, are the same things that can get us killed off the field.” Bailey grew up in Folkston, Ga., about 45 minutes from Brunswick, where Ahmaud Arbery was shot and killed after two white men (one of whom was a retired law enforcement officer) chased him down while jogging in February. Arbery’s death, which was also captured on video, felt personal to Bailey, and he shared that in an Instagram post in April. It reminded him of the times when, as a child and teenager, his father warned him and his brothers to stay out of predominately white neighborhoods, and of the time he and his friends didn’t heed the warning. “We were just riding around, just being kids. We weren’t being disruptive. But we were seen driving down the street one too many times. A guy gets out of his truck and cocks his shotgun and yelled, ‘I’ll do it!’” Bailey said. “We were like, ‘What are you talking about? We’re just driving.’ We sped off and drove home. It’s not like we could go to the cops.” Bailey knows stories like that aren’t unique to him; it’s a shared experience for black Americans, regardless of whether they are athletes. Maybe, now, that message is getting through. “In theory, you expect somebody who cares about you to care about what you’re saying how you feel,” he said. “You know, I would think that there are a lot of white people, that if something happened to me today, they would cry about it, you know what I’m saying? So, those feelings are real. So, let’s show that same compassion while I’m living, listen while I’m living, and try to help make the change.”

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The activism and responses on social media have touched every part of sports: from the biggest stars like James and Patrick Mahomes, to college athletes like Trevor Lawrence, to track and field and tennis. And athletes have found ways to get creative in their statements. American tennis pro Frances Tiafoe, ranked No. 81 in the world, recruited active and retired black tennis players and coaches, including Serena Williams, Coco Gauff, Sloane Stephens and James Blake, to participate in a video he made with his girlfriend, tennis player Ayan Broomfield, called “Rackets Down Hands Up.” “It’s unbelievable to see everyone come together, and an unbelievably powerful message was able to be made. Everyone was like, ‘Yes, sure.’ I was pleased with that, and with their help, we created an unbelievable video,” Tiafoe said. And it is also notable that over the past 10 days, white athletes have spoken up in unprecedented numbers. Among them were a handful of quarterbacks, like Joe Burrow and Carson Wentz, and Tom Brady was among those supporting the call for police reform by the Players Coalition, a group of NFL players that works on social justice initiatives and is largely focused on criminal justice reform and education. A number of white NHL players spoke at length with The Athletic’s Ryan S. Clark about how Floyd’s death has inspired them to address racism. Those sorts of statements have been noted and appreciated, Davis said. “I think this is the one to tip the axis because so many black people started to demand a response from their peers,” Davis said. “And it’s like, if you’re not going to share the cry that I’m putting out on behalf of my community, then you can’t say you’re my friend or you can’t say you’re my neighbor or you love me. And I think that was the heart of so many other people that it wasn’t that they didn’t love black people, or I didn’t care about them. It’s just for whatever reason, they remained silent on the issue, and everyone just decided at one time not to remain silent.” Davis spoke on Tuesday, a day before teammate and Saints quarterback Drew Brees criticized player protests during the national anthem. In an interview with Yahoo Finance, Brees said he would “never agree with anybody disrespecting the flag of the United States of America.” Brees’ comments were met with harsh backlash from across the NFL, and particularly from teammates like Malcolm Jenkins. “When you talk about the brotherhood and all this other bullshit, it’s just lip service, or it’s only on the field, because when we step off this field and I take off my helmet, I’m a black man walking around in America, I tell you I am dealing with these things,” Jenkins said. (Brees on Thursday morning issued an apology via Instagram, directed to his teammates, friends, New Orleans and “the black community.” In speaking with some of you, it breaks my heart to know the pain I have caused,” Brees wrote. “In an attempt to talk about respect, unity, and solidarity centered around the American flag and the national anthem, I made comments that were insensitive and completely missed the mark on the issues we are facing right now as a country. They lacked awareness and any type of compassion or empathy. Instead, those words have become divisive and hurtful and have misled people into believing that somehow I am an enemy. This could not be further from the truth, and is not an accurate reflection of my heart or my character.”) Those are words, part of a cascade of statements from athletes, coaches, agents, team accounts and athletic brands, some more powerful than others. On Thursday evening, a star-studded group of NFL players, including Super Bowl MVP Mahomes, his Chiefs teammate Tyrann Mathieu, Saints receiver Michael Thomas and Cardinals receiver DeAndre Hopkins, collaborated on a video they shared across all

18 of their social media platforms. In it, they challenge viewers to see in them the victims of police killings. And then they issued a direct challenge to the NFL: To admit the league was wrong for silencing players for who had engaged in peaceful protests, and to say “Black Lives Matter.” Some athletes are already choosing action, and by last weekend, a number of athletes were taking their activism beyond social media and participating in Black Lives Matter protests and marches. Among them were Boston Celtics forward Jaylen Brown, who drove 16 hours to march in his hometown of Atlanta; Vikings defensive end Ifeadi Odenigbo, who marched in Minneapolis; Saints safety Malcolm Jenkins, who marched in Philadelphia; Houston Texans quarterback Deshaun Watson, who joined protesters in Houston; Stephen Curry and Ayesha Curry, along with Klay Thompson, who marched in Oakland, Calif.; Teenage tennis player Coco Gauff, who spoke Wednesday at a rally in Delray Beach, Fla.; Atlanta Hawks’ Trae Young, who spoke in Oklahoma; and Simmons, the Broncos safety, who spoke at a protest in South Florida. Other athletes, including Bengals wide receiver Auden Tate, who is from Tampa, Fla., and former NFL punter Marquette King, who lives outside Phoenix, participated in clean-up efforts in their home cities. “I don’t want to be a part of the silence,” Simmons said. Athletes are considering what comes next. It is without question a pivotal moment, and players have found ways to make their voices heard when they aren’t playing and when they don’t have the typical platform. If games were being played, we may have seen massive protests, perhaps greater in scale than the display by NFL players in 2017 in response to Trump’s “sons of bitches” comments. That’s not to say more players will join Texans wide receiver Kenny Stills and safety Eric Reid (if he signs with a new team) in kneeling during the anthem come fall. But we should expect some sort of tangible action. Those conversations are beginning to happen during formal team meetings held over Zoom and through organizations like the Players Coalition. In the wake of Floyd’s killing, the Coalition has focused its policy initiatives on police reform. That includes being involved in educating voters on where mayoral and gubernatorial candidates, along with others running for elected law enforcement roles, stand on police reform. The Coalition also plans to work with city governments to restructure contracts with police unions and rework the language that currently protects officers suspected of using excessive force. “On the surface level, we need people to be upset and say we demand radical change,” Davis said. “Because with that momentum, we will go in and find the facts and the policies that need to be changed. We know how to use our voice effectively when it comes to voting.” Fans should also expect to see some athletes wearing shirts bearing some sort of slogans tied to the Black Lives Matter movement. The Dallas Wings’ Arike Ogunbowale and her teammates are discussing designs and phrasing for shirts they would wear before games. They would also sell them, with 100 percent of proceeds going to social justice charities. They envision a campaign that can live longer than social media posts.

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“It’s good that everyone’s been posting, but there is more that can actually be done,” Ogunbowale said. “Giving money, bringing awareness, selling T-shirts — that’s a way we can take this a step further.” Several teams, including the Baltimore Ravens, San Francisco 49ers and Seattle Seahawks, either through ownership or players’ social justice funds, have committed to making financial donations to further advocacy. Some players, like Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott, have as well. Teams have forgone their typical online offseason meetings this week in order to have open conversations about race. Those meetings may continue after the protests, scripted statements and social media posts subside. “Listening to their life stories and many others, like I said, has helped me cement my belief that we all must do whatever it takes to improve our country, especially as it relates to race relations,” Texans coach Bill O’Brien told reporters on Wednesday. “It’s so much deeper. It’s 400 years ago slavery, it’s segregation, it’s police brutality, it’s not equal opportunities. It’s so much deeper. It’s deeper. We have to stand with the black community and we have to heed the call to action and challenge each other to live out the change that we want to see.” NFL executive vice president Troy Vincent Sr. said he wants those conversations to expand beyond the locker room and include ownership, community leaders and law enforcement. “When we look at the power of the athlete to get people to listen or take notice, this one of those moments,” Vincent said. “I’m not sure if we’ll get this moment again.” That Brees, one of the NFL’s biggest stars, remains focused on the flag and not the purpose of the protest shows just how much those conversations need to continue within individual locker rooms, across sports and beyond. “A lot of people are realizing the power that their voice has, and the power that we have as people and being united together,” Davis said. “And I just hope that we remember that and in the middle of going about our regular lives, that we continue to keep humanity first.”

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The Athletic / Mirtle: Why the NHL’s summer playoff schedule may become hockey’s new normal By James Mirtle – June 5, 2020

Let’s start simply by laying out the NHL’s ideal timeline for resuming the season — assuming it can do so. Training camps are scheduled to begin no sooner than July 10 and continue for at least two weeks. Teams would play two exhibition games, likely after that point, once they’ve arrived in their hub cities. By late July or early August, the league’s eight planned play-in series would begin and continue for the next 10 or 11 days. By mid-August, the traditional four-round playoff format would start. If all four rounds are best-of-seven series — which is what the players’ side is pushing for — that could take the better part of two months. I’m told at this point that the latest the NHL believes it can give out the Stanley Cup is Oct. 8, four days before Canadian Thanksgiving. (The NBA’s current projected end date is Oct. 12.) The NHL would then begin the draft and free agency in mid-October, followed by a two-month offseason that would carry into December. By mid-December, training camps and preseason would begin, culminating in the start of the 2020-21 season with the Winter Classic on Jan. 1, 2021, in Minnesota. Sound radical? Well, it is, given how accustomed we’ve become to a September training camp and a June Stanley Cup Final schedule, which has been the norm since the Penguins won the Cup in June 1992. What’s fascinating about some of the current conversations coming out of the NHL’s return-to-play talks is not that the league would resume playing in July or August — a scenario the NHL was forced into by the unprecedented events of the pandemic — but rather that playing games deep into the summer could actually become the league’s new normal. There are two key reasons for that, one practical and one business-related. The practical concern is that once you’ve played one season into October, how then do you get back on a September-to-June schedule? Wiping out a large section of games would work, but the NHL has strongly denied that as an option. If the 2020-21 season begins Jan. 1 and includes a full 82 games and playoffs, the earliest it could plausibly conclude would be sometime in August. (And good luck trying to fit in anything like the Olympics, bye weeks or the All-Star break.) If the 2021 Stanley Cup is awarded in August, the earliest the NHL could then contemplate playing the next season would be in late November, which would inch the calendar forward a month or so. Even in that scenario, there would theoretically be playoff games played into July for years. When you factor in training camps and the preseason, getting back to the pre-pandemic schedule would be extremely difficult.

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What’s interesting about that timeline is the strong business case for many NHL teams to move most of their fall games. In many U.S. markets, ticket sales and TV ratings pick up considerably in the late winter and early spring. Last season, for example, Arizona, Carolina, Columbus, St. Louis and the Islanders all had significant bumps at the gate — between 6 and 18 percent — after Feb. 1. (One caveat: New York’s increase was largely driven by where the Islanders played, given the capacity differences in their two home arenas.) Some of that may well be driven by playoff races and that games carry more significance later in the season. But the reality is the October sports calendar is packed with MLB playoff games, the start of the NBA season and the NFL, which is in full swing. Hockey, in many of the NHL’s American markets, sometimes takes a back seat. And the major networks are less interested in airing hockey games in the fall. “Media rights consultants have told (commissioner) Gary (Bettman) that it would increase the value of broadcast rights,” one league source said of moving the NHL’s start date to later in the calendar. Avoid conflict with the World Series and a big chunk of the NFL season. The NHL could deliver live sports content at a time of least competition — therefore higher ratings.” The time of least competition on the traditional sports calendar? February to August. That kind of a radical scheduling change will drive hockey purists in Canada and parts of hockey’s traditional fan base in the U.S. wild, but with the fallout from COVID-19 likely hitting NHL revenues for years to come, it could well be one shift that Bettman and Co. get behind. Especially given the U.S. television rights deal expires at the end of next season, as that money will be a key factor in helping rebuild the league’s finances in 2021-22 and beyond. It is likely the league would have wide support from the governors for pushing the schedule back, given the revenue boost it could provide. “Owners don’t care about home games from October to mid-January,” said the source, pointing out that this issue, in part, led to the half-season lockout in 2012-13. “They really care about games from mid- January on — and especially about the playoffs, where they make a killing.” If more of the money is in the second half of the season, in other words, why not simply push the season forward? If the NHL is already playing games in June, will ice conditions be that much poorer a month later? Will the league’s hardcore fan base in Canada and the northeastern U.S. tune games out if they’re pushed deeper into the summer? They’re all fair questions. And the players themselves will argue against having their offseason moved from the summer to the fall, given the logistical challenges that change could pose to their families and lifestyle. But there is one more advantage to the NHL pushing next season back, one that might trump them all: It’s possible that by January teams and leagues will be able to allow fans into arenas and stadiums again. Perhaps not in the same numbers as in the past, and likely with many new cautionary measures in place, but any progress in this direction would be huge for a league that drives a huge percentage of its revenues — in the neighborhood of 50 percent — from ticket sales.

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All of this outlined here is predicated on the idea of the season coming back at all. An increasing number of NHL players are uneasy about the return, with some of those issues outlined well by veteran Anton Stralman earlier this week, and there are legitimate concerns about how much revenue the league will even be able to derive from playing without fans in hub cities in the middle of the summer. But the league is pushing ahead as if there will be games beginning sometime in late July. There is still optimism at the league office, at this point, that the Stanley Cup will be awarded and some of the revenues lost can be recouped. And the reality is that if hockey in midsummer becomes the new normal, that won’t be nearly as much of a problem as you might think.

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Sportsnet.ca / 31 Thoughts: NHL, NHLPA hard at work on CBA extension By Elliotte Friedman – June 5, 2020

A regular “31 Thoughts” wasn’t possible this week, but I did want to contribute something. Below is an extended profile of Sean Day, a look at where things stand between the NHL and NHLPA, and Anaheim GM Bob Murray’s comments from Wednesday. But first, I wanted to re-post this week’s two podcasts. The first is with Kim Davis, the NHL’s Executive Vice-President of Social Impact, Growth Initiatives & Legislative Affairs. The second is with Jarome Iginla and Connor Brown. This is not the week to take anyone’s else ideas or commentary and claim them as your own. So, their words are presented in full in those links above. 1) Sean Day was surprised at the question. “There are people,” he was told, “who saw the news that the Rangers were terminating your contract as a sign that you wanted to quit.” “I’m playing (next season) for sure,” he replies without a pause. There isn’t a ton of hockey news at this time, so anything that does occur gets extra attention. Last weekend, the placed Day on waivers to terminate the final season of his contract. When no one claimed him, the deal was dissolved, making him an unrestricted free agent. There were a few tweets and Direct Messages from fans along the lines of: “What happened here?” I’d never spoken to Day before Wednesday, but Canadian junior hockey fans know him well. In 2013, the smooth-skating became the fourth CHL player given “exceptional status,” allowing him to play in the league at age 15. His first OHL team was the . “That first year went smoothly,” said James Boyd, who coached that team. (Two weeks ago, Boyd was named OHL GM of the year for his work in Ottawa.) Day had 16 points in 60 games on a 24-38-6 team that lost in the first round of the playoffs. “I thought he’d have a lifetime in hockey. Every day, he’d do something that would make you say, ‘Wow.’ His talent was incredible. In year two, the pressure Sean felt. We were happy with him, and we’d tell him that. But you could tell he wasn’t having much fun. The articles being written, what was said… how he played was never good enough. We felt bad for him, because you could feel the weight of the world on his shoulders.” The first three OHLers given exceptional status were John Tavares, Aaron Ekblad and Connor McDavid. Day could not escape those long shadows. “Obviously I have a lot of critics, but a lot of people don’t know me,” Day said this week. “When this whole thing came out (with the Rangers), it was pretty hard for me. I don’t have Twitter, but a bunch of my buddies kept sending me stuff… what people are saying about me. None of (those people) know me. If they knew me, they wouldn’t say half this stuff.” In conversations both on and off the record, it’s clear people who do know Day really like him. He laughingly calls himself “a goofball.”

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“I love being the class clown,” he says. “I love being everybody’s favourite teammate, and I love hanging out with anybody who wants to hang out.” This season, when he was sent from AHL Hartford to ECHL Maine, Day said approximately 14 of his teammates took time to wish him the best. That meant a lot to him. While his fun-loving approached worked on a personal level, it didn’t always help him on the job. By his own admission, when he was younger, Day relied on his prodigious talent, and, at that time of his life, did not put in the work. In researching this story, I learned that his combine performance for the 2016 draft is still discussed by people who were there. Day showed up “with a total bedhead,” according to one source, and did very poorly in testing. He fell to 81st, where New York — with no first- or second-round selections — took a shot. It seemed like a great gamble. “I remember talking to the Rangers’ guys after the (2017) Memorial Cup,” says then-Windsor coach Rocky Thompson. “They were so excited about how he played.” Day was traded to the Spitfires in 2016–17. Mikhail Sergachev was his partner, and the pair formed an outstanding top four with Jalen Chatfield and Logan Stanley (although Stanley missed time with an injury). “Sean did an outstanding job for us,” said Thompson, who now coaches AHL Chicago. “A lot of the credit goes to (assistant coach) Trevor Letowski.” Senior Writer Ryan Dixon and NHL Editor Rory Boylen always give it 110%, but never rely on clichés when it comes to podcasting. Instead, they use a mix of facts, fun and a varied group of hockey voices to cover Canada’s most beloved game. Thompson stops and laughs. “I can be a real pain in the ass when it comes to body position and stick position. Dogmatic. I’d get on him about it, and Sean would say, ‘It’ll work better if this comes from Trevor.’ Pushing him hard didn’t work. So I’d say to him, ‘How can I hold you accountable, then?’ He’d say that Trevor’s approach worked better for him. I agreed to let Trevor handle it, but I also told Sean it had to work. If it did, I would back off. I’m not a yeller and a screamer, but I have the ability to take away ice time. To Sean’s credit, it worked. He lived up to his end of the bargain. “Sean was a horse for us. When we won the Memorial Cup, he was basically playing every other shift. His defensive game got so much better. Erie (beaten by Windsor in the Memorial Cup Final) was basically an all-star team and he was out there against NHL-level players. He was a big reason we won.” “(Rocky and I) weirdly hit it off,” Day laughs. “When I got there, everybody was saying, ‘You can’t crack jokes around him, you can’t be loose, you gotta be strict.’ I remember my first day there, I made him cry laughing in one of the meetings. And everybody was like, ‘What did you just do?’ I like him. He knows what he’s doing. He believed in me. “But the one thing I hate is when a coach gets right in your face and screams at you. I get it — some people like it. Some guys you need to coach them differently. For me, I learn best when I know that you trust me.”

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Day finished his OHL career in Kingston. He spoke highly of then-coach , who he said used to have him over for Chinese food. (Varady now coaches at AHL Tucson, the Coyotes’ affiliate.) He added that Varady and then-assistant Kurtis Foster, who played 405 NHL games, were instrumental in getting him to start realizing the importance of conditioning. “When Sean was sent to us, I called Jay,” said ECHL Maine coach Riley Armstrong. “He said, ‘You have to find a way to have Sean Day trust you. If he doesn’t have that trust, the wall goes up. I let him go and play — 14 days go by and he asks to do some video with me. That’s what I was waiting for, to let him be comfortable working with me. If he feels you have his back and will fight for him, he will fight for you.” The Rangers declined to comment for this story, saying simply they wanted to wish Day the best. (It should be noted no one from the organization reached out to say anything negative off the record, either.) According to several sources, the team explored trades for Day last season, but couldn’t find anything to its satisfaction. It’s kind of like Jesse Puljujarvi in Edmonton. The team wants value based on potential, but opponents look at it like, “Well, we haven’t seen that yet.” “It was not a good fit for New York, [but] I’m not going to sit here and bash them,” Day said. “They did give me the opportunity to play pro hockey and they drafted me. I’m overly grateful for that. It is just time to move on. I wasn’t in their [future]. I could tell that.” That brings us back to the retirement question at the top of this story. Day thinks that’s an outdated opinion from people who don’t know him. “I love hockey, and the last two years, I’ve done enough to show people that I really do care about this sport and I want to do it for a living.” He was really happy with the way he finished his first professional season (2018–19). He felt he showed up that year in much-improved condition and credited the Rangers’ nutritionist for teaching him things he needed to know. But hip surgery loomed large. “I knew it was coming, and I said to myself that I can’t let this be a setback. Everyone thought I wouldn’t be back until a month into the season. For me, my goal was to make it to opening night.” Day invested in blood and saliva testing to determine what his body was allergic to and how he could maximize his recovery. He said his energy levels were low in the morning and wanted to correct that. “Eggs, cheese, celery, corn — foods that you typically eat a lot of, thinking that they’re healthy. The whole time I’m thinking that it’s bread… that you need to cut out carbs, [but] it wasn’t. I could have the carbs. (The problem was) the things that I was still eating. I was begging to be on the ice last summer. I was sneaking on when my doctor was telling me not to. I just went to the one end to see how it felt. I went into camp and ended up testing the best I ever did in my four years in New York. “Whenever somebody says, ‘Do you want it?’ Well, I had hip surgery and I came back a month early, just to prove to everybody that I want this.” Day is still learning the defensive side of the game. Another team did indicate that, if you look at Hartford’s roster, Day’s quicker-than-expected recovery might have overloaded their blue line, causing a numbers game he lost. In December, he was sent to Maine. “I know the Rangers were excited how Sean’s body changed,” said Armstrong. “He understands how he’s got to take things more seriously. This is not junior hockey, where you can walk in, play 35 minutes

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and get four points. The ECHL to the AHL is a pretty big jump. At this level, the way he skates, he’s a one- man breakout. He’s working on his defensive side. There was one game late in the year, where he had three points, and said, ‘I was garbage tonight.’ He started to understand how he needs to play. “Inside the locker room, he is still a goofball. There’s not a guy who didn’t like him. He’s that guy who took more time to grow and find himself. I just feel the way he skates, he’s worth it.” There is interest in Day, although COVID-19 has thrown next year’s schedule into uncertainty. Day feels strongly that Armstrong (who he loved playing for) is right about maturation. During the 2017 Memorial Cup, Day spoke to Sportsnet’s Damien Cox and discussed a family situation he usually shielded from the public. “I remember watching my brother, Scott, play, and ever since then I wanted to be a hockey player,” Day told Cox. “He was my role model growing up. He’s the reason I wear No. 4.” In October 2014, Scott was driving his pickup truck when it slammed into another vehicle. A 62-year-old woman was killed, and police found his blood-alcohol reading was twice the legal limit. In 2016, Scott Day was sentenced to prison for no less than 57 months and no more than 15 years. He was released last December. “I don’t think a lot people know what I went through when I was being labelled as immature,” Day said. “Honestly, it’s tough to talk about. My brother was going away to prison. I wasn’t able to be there, to see him and go to his trial. Also, my mother was in the hospital with different blood disorders. She has lupus and celiac disease and her blood would get really thin. I didn’t know how serious it was at the time…. Now she has a little more control over it and I don’t get as worried. Back then, it just started happening. It was kind of scary. I’m dealing with that while being away from home. And you have to ask, how would a normal 17-year-old handle that? “I think I handled it better than a lot of people give me credit for. I just want to play, I want a spot where I’m not judged off my past. If people thought I was immature, fine. But that was when I was 17. I’m 22 now.” 2) The major NHL news today was the finalization of the playoff format. Initially, the league preferred “bracketing” the post-season after the “play-in” round, but chose to give the players the final decision. They preferred the highest-remaining seed against the lowest after each round, and that will be the way it goes. Every series after the opening qualifiers (which are best three-of-five) will be best-of-seven. The top four seeds in each conference will be determined by the results of the three-game round robin, with regular-season points percentage serving as a tiebreaker if needed. We should see by the end of this week if the NHL and NHLPA can implement Phase 2 of the NHL’s “Return to Play” protocol. It’s not mandatory for players, and I’m not sure we’ll see too many participate. Phase 3 (training camps) is mandatory, and a huge step. It won’t begin before July 10, and there’s a lot of work to do. The playoff-structure debates got the most attention, but negotiations on the protocols were even harder, I’m told. So you can imagine the necessary grinding for something that would be mandatory, from testing on down.

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However, there are plenty of rumours that the NHL and NHLPA are working hard on a CBA extension, with multiple sources indicating there is a legit attempt to get something done by the time play resumes. The league wants long-term stability. The players want a cap on escrow, and word is that it is being considered. If the season does not resume, their hit would be 35 per cent. Even if there are games, they are looking at 27 or 28 per cent. I heard rumblings of a 20 per cent escrow cap over the next few seasons — others said they heard slightly less. A flat salary cap of $81.5 million for a few seasons is possible, too. Health care is a huge issue, too, since no one really knows the long-term effect of COVID-19 — even on a healthy athlete’s body. Now, it’s important to remember that these are discussions and nothing is done until it is done. Both Commissioner Gary Bettman and NHLPA Executive Director Donald Fehr will have constituents feeling very differently about these solutions. And fans do not want to hear about disputes right now. But an attempt is underway to see if there is common ground. Richard Deitsch and Donnovan Bennett host a podcast about how COVID-19 is impacting sports around the world. They talk to experts, athletes and personalities, offering a window into the lives of people we normally root for in entirely different ways. 3) Finally, Anaheim GM Bob Murray raised eyebrows with his comments about ’s first season during a Wednesday conference call. Murray is blunt, and I’ve learned with him that just because he’s honest doesn’t mean he’s overly reactionary. When it comes to coaches, he’s probably been a lot more patient than some of his peers. But I did ask for the transcript of the call to read for myself in full context. Here’s the question and answer about accountability: Q: What did you like/dislike about your club’s 2019-20 season? A: “The record wasn’t where I wanted it to be, or where anyone wanted it to be. The question is why? Again, I’m encouraged. There were some stretches of very good hockey played by this group. Definite steps in the right direction of playing faster, quicker and doing some things the proper way. Far too inconsistent. We’d play good games against good teams and show we could play, and then we failed to show up. Why? Special teams, a major concern. If you put us in the middle of the pack on special teams, we could be one of the teams playing right now. We’re so far down the totem pole, and that’s inexcusable. That’s on the coaches, players and everybody. That has to be fixed. Certain things are going to change. I’m going to be pushing very hard. The inconsistencies cannot be allowed to happen with the way they were. “In hindsight, because of the year before and what happened at the end, I kind of backed off and gave everyone space. I didn’t feel I could be around as much. In hindsight, that’s a mistake. An error in judgement. My people argue with me on that. That won’t happen again. Everybody talking about the young guys, it just led players, at times, to say it’s just a rebuilding year, and that it doesn’t matter. Up and down the lineup, some of the kids were allowed to get away with murder this year. That’s over. Accountability in this group is going to change. I’ve said that a couple times. I’m hellbent on that happening going forward. The coaches are going to hear that loud and clear. They already have. That

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goes right from the lowest ice time to the most ice time and the most veteran guys to the younger guys. That leads to the inconsistencies. Some of that was, ‘Okay, we have some of the young guys. We’re going to be young.’” Twelve questions later, Murray was asked specifically about Eakins: Q: What did you think of the job Dallas Eakins did in his first season behind the Ducks bench? A: “I thought he was very organized and well prepared. I thought the communication was good early. It got off track a little bit. As I’ve said before, he had to get rid of some of the things that came from Edmonton. I think those are gone now. He was very hard on some young people in Edmonton and it kind of backfired on him. I’m not saying it’s all his fault, by the way. “He took the foot off the gas a bit with them. He’s going to be much more consistent and on point with everybody next year. He had to get a few things out of the way, and he did. “We were a decent hockey team a lot of nights. That’s why I expect much more next year. We showed we could play the game. They have to get better on special teams. They’re working on it. You can’t watch certain teams’ power plays. I’ll use Boston [as an example]. That’s a pretty damn good power play. We don’t have those players, so we have to have a different sort of power play. You have to work with what you have. You can’t recreate a Boston, Tampa Bay or Washington power play. We can’t try to do that because we don’t have those people at this point. We’re getting some. We’re starting to draft some of those high-skilled people. For now, we’re going to have to do it a bit different. That’s my message. We can get better on special teams. That’s on coaching and the players. That’s something they’re working on.” I see this as a very blunt GM being … very blunt. He criticized himself, too, by not giving his coaches the kinds of players they needed to have a better power play, too. I’d bet Murray regrets mentioning Edmonton, but, with his history, I don’t read that as Eakins being in trouble. I read it as Murray hates losing and doesn’t want to see any more of it.

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Sportsnet.ca / How the NHL's playoff could be better, and is a return worth it? By Justin Bourne – June 5, 2020

Each week, Justin Bourne’s column will cover three different topics in varying depths. Think of it as a three-course meal with an appetizer, main course, and dessert… Appetizer: It’s not too late to change the shoes During our daily conversations on Hockey Central, Brian Burke has taken a consistent stance on the NHL’s return-to-play plan, which can be summed up thusly: The plan is a stunningly beautiful woman, and we’re sitting around criticizing her shoes. An apt use of metaphor, I’d say. That said, if you’re paid to talk about this playoff format 10 hours a week, the metaphorical shoes are gonna come up. So, before we get into the meat of today’s meal, one last comment on those shoes, which leave a near-perfect outfit wanting. The NBA just approved a return to play format that brings back 22 teams (which is everyone who had a reasonable shot at the playoffs), and sees those teams play eight more “regular season” games each before the eight and nine seeds contest a play-in series to crack the post-season. The format for that play-in series is – drum roll please – weighted. The eight-seed will have to beat the nine seed just once to lock-in their playoff spot. The nine-seed can still upset the eight-seed…by beating them twice. It just makes so much sense. You award an advantage to the team that’s earned a higher standings position over thousands of regular season games, while letting the closest challenger at least have a crack to show they’re more deserving of that spot. The NHL’s best-of-five play-in series could’ve used some tilting in favour of the five and six seeds (versus the respective 12 and 11 seeds), and I’m not sure who would’ve argued. Maybe it’s not too late for the league and players to make that tweak. Maybe it is. In the end, I generally like what the NHL has done and think they’ve created some high-stakes high-drama hockey, which I’m sure is at the heart of the goal for them. It’s all just so close to perfect I thought it worth one last mention. Main course: Answer to the question “Is returning for hockey worth it” matters most in the big picture, as individual answers will vary A few days ago Anton Stralman made some comments that got me thinking about just how varied each player’s circumstances are in this time of relative isolation. Stralman posed a question of if it was “worth it” to return to play, the answer to which would vary greatly around the league. From that piece by Joe Smith: But Stralman wonders: “Is it worth it?” “I think you should be concerned,” Stralman said. “There are so many ways to look at this thing. I know everybody wants hockey back, but safety has to come first. And it’s a little bit worrisome, I can’t deny that. Even though most players are young and healthy, I’m sure there are players like me that have underlying health issues. I don’t know how my body will react if I get this virus.”

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Stralman has dealt with bronchiectasis, which prevents mucus from being cleared from his lungs, since early in his career. It was finally detected during the Swede’s time with the Rangers, and he just got off the medication in the past year. I’d say the answer to “Is it worth it?” for him is a pretty unequivocal “no.” Stralman will turn 34 on August 1, which could potentially coincide with a re-opening of training camps. Stralman has earned north of $34 million in his career to date and is scheduled to make $11 million more. He has a wife and four children between the ages of eight and 13. He’s currently in his home country of Sweden and plays on a team that’s a 10-seed heading into a potential play-in series. And again, he’s got an underlying health condition that affects his lungs. If you dial the microscope out from Stralman to the greater NHL, though, you’ll find no shortage of players whose situations look worlds different from that. Career earnings of $34 million are not common, years of comfortable earning ahead are not common, and escrow has done some damage (and threatens to do much more) to many players. Whatever you think of the comfortable living players earn, you can be sure the bulk of guys would like to play so they could keep more and make more in the future. The majority of players are in North America right now and are young and healthy. For many of them, forfeiting a real shot at a Stanley Cup is not a small price. Whether it’s worth it or not certainly varies depending on where you sit. These are important questions, though, and Stralman is 100 per cent right in asking it, given the answer is bigger than “Most guys want more money and a Stanley Cup.” There are workers involved in putting on a hockey game beyond those the camera usually focuses on. There’s concern about prioritizing pro athletes over society at large when it comes to testing, though the league has said it’s making avoiding that a priority. The simple end point for some people on safety is “If you just don’t play, you don’t risk more people getting sick.” It’s tough to contend with that point morally. I think partially because it’s so hard to quantify what can be lost by not playing. If they don’t come back to play, what’s the damage done to the health of a business that brings in some $4 billion dollars annually, and in turn all the people it keeps afloat? Owners aside, a lot of people depend on the NHL for more meager incomes than the players. If other leagues return to play and the NHL doesn’t, will it take a larger hit in the public consciousness, a space which already offers a staggering number of competing entertainment products? Is there a mental health element to returning to play for not just those immediately involved, but the fans who swear by it? There’s a lot of concerning questions here that end in “Well, we’re not really sure.” Sitting here today the question is so tough because we can’t yet see the outcomes on the other side. We’re just left to best guess if it will have been worth it when we look back years from now. It’s certainly not going to be deemed worth it if a return leads to a large outbreak. But if there’s a safe way to pull it off with minimal negative impact (in terms of COVID-19 spread), the league surely will be pleased with its decision. Stralman’s question doesn’t seem like a guy saying “I don’t think this is worth it for the league.” To me it’s just someone asking a big picture question that has different answers depending on where you focus the microscope.

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But the decision needs to be made without a microscope at all, and pretty high up in the sky, too. By and large, what’s the best thing for the individuals, the NHL, and the game of hockey as a whole? It’s impossible to say where we’ll be by the time they want to ramp things back up in August. We’ll never have guarantees, but given global trends, it sure seems like we’ll be able to answer “Is the NHL returning to play in August worth it” with a “yes.” Senior Writer Ryan Dixon and NHL Editor Rory Boylen always give it 110%, but never rely on clichés when it comes to podcasting. Instead, they use a mix of facts, fun and a varied group of hockey voices to cover Canada’s most beloved game. Speaking of trends in hockey, Sportsnet was fortunate to have two guests on this week who hit on major issues in our sport (and the world) today: the women’s game and diversity. Even if these are not the sort of interviews you tend to seek out, I implore you to listen to these two women discuss issues pertinent to hockey today. They were excellent and extremely informative. Kim Davis (the NHL executive vice president for social impact, growth initiatives and legislative affairs) spoke with Jeff Marek and Elliotte Friedman about race and hockey here: The NHL’s Kim Davis on the need for ‘uncomfortable conversations’ And Cassie Campbell-Pascall explained the state of women’s hockey, and the potential for the NHL to get involved with a WNHL at some point in the future. I got the impression it’s not too far down the line, though that’s not said explicitly. Check Cassie out here at 54:30:

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Tech Xplore / Broadcasters face screen test in coronavirus age By Pirate Irwin – June 5, 2020

Sport has been forced behind closed doors for the foreseeable future but experts are divided over whether broadcasters will suffer or prosper in the new landscape. Some believe television rights will either stagnate or decline in value, others think they will be driven up due to increased interest from tech companies such as Google and Amazon. The sums in play are enormous. American broadcaster NBC's current deal to cover the Olympics until 2032 is worth $7.75 billion. The English Premier League's most recent overseas TV rights package for 2019-22 rose a reported 35 percent in value to £4.2 billion ($5.25 billion) despite a fall in the value of the domestic rights. European Broadcasting Union executive director of sport Stefan Kuerten is unconvinced that rights deals will continue to soar despite potentially millions being added to viewing figures. The 61-year-old will on Friday step away after almost 20 years of negotiating global and European rights for events such as World Cups and Olympics on behalf of public service broadcasters. "They (TV) will be in a strong position but will prices go up because of it? There I have doubts," he told AFP by phone from Switzerland. He believes the virus will have an impact on the industry. "Broadcasters have learned now these kinds of pandemics exist and could ask for new exit and security clauses in contracts like a force majeure (unexpected event) or unforeseeable event. "The virus has placed a safety belt on sports broadcasters as to whether they increase the payment in case something else happens." Kuerten warns that viewers will tire of watching events without crowds, even if they can watch sport from the comfort of their armchairs. "Without any fans in the stadium, TV is not sustainable for football or other sports," he said. "When the crowd reacts, then emotions spill over into the screen. "If one of these elements is missing then there are different sensations and viewers hesitate to have the same interest in the product as before. "I have to say from my experience following matches (in the Bundesliga, taking place behind closed doors), something is missing." British advertising tycoon Martin Sorrell, who founded advertising giant WPP, is more bullish, though he admits the waters are choppy. "There are not exactly positives to come out of this (coronavirus) but demand will see live sport at a premium and may see more distant viewers/fans tuning in and watching," he said. "The rights will continue to increase driven by the incursion of digital media players, platforms and hardware companies."

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'The COVID pause' Sorrell, who sits on the International Olympic Committee's Communications Commission, says it is clear that "public thirst for live sport, for watching it, has increased". The 75-year-old Englishman, who left WPP in 2018 and set up digital advertising and marketing services company S4 Capital, says the public have adapted to the online world. "COVID-19 has had influence, with huge amounts of people unable to go to the shops due to lockdown shopping online, communicating online," he said. "As media becomes increasingly more digital and less analogue, that moves it more online so potential audiences move online." Terrence Burns, who since leaving his marketing executive role at the IOC has played a key role in five victorious Olympic bid campaigns, believes sponsors and advertisers who partner with broadcasters will be more selective. "I think the 'COVID pause' will lead to what I call the 'great value realignment' in sport," he said. "Obviously, brands (sponsors and advertisers) will come back to sport—it is the most emotive marketing strategy on the planet and most efficient. "The question is what are they coming back to? "Brands will be necessarily more demanding in terms of expenditure and value—they will be 'pickier' about what sports (competitions and events) they invest in. "This means that smaller and or marginal sports may indeed suffer in the short term, but I also think this will force federations to find and create niches for the right brands."

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The Athletic / Duhatschek Notebook: Inside HHOF’s 2020 selection plan and playoff peculiarities By Eric Duhatschek – June 6, 2020

Unlike the Stanley Cup Final, the NHL Draft or the free agency courting period, which have all disappeared from the June hockey calendar, there is one piece of traditional business that is going ahead, on schedule, this month. The ’s annual selection committee meetings will be held over a two-day period, June 23 and 24, just as planned. On the NHL’s critical dates calendar, June 13 was supposed to be the last possible day for the 2020 Stanley Cup Final; the annual NHL awards were supposed to take place June 17 in Las Vegas; and of course, the draft was set for June 26-27 at the Bell Centre in Montreal. All have been pushed back indefinitely. But the Hall of Fame will carry on and elect the class of 2020, though the scheduled meeting time is about the only part of the process that will remain the same. A handful of selection committee members who live in the Toronto area will attend the meetings in person, as will Jeff Denomme, the HHOF’s president and chief executive officer, and Lanny McDonald, the HHOF’s chairman of the board. Denomme and McDonald act as scrutineers for the 18-member selection committee, the majority of whom will be connected to the meeting remotely, including three from overseas (Anders Hedberg from Sweden, Jari Kurri from Finland and Igor Larionov from Russia). Once the voting is completed, there are still plans for a short television announcement on TSN in Canada, after the successful candidates are notified of the results. As with so many activities in a world gradually reopening in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, these are tricky new waters for Denomme – and the rest of the Hall of Fame’s staff – to navigate. “The deliberations have a fluidity to them anyway,” said Denomme, “and it becomes even more different when you hold them virtually. For one thing, we don’t know how long these meetings will last. It’s always more conducive to hold them in person, so this is a first, and we’ll see how it goes. We’ve got an online balloting system that we’ll be using to maintain the integrity of the secret ballot – and we have to make sure is working properly. That’s the priority – so we’ll do a practice round on the day before the meeting to make sure the flow works well.” Denomme acts as the moderator/ringmaster for the annual election. Procedurally, a successful candidate needs a minimum of 14 affirmative votes from the 18-member committee to be elected. The discussion is divided into four separate conversations – to elect candidates in the male and female player categories; the builder category; and in years that it’s applicable, a referee and linesman category. A player must be retired three years in order to be eligible for Hall of Fame consideration. For 2020, the two most prominent first-year eligible male players are Jarome Iginla and Marian Hossa.

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Iginla is 34th on the all-time points list (with 1,300 in 1,554 games played) and is tied for No. 16 all-time in goals scored (625) with Joe Sakic. Iginla won the scoring title in 2002 and the Rocket Richard Trophy as the NHL’s goal scoring leader in both 2002 and 2004. And while he didn’t win the Hart Trophy as MVP in 2002, he was chosen by his peers for the Lester B. Pearson Award that year (now named the Ted Lindsay Award, the most “outstanding” player as selected by members of the NHL Players’ Association). Hossa, meanwhile, is 57th all-time in points (1,134 in 1,309 games played) and is No. 35 all-time in goals scored (525), just behind Frank Mahovlich and just ahead of Bryan Trottier. Hossa is still officially under contract to the for one more season, which will complete the 12-year, $63.3 million contract he signed with the Chicago Blackhawks in the summer of 2009, but he hasn’t played a game in the NHL since the 2016-17 season because of a progressive skin condition. Under HHOF eligibility rules, the fact that he hasn’t played for three full seasons makes Hossa eligible for selection this year. Hossa was a three-time Stanley Cup champion with the Blackhawks and is 30th all- time in playoff scoring (149 points in 205 playoff games). Only Bobby Smith and , among eligible HHOF forwards, have more career playoff points than Hossa. (Active players, such as Jaromir Jagr and Joe Thornton, are not currently eligible for HHOF selection). Iginla seems like a lock in his first year of eligibility – and while Hossa has a strong Hall of Fame case, sometimes a player with his credentials doesn’t always get the nod in his first year of eligibility. Who else might get a look this year? Statistically, among players who’ve been passed over in previous years, Pierre Turgeon remains the highest scorer of all-time not chosen for the Hall, with 1,327 points in 1,294 career games. Three others in the top 50 all-time scorers have not gained admission as yet: (1,216 points), Bernie Nicholls (1,209 points) and Vincent Damphousse (1,205 points). Among defencemen, the highest scorers not yet chosen to the Hall are Gary Suter (14th all-time, with 844 points in 1,145 games), Doug Wilson (15th all-time, with 827 points in 1,024 games) and Sergei Gonchar (16th all-time, with 811 points in 1,301 games). Most lists that consider Hall of Fame snubs will also reference the candidacies of players such as Alex Mogilny, Daniel Alfredsson, Keith Tkachuk, Theo Fleury, Rod Brind’Amour, Kevin Lowe and others. Goalies are notoriously underrepresented in the Hall – and the eligibility list there currently includes the likes of Mike Vernon, Curtis Joseph, Tom Barrasso and Chris Osgood. The Hall introduced a 15-year maximum term limit for selection committee members some years ago. For this year, that means longtime NHL executive vice president Colin Campbell has rotated off the committee. Campbell has been replaced by Mike Murphy, the NHL’s senior vice president of hockey operations, who will be participating in his first-ever meeting. In order to allow committee members to candidly assess the strengths and weaknesses of prospective candidates, the Hall of Fame asks committee members to sign confidentiality agreements to keep the internal discussions private. Accordingly, Denomme says they’ve put “a good system in place” and are “maintaining the secret balloting by providing user IDs that were all randomly sent out, so we don’t know even know ourselves who’s been assigned them. As the moderator, I’ll be handling the system on the back end, but we won’t even know who’s who, and that’s the way it should be.”

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How the NHL’s return to play may impact the induction ceremony The Hall of Fame is currently closed because of the coronavirus pandemic and Denomme says that making any plans – about reopening or even how to handle the induction ceremonies currently scheduled for Nov. 16 – remains problematic. “There’s uncertainty about November, partly because of the uncertainty around the NHL and the return to play,” said Denomme. “Obviously, our induction is built around a Hall of Fame Game – and it’s unclear if they’ll be playing games in November. So, we’re just going to have to see how that plays out. “For a mid-November event, we’d like to know one way or another by mid-August. The one thing we’re not going to do is put on an event where there’s a chance it wouldn’t be a success. That would be a disservice to everybody – the inductees especially. It may very well be, at the worst-case, that this year’s inductees are inducted in November 2021. Anything’s possible. I think we’re going to know a little bit more about the league’s plans in the next 30-45 days – and whether it’s even feasible to have a Hall of Fame Game. “At the end of the day, we’re going to determine this well in advance. We’re not going to roll the dice with this.” In theory, the Hall of Fame could turn the 2020 induction ceremonies into a television event, in the same way the NHL plans to resume play initially without fans in the building. The problem there, according to Denomme, is that a made-for-TV event would take away one of the key elements of the ceremony – where the inductees get to invite family, friends and the people who were influential in their lives to attend the event as their guests. Most years, most inductees, have their own family get-togethers over the course of the weekend; and most years, most times, McDonald and Hall of Fame executives such as Phil Pritchard, Craig Campbell and Kelly Masse arrange to have the Stanley Cup drop by those events. “If this goes on for one or more business cycles, we may have to react and do something different,” said Denomme. “But at the moment it’s basically, see where we go. I just know this: The inductees deserve to have proper lead time to plan. It’s a huge event for them. “The bottom line is, the Hall of Fame induction itself has 2,000 people – and that’s not a physical distancing event. But if you can’t do it, you can’t do it.” Opening soon? Summertime tends to be one of the Hall of Fame’s busiest periods in terms of foot traffic. The Hall of Fame is located in Toronto at Brookfield Place, not far from Rogers Centre, home to MLB’s Toronto Blue Jays. “There’s no doubt, we have for a long time, traded well on Blue Jay attendance,” said Denomme, “especially, when they’re filling the building. Our attendance variances often go hand-in-hand with attendance at the Rogers Centre. Baseball and hockey are usually synergetic that way. Baseball fans are also hockey fans. Because the Blue Jays are Canada’s team, we have a lot of Canadian tourists that will take in a ballgame and then make plans to go to the Hall of Fame. “When the New York Yankees or the Boston Red Sox are in town for a three or four-day homestand, those are huge revenue days for us. Those are always our best days. So, we’ll miss out on them this summer anyway. About 25 percent of our visitors are American; another 10 per cent are international.

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“With border issues, I don’t expect we’re going to be anywhere near full throttle any time soon. In fact, if we’re half-throttle, we’ll be doing well. I think it’ll be tough slogging for traction for a while.” In the meantime, during the closure, the Hall of Fame is putting a health and safety plan in place which will emphasize advanced ticketing and put a capacity on how many people can physically be in the building at the same time. Best of sevens confirmed If only to stay visible during the NHL’s current state of limbo, it’s been a good idea for the league and the players’ association to incrementally roll out plans for the resumption of play as protocols are firmed up. On Thursday, two new further pieces of the reopening puzzle were unveiled: Even though the play-in round to determine the final eight places in the 16-team playoff field will be best-of-five series, once the actual playoffs begin, with 16 teams, each round will be a best-of-seven. No firm decision had been made on that part of the format when commissioner Gary Bettman rolled out the preliminary return to play plans. In fact, there’d been some thought that the first and even the second rounds could also be handled as a best-of-five in order to move the playoff along more quickly. That idea was ultimately rejected, on the grounds that if the league intends to hand out the Stanley Cup in 2020, it should be competed for under the normal procedures. The NHL’s current system – of a firm, cast-in-stone playoff bracket – was altered and replaced by a blast from the past. For this postseason, the league will reseed the following every completed round – with the highest remaining seed playing the lowest remaining seed as each round unfolds, throughout the remainder of the playoffs. Generally speaking, the NHL likes the bracket format because it can do some promotional things with it. Bracket challenges on NHL.com that mimic the NCAA basketball tournament have proven popular in the past. If they try to resurrect the concept now, they’ll have to amend it and go round-by-round. On the other hand, if the ultimate goal is integrity – as opposed to achieving promotional goals – then reseeding makes the most sense. It also creates more uncertainty about matchups – and one of the best things about the 24-team format that’s been unveiled is we’ll see some fresh matchups – or rivalries that haven’t been renewed in decades. For example, the 8 vs. 9 matchup in the West is between two teams, the Flames and the Winnipeg Jets, that haven’t met in the postseason since 1987. Who’s hot, who’s not Two of the participants in that series, Winnipeg’s Kyle Connor and Calgary’s Mikael Backlund, were among the hottest players in the NHL in the final month of play before the league hit the pause button. From Feb. 6 to the final game played on March 11, Connor and Backlund each had 22 points, tied for sixth overall in that span. The only players with the same or more? Two Rangers (Mika Zibanejad and Artemi Panarin), two Oilers (Leon Draisaitl and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins) and Minnesota’s Kevin Fiala. Zibanejad had 30 points in that span, Draisaitl 27, and Fiala, Nugent-Hopkins and Panarin 22 apiece.

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Backlund is back in Sweden and on Thursday, I wondered if he could get back to the same level after such a long time away. The break wasn’t great for any NHLer, but it was particularly tough on players who were having the best results of their career. But Backlund was philosophical about it, noting that every player was in the same boat – needing to start over again during an unusual and unprecedented time. “The important key is going to be that I accept training camp isn’t going to be perfect – and that it’s been a long time away,” said Backlund. “It’s not going to be a perfect scenario going into camp. You just have to make the most of camp, and get the timing back, and get up to NHL speed, and just accept (things) and not get frustrated. Who knows? Maybe I’ll have a great camp. “I’m just saying, I know going into camp, it’s going to be different. When you start playing – if we do play – it’s going to matter right away. I hope I’ll find the A-game right away. If it takes one or two games … you have to realize, it’s going to be the same for everyone.” That last observation is worth further exploration because so many accomplished NHLers, past and present, identify themselves as slow starters. Iginla was like that for much of his career. Many times, he’d be slow off the mark in October but on fire in November. The Jets’ Patrik Laine noted in an earlier Zoom call that he usually takes time to get into a good rhythm. Playoffs past have often produced unlikely scoring heroes – and it’s easy to imagine that contributions from depth players could be even more important than usual, especially in the play-in round, where a team could be finished in as early as a week. Back in February, or a month before the pause, I put a question to Craig Berube, coach of the defending Stanley Cup champion St. Louis Blues. What did Berube want to see happen before the start of the playoffs, to enhance his team’s chances of repeating? More than anything else, Berube said: “I want to be a deep team. I want to have four lines and six D that I can throw out there the whole game and play them. That was a big thing last year – that we were really deep and that carried us into the playoffs and throughout the playoffs.” Berube will get his wish on one important front. Vladimir Tarasenko, who’d missed almost the entire season, will be healthy and rested for the playoff run. Presumably, when the dust eventually settles – and if the NHL can actually crown a 2020 Stanley Cup champion – it’s logical to think there’ll be a whole host of Chris Kontoses and Fernando Pisanis who could make unexpected contributions to a good playoff run. Maybe it’ll be another year like 2007, when the ’ third-line checking centre, Sammy Pahlsson, was legitimately in the running for the Conn Smythe Trophy as playoff MVP. For those unfamiliar with his game, Backlund possesses many of the same defensive qualities that Pahlsson had, but was producing offence at a career-high level in February. The NHL unveiled plans for Phase 2 of its restart plan on Thursday, which will allow players to return to their home training facilities for voluntary on and off-ice training. For Backlund, that might involve driving to Stockholm to skate and scrimmage with other NHLers in Sweden, who’d also gone home. Sweden had far fewer social distancing restrictions placed on its society than the rest of Europe.

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How has that played out for Backlund? “When we were in Calgary, we were pretty much just at home,” said Backlund. “Not that we were running around here, but we’ve spent more time with family and friends here. You can tell it’s different than normal life, but you still see people out and about. When we do need to get things for the house, you see more people out about here than you in Calgary – or that you read about in the world as well. “Other countries, especially here in Europe, were totally shut down. It was a nice change, coming back to Sweden, and able to see more people; and being able to spend time with family and friends. I don’t know if it’s the right way or not, but so far – knock on wood – my family and friends have all been healthy.”

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The Athletic / LeBrun: What to expect from each of the 24 teams as they enter Phase 2 By Pierre LeBrun – June 6, 2020

Even though Phase 2 begins next week, that doesn’t necessarily mean you’re going to see NHLers flocking back to their home markets. With Phase 3 training camps not expected to open until mid-July at the earliest – the timetable still needs to be negotiated – many players are going to stay put and skate on their own, rather than come back to their respective NHL teams. Which is their right as Phase 2 is voluntary. And frankly, probably the smart thing to do right now. Because of that, some teams aren’t even opening their practice facilities next week because their numbers are so low and the players on hand already have their own skates going. And well, the Phase 2 protocols are lengthy, so opening only makes sense if you have a certain number of willing players. Despite the challenges, some teams will indeed open their facilities. On Friday, I inquired with the 24 teams scheduled to play again this summer and tried to get a sense of where things stand for Phase 2 (in order of seeding). Eastern Conference As of Friday morning, the Bruins hadn’t finalized their Phase 2 plans for next week, which is not uncommon as many teams work through the protocols for opening. Boston hopes to have a more definitive response after the weekend. The Bolts don’t expect any of their out-of-market players to return for the beginning of Phase 2 but many Lightning players have stayed in Tampa during the pandemic. GM Julien BriseBois asked his players in town if they wanted the team’s facility open and most indicated they would like to have that option. Accordingly, the Bolts are preparing to open their facility for skating on Tuesday. The Lightning will conduct COVID testing for the players on Saturday, medicals Monday and open the rink for skating on Tuesday. The Caps expect three to five players to be around for the start of Phase 2. As of Friday, the team wasn’t sure when exactly they would open their practice facility, as they are still working on a few details. But a team source said they would perhaps be ready by later next week. Flyers GM Chuck Fletcher said on Friday that his team’s practice facility would be open on Monday even though the club only anticipates a handful of players to be around as Phase 2 opens up. Fletcher said that list would likely grow as the month goes on and the team indicated they felt it was important to have the facilities available should any player wish to use them.

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Pittsburgh Penguins “Well over half’’ of the Penguins’ roster is expected to be in town when Phase 2 opens. The team intends to open its practice facility at some point next week. The Canes say seven players are on hand right now and GM Don Waddell said on Friday the team has decided not to open next week when Phase 2 begins. Once more players are in town, they will open their facility. (And again, most players currently have access to ice for their own skates, so they don’t necessarily need the team’s facility yet). New York Islanders GM Lou Lamoriello told me on Friday the Isles’ facility will be allowed to open next week, having met all the local requirements and protocols. The plan is to have it available to the players as of Monday when Phase 2 begins. Lamoriello said about a third of his roster is in the area, although he wasn’t sure yet how many players intended to make use of the facility when Phase 2 officially starts, stressing that participation is completely voluntary. Toronto Maple Leafs The Leafs say they expect “around 20 players’’ when Phase 2 opens and if they can meet all the requirements, plan to open their facilities on Monday. Twenty players (17 expected by Monday and an additional three in the city completing quarantine) overall is a high number compared to most teams and is mostly the result of so many players staying in the Toronto area when the pandemic began. As I reported last week, Auston Matthews and Frederik Andersen are expected to stay in Arizona for now where they’ve got a good workout routine going. Furthermore, if they returned to Toronto now, both would face the mandatory 14-day quarantine (there is still no word on if the Canadian government will loosen that restriction for athletes at some point). Obviously, at some point they will return before training camp. Columbus Blue Jackets As of Friday morning, the Jackets hadn’t decided yet when exactly they would open their practice facility for players to skate but it was likely not going to be by the opening of Phase 2 on Monday, according to GM Jarmo Kekalainen. The Jackets expect around 10 players in town when Phase 2 opens. Florida Panthers The Panthers had 12 players stick around through the pause and some are going to start to trickle back over the next few weeks, according to GM Dale Tallon. The Panthers plan on opening their practice facility to players on Wednesday, Tallon said. New York Rangers The Blueshirts, as of Friday, expected six to seven players on hand when Phase 2 opened. They planned to have their facility opened on Tuesday. The Habs have three players in town as Phase 2 sets to open. As of Friday, the Canadiens were looking at mid-week to open up its practice facility. Western Conference St. Louis Blues The Stanley Cup champions had around eight players stay in town during the pause. GM Doug

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Armstrong said on Friday that he didn’t expect other players back until closer to Phase 3. The Blues aren’t expected to open up their facility next week. Colorado Avalanche Roughly six to seven Avs stayed in the Denver area throughout the pause, the team said on Friday. But it wasn’t clear as of Friday morning when the Avs planned to open their facility. Vegas Golden Knights Most of the Knights have been in Vegas the whole time. But whether or not the players want to use the facility when it opens is really up to them. Some have been conducting their own individual skates. The Knights were still working through some of the logistics on Friday but were hoping to open their facility at some point next week. Dallas Stars GM Jim Nill expects about six to eight players on hand next week when Phase 2 opens. That list will grow the deeper we get into June. Nill said the Stars plan to open the facility next week, testing and medicals over the first couple of days and by Wednesday, ice time will be available to players who want to make use of it. The Oilers only expect their local players to be on hand when Phase 2 opens. A team source said there would be further discussion on Friday afternoon to determine when exactly they would open their facility but the hope is to be ready by next week at some point, perhaps as early as Monday. Our Oilers beat writer Daniel Nugent-Bowman said the Oilers should have five players on hand next week. The Preds have 12 players in town as of Friday. A team source said they planned to have more discussion with players on Friday to determine what made sense for Phase 2 but the tentative plan is not to open the team facility until June 15 or so. Vancouver Canucks The Canucks have only three players in town and weren’t expected to have more until there was clarity on training camp dates and logistics. While there’s not yet been any determination for sure, the early idea for the Canucks was to wait until June 12 to open their facility to players. The team said on Friday morning that they were still figuring out the Phase 2 plan and are working on confirming a date to open their facility to players. Winnipeg Jets The Jets weren’t expecting an influx next week to the handful of players already in the Winnipeg area. Many Jets players have indicated they want to wait and see what the quarantine situation will be before deciding when to travel back. Which makes sense. The Jets will portably open later next week depending on when the players in their market want to skate. A team source said on Friday that he didn’t expect more than four to six players to be on hand when Phase 2 opened next week. He also said the team didn’t expect to open their facility until June 22 or so.

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Arizona Coyotes GM John Chayka, via text message on Friday, said his team planned to open their facility for Phase 2 next week and that he expected one to two groups (six max per group as per the protocol). The Coyotes had more than half of their team stay during the pause. Chicago Blackhawks The Hawks don’t expect many players initially when Phase 2 opens. Six players were in town as of Friday and the team expected perhaps three more players to arrive by the end of next week. The team expects that number to increase as the month goes on and by July 1 to have most of them back. Chicago expects to open their facility sometime next week, a source said on Friday, with players likely on the ice by the end of the week. Our very own Scott Powers, who covers the Blackhawks, shares his thoughts on Chicago’s situation as it prepares for Phase 2: “I imagine Phase 2 will begin without much player presence in Chicago early on. Most players took off and returned to their hometowns at the beginning of the pause. With the uncertainty of the season and the state of Illinois still getting around 1,000 new COVID-19 cases a day (which has been notably decreasing), players will likely take a wait-and-see approach before coming back. Chicago is just starting to allow some businesses to expand their operations. The city is also under a 9 p.m. to 6 a.m. curfew due to the recent protests. Considering all of that, players aren’t likely rushing back until there are more definitive plans for the season to return.”

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The Athletic / Q&A: NHL’s Kim Davis says this is ‘a moment for us to really accelerate’ By Scott Burnside – June 6, 2020

Kim Davis arrived at the doorstep of the NHL less than three years ago with a long, shiny title and an even bigger mandate: Make the sport of hockey safe and accessible to everyone. The NHL’s executive vice president, social impact, growth initiatives and legislative affairs, has been hunkered down in the family’s home in New Rochelle, New York, since the league paused on March 12. The New York City suburb was the local epicenter of the COVID-19 spread in the New York area. Davis and her husband, St. Clair Davis, have a full house. Their daughter, Hilary Davis-Kelly, who is expecting her first child and the Davis’ first grandchild in August, and her husband are in New Rochelle. So, too, is Davis’ son, Jared Davis, a Ph.D. student at the University of Manchester in the United Kingdom. In a wide-ranging interview with The Athletic, Davis described the NHL’s new initiative to make the game more inclusive at all levels, which will be announced soon, plus her family’s own experience with racism in hockey and her goals for making lasting change in the sport. Since George Floyd’s murder, having your family under one roof, what that’s been like for your family to share and to observe what’s going on in the wake of that. We’ve had a lot of conversations about what is going to really be different about this moment. And I think we are hopeful and cautiously optimistic. My son is actually an anthropologist and a lot of his work is about anti-racism globally and with a particular focus on the Arab community in Africa, in Tunisia. So you can imagine having an anthropologist in the house, there’s some interesting conversations that we’re having. And my son-in-law is from Ireland and who grew up and spent most of his life in Ireland, so it’s been rich discussion and conversation about what all this means and what it’s going to be mean going forward. If you look at your job and even in this short period of time whether you feel your role with the NHL is different than even when the pause began? I don’t see it as different, Scott. I see it as a moment for us to really accelerate. I think that we have the listening ear right now of so many people in positions of power, white men in positions of power. There was something different. We’ve talked about a lot in my house what was the thing that was different about this moment? And I think it was the fact we are pausing. We have paused. And we had a different kind of attention maybe. This time because of everything else that was going on around us, the pandemic for sure, but this racial pandemic that we are experiencing is one where I think it’s an acceleration point for the many things that we have been talking about for the two years that I’ve been here. So there’s no news about what we need to do, it’s just how do we put our foot on the gas pedal and really begin to move forward and execute the many ideas that we have. What’s it been like for you to watch the different players and the different voices that have come up on social media and to see the wording that is used? My sense is a lot of real heartfelt thought has gone

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into a lot of those messages and it’s forced players, I think, in many ways to step out of their comfort zone. How important is that to you and the things that need to get done by the NHL? It’s critically important because, if you look at the history of any sports and any sports league, it is the activism of the players that really begins to create the sustainable change. And I think that to capture this moment where our players are using their voices and expressing their views about social justice I think is an important moment for us in hockey. And I think we have to capture the imaginations of our fans as they become more empathetic and sensitized to the experiences of black and brown people in the world and specifically in our sport. And you really take that from emotion to action. And so I think we have to really be very intentional about getting our players to continue to be part of this movement. And everyone’s not going to Tweet, right? People are going to use different ways and just because a player doesn’t use social media doesn’t mean that they don’t have a heartfelt sense of what we need to do. So now I think the players have come directly to us and I think we now have to respond accordingly and capture this and accelerate it. How do you do that? Because, I don’t even know if its cynicism, but I think there is a sort of notion well, how does this become more than just words that these players have shared? How do you take advantage of it? There are a lot of different ways. Some of the ways that I’ve thought about it and some of the things that we’re trying to activate now is player to player. So we’ve really been creating this movement of particularly our retired players who have become very actively involved. They garner the respect of the current players, so getting those players to reach out and doing podcasts and doing things that the NHL is now supporting, not just off-channel but on-channel, and curating these conversations and town halls and more listening and discussions with players, and I think that we have a lot of ideas about how we do that. Secondly, I think we have to become a deeper reservoir of information, of ways for people to understand how they build their awareness and education, and how they move from awareness and education to allyship and then from allyship to advocacy and action. I think often we want to jump right to action when we see something like this happen. We want to know how do we solve this problem? And you can’t just jump to action. In order for us to make this moment something different you really have to start with awareness and education. How do we check our own privilege? How do we understand the language that needs to be used? How do we understand when black and brown people say that they are exhausted and that they feel like they have to always be on and politically correct? How do we suspend judgment and continue to open those dialogues? And I think that’s what we are willing to start really tackling. Do you have a framework that you are hoping to flesh out? Do you need to have a council of players that you can name and then perhaps have them help you go forward within their own clubs? Do you have those kinds of things in mind? We’ve been working on an architecture around getting voices into the league and then to the clubs for a number of months and we’re ready to announce it. It starts with an Executive Inclusion Council that we have put in place and actually invitations have been sent out and we’ll be announcing those names very shortly. It’s going to be made up of (team) presidents, owners and GMs that will hear the voices of our fans, our youth hockey parents and other stakeholders in the youth hockey system and our players. Three separate committees will support the council. A Player Inclusion Committee, which will be made

46 up of both current and former players. A Fan Inclusion Committee, which will be (answering the question) how do we ensure that our marketing and our messaging is open and inclusive to all groups? And that’s going to be made up of our CMOs (chief marketing officers) of our clubs, as well as some external marketing partners that we worked with in various communities. And then a youth advisory board (Youth Hockey Inclusion Committee) that’s going to be made up of youth hockey folks, parents, so that we can talk about how do we create a stronger ability for kids of color, particularly black and brown kids, to feel welcomed in our sport. And their recommendations will roll up to this executive council for action. Do you have a timetable for that, when you might announce the identities of people who will be taking part? We’ll be announcing in the next four weeks. The NHL has worked very hard on various inclusionary programs, whether it’s You Can Play or Hockey Is For Everyone, but I think there have been questions. Certainly I think of the messages that come from a person like Akim Aliu, who’s suggested that hockey really isn’t for everyone, and we have to move beyond this notion that it’s just a label to really delve into how we can make that so. I wonder if it’s discouraging to you when you hear people say, ‘well, hockey isn’t for everyone’ or if this is part of the challenge for you moving forward to accept that maybe it isn’t where it needs to be right now? I’m not discouraged, Scott. It deepens my resolve because the idea of Hockey Is For Everyone is not to say that we’re taking a victory lap, that it’s done and we wiped our hands and said here we are. Hockey Is For Everyone is aspirational. It is who we want to be and how we want to show up, and we know that we have work to do. We know that we are not perfect. We are quite imperfect and we have to be open, authentic and humble about the fact that we’ve got work to do in every single part of the system. We know that and we are working on it. But you can’t expect that something that’s gone on for 100 years is going to be solved in one year. And if you are part of any kind of change effort, and I’ve been part of many over the 30-plus years that I’ve been in corporate life, you know that if you’re not in for the long haul you’re going to be disappointed. And if people are cynical because you don’t get something done immediately, then they aren’t really understanding what change work is really about. Deputy commissioner Bill Daly and commissioner Gary Bettman talked about some of the framework for programs that they put in place coming out of the Board of Governors meetings late last year, counseling for coaches and things like that. Can you describe where that is at given the pause? What I just described to you in terms of the council and the committees is a big part of that architecture that Bill and Gary talked about, and the committee work is going to be that deep work to look at what kinds of hiring and sourcing we need to do. What kind of summer internship programs can we put in place? The conversation about the coaching development program, Michael Hirshfeld (head of the NHL Coaches’ Association), we’ve been having ongoing dialogue about putting something like that in place. Even in the midst of the pause those conversations have continued, and we’re committed to that. Getting more coaches and officials, more courage in the youth hockey system and more dialogue both with Hockey Canada and USA Hockey, because we know that a lot of the issues that we’re talking about actually exist at the youth level. So how can we continue to be partners and promoters of the practices that we know are the right practices to grow our sport? And that is a huge part of what we are spending a lot of time on regardless of the pause. Because the pause will be over and we will need to be ready to accelerate and we will be ready to accelerate.

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Will those courses for all NHL coaching and management staff be in place (before the start of the 2020- 21 season)? It’s absolutely our plan. (The league will also be introducing its anonymous hotline for team staff, officials and players who have concerns about treatment or behavior to report without fear of repercussions as outlined by Bettman at the league’s Board of Governors meetings in December.) We will be prepared to launch the hotline at the end of June as we indicated. And so that work has been deep and intensive for the past six months. As you can imagine, a lot of elements to pull that together. And the first phase of it is going to focus on hockey operations, our players, our coaches, officials in hockey operations and then over time we see, hopefully, this extending out even potentially including the youth hockey system. But we’re starting with our own, getting our own house in order, if you will. That will be the first rollout at the end of June. I think when the hotline officially opens, people will feel comfortable hopefully being able to express any concerns they have in an anonymous way. You started with the NHL in December 2017. I don’t know what you would have imagined in terms of the challenges in doing this job and what lay ahead of you, but are there things that have surprised you at where the game is at in terms of what needs to be done? What has surprised me, and again I’m encouraged by the advocacy that I’ve seen of recent by the players, was the lack of social involvement by our players. I was ignorant to understanding the history of our sport, and I think the team nature of our sport is very different from any other sport, makes that advocacy a little bit more complex. I think a number of players, white players, talked about it the other night. And they talked about hockey is the sport where it’s not about the individual, it’s about the team. So understanding that helps to explain this issue of everyone sort of sticking together. But I do think when you look at the generation of hockey players that we are bringing in and their access, the Gen Zers, and their access to social media regardless of whether they’re from Canada, Minnesota or Sweden, their orientation to these kinds of issues is very different, and I think that’s what we’re seeing now with many of the players stepping up and standing up. I also think that the players have been very encouraged by seeing support from their owners and their clubs affirming them in their voice, and I think that’s something that is important, and I think that’s new, and I think that’s going to continue and I’m encouraged by that. So, there’s nothing that has stood out for me, that, oh my god, I didn’t expect this. I knew exactly what hockey was. My son had experienced youth hockey at an all-boys’ school and it wasn’t a very welcoming experience for him. So I had a sense of what some of the challenges were. So we move forward to be agents of change. When you say it wasn’t very welcoming, can you elaborate? How would he describe his experiences? He would say that it was the first time that he was called the N-word and he was 9 years old. From other players or parents? Parents. I’m sorry that he had to go through that. I’m sorry that that was part of his experience of the game. Yeah. And we had to have a conversation about that day coming, so he was not terrified, he was disgusted by it. And in fact, we were in a position, my husband and I, to really bring some pretty significant change to that school as a result of our voices. But not every family and not every person has

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the wherewithal or the courage to do that. That’s why when we talk about these issues we talk about being systemic and systemic change requires systematic and institutional change. When we talk about the game and making it accessible, we often think just about the players. You mentioned something I wanted to circle back to and it strikes me that it’s not just important to open up this game to players but to open up this game to people who might want to coach or who might want to have a job with a hockey team. I look at what is going on in Seattle with the way they have cast such a wide net and I think that’s a really positive thing. How important are those kinds of things to what you want to achieve because it can’t just be about the players can it? It’s critical. Representation counts. People want to be part of organizations where they can see themselves. Everyone wants to see themselves. The first CEO that I ever worked for, Tom Labrecque, who was the CEO of Chase Manhattan Bank who became a great mentor to me, said to me very early in my career that the reason that he was comfortable in being able to take risks was because men, white men that looked like him, affirmed him. And they kept giving him chances. And when he failed they didn’t penalize him, they swept behind him. They dumped him in the deep end and brought him up just enough to get air and put him back, which meant they kept giving him development opportunities. That’s what people want. They want the opportunity. I don’t think people are looking for anybody to give them anything. People want fair and free access to opportunity and that starts with our having people of all hues and all races at every level and every rung of our sport. And that’s how we’re going to get more players. When players see coaches and officials that look like them that makes them feel stronger and better, and you talk to and listen to any player of color, any person in a senior role, and they will tell you that at some point in their career it made a difference for them to see somebody that looked like them. People tell me that all the time in hockey. If we’re having a cup of coffee or a glass of wine a year from now, maybe, wherever we’re at in the playoff run a year from right now, how would you like the league to look or be different? We’re going to continue to be having the dialogue about open access and authentic conversation. A year from now we aren’t going to be able to say that we’re going to go from having 29 black players to 50 black players. That’s unrealistic. What I hope we’ll be saying is that we in earnest have put in a development program to develop the next generation of coaches, that we take seriously Hockey Is For Everyone programs and that we’re providing funding to those programs in inner cities to find the next Connor McDavid. Or not. That kids feel good about that experience that they’re having playing hockey and the life skills that it teaches and how our declaration of principles affirmed them in their walk in life. That parents feel good about our sport such that they want to consume it and become fans. That we have a program in place to source and hire people in clubs so that we see more CMOs of color and ultimately we see more leadership. That’s the journey that we’re on and that’s the way I want us to be measured in terms of our progress.

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Sportsnet.ca / Quick Shifts: NHL community taking critical steps in fighting racism By Luke Fox – June 7, 2020

A quick mix of the things we gleaned from the week of hockey, serious and less so, and rolling four lines deep. 1. There’s a bit of crazy in writing this in a week of clenched fists and tear gas, of rubber bullets and upside-down Bibles, of pandemic and protesting: I feel more optimistic than ever. “People are hurting. People are dying. The world is in turmoil,” Hayley Wickenheiser wrote late after midnight midweek, no doubt consuming the same stream of infuriating, encouraging news and video clips as the rest of us. “We are on the cusp. Change is a coming. We have to be the change we want to see in the world.” People are hurting. People are dying. The world is in turmoil. We are on the cusp. Change is a coming. We have to be the change we want to see in the world. — Hayley Wickenheiser (@wick_22) June 4, 2020 It’s only a start, absolutely, but it’s a forceful one. And, God, this time it might have legs. Racism and police brutality are as old as sin. Cellphone cameras just got better. Since ever, my entertainment bubble has been co-headlined by rappers and athletes. I learned more about social issues and injustice and black history from KRS-One and Ice Cube and Chuck D and Brand Nubian and Pharoahe Monch than all my teachers and professors combined. As an impressionable kid, what my heroes endorsed mattered. (I didn’t eat Pro Stars because it was a superior breakfast cereal; I ate it because of the box.) As a reporter, I’ve also accepted that active hockey players, for the most part, stick to sports — and charity work. So the people’s response to the murder of George Floyd, hopefully a systemic breaking point in soul- crushing series of vile abuses of power, is an uplifting one. Hip-hop artists I’ve admired for their art have been particularly active. Jay-Z called Minnesota governor Tim Walz and demanded justice, then bought full-page ads in newspapers across the U.S. to honour Mr. Floyd. Kanye West ditched his horrid MAGA cap, attended a Chicago protest and donated $2 million to the families of Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery and Breonna Taylor. Killer Mike delivered an incredibly emotional and inspiring speech in his hometown Atlanta (and then, with El-P, dropped a soundtrack to revolt by). "We didn't create these conditions. White society did that. White people need to be teaching white people. Black people are tired. How much do we have to do for you before you do something for yourself? Before you say: 'I'm going to self-educate myself.'"@KillerMike pic.twitter.com/GD08yGgAvb — UNDISPUTED (@undisputed) June 4, 2020

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I’m not sure the hockey community’s response would be as thoughtful or as voluminous were the conference finals being waged right now, with controversial offside calls and borderline hits to distract us. But in some mysterious way, maybe North America needed a literal virus to focus on a vaccine for its rhetorical one. I am sure the dominoes wouldn’t have tumbled were it not for Evander Kane giving the first one a nudge. The star went before the cameras on May 29 and boldly challenged his white peers, naming Sidney Crosby and Tom Brady specifically, to use their voice: "We've been outraged for hundreds of years, and nothing's changed. It's time for guys like Tom Brady and Sidney Crosby … to speak up…" Evander Kane reacts to the death of George Floyd. pic.twitter.com/uQ3Gh8X8aW — First Take (@FirstTake) May 29, 2020 A critical and swift second step was Sharks captain Logan Couture adding to a conversation J.T. Brown and Akim Aliu and Kane started (“I think most of us have been at fault for turning a blind eye when it comes to racism. It cannot continue”) and Sharks owner Hasso Plattner putting his name to a supportive statement. (How many other major sports team owners have done so?) The floodgates opened. Jonathan Toews, Alex Ovechkin, Erik Karlsson, Steven Stamkos, Auston Matthews, Connor McDavid, Anze Kopitar, Braden Holtby and, yes, Crosby were but a few of the 100- plus NHL players who penned and posted statements on social media. MLSE, owner of the Maple Leafs and Raptors, posted a job opening for a director of inclusion and diversity. “I think it’s changing. I think it’s getting better,” Braden Holtby said Friday, regarding NHLers’ reluctance to speak out. “You look at what Johnny Toews did. People will follow guys like that.” Minnesota native Blake Wheeler and Holtby gave lengthy Zoom calls with reporters in which they thoughtfully spoke thoughtfully at length on racial injustice. “I don’t think this time is a time to sugarcoat anything,” Holtby said. “It’s a time to look at ourselves in the mirror and really find how we can be better, and how we can take responsibility for the past and learn from that to move forward. “I’m really hoping — I really believe that this is going to change the world in a lot of ways.” Patrice Bergeron, P.K. Subban, Patrick Kane and Tom Wilson were among those who put their wallets behind the cause. wrote a tearful Players’ Tribune column, “Silence is Violence.” On Thursday, Tyler Seguin attended his first peace protest at Dallas City Hall. Behind him, a woman held aloft a sign: WHITE SILENCE COSTS LIVES. “In a weird way, hockey and sports kinda pushed me into it,” Seguin said on Hockey Central @ Noon. “You talk about accountability in the dressing room. “The first thing I said in my head — and I’ll never forget this — was: ‘I’m white. I’m from Canada. And I’m an NHL hockey player, a predominantly white sport. And this isn’t really my business.’ That kinda

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haunted me a bit. Understanding more, researching more, and seeing people, the pain really, and seeing George Floyd and how angry it made me, I realized this kinda is my business. “We’re not immune in Canada to racism. We can all be better. And I have a small platform. “Now it’s about taking the next step.” The optimist in me wants to believe we are on the cusp, that athletes kids look up to are better realizing how they can influence change. In a matter of days, Kane’s tone has been inching from frustrated to encouraged. Upon seeing the snowballing response from his fellow hockey players, Kane tweeted: “STRENGTH in NUMBERS.” It’s been a real emotional week and a half. For so long we wanted to be heard, to be seen, to matter. To see the country and world come together like this makes me hopeful as hell. BUT when the protests and posts stop, our advocacy can’t. Never stop fighting for equality. pic.twitter.com/mlJwpgdiRu — JT Brown (@JTBrown23) June 4, 2020 2. The Presidents’ Trophy–winning Boston Bruins finished the season with 100 points. That’s eight more than Tampa (92), 10 more than Washington (90) and 11 more than Philadelphia (89). They’re not getting rewarded enough for their superior season. Suddenly, all four Eastern Conference playoff teams are on equal footing heading into a three-game round-robin; a points percentage tiebreaker, should it come into play, will be their only advantage as that foursome battles each other for the top four seeds. “With what the team was able to accomplish in the first 70 games and then the point spread we had — not only with the teams in the league, but also with the teams in our division and conference — to kind of have three games dictate where we fall in the conference standings is somewhat disappointing,” president Cam Neely said. “I understood why they landed on 24 [teams]. I just would have liked it without the round-robin for the top four seeds.” In the West, St. Louis (94 points) and Colorado (92, with one less game played) have instantly been dropped to the level of Vegas (86) and Dallas (93) in the round robin. Essentially, the players on the top eight teams have chosen competitiveness over fairness as they await the survivors of the qualification round. “I think they’re going to be just as intense as those play-in games. If you’re fighting for seeding, you want to play the lowest-seed team. That’s why you fight for position during the regular season,” Vegas’s Ryan Reaves said on Good Show Wednesday. “You’re also getting ready for a team that’s playing heavy playoff-match-like games.” As much as casual fans and broadcasters may prefer the expediency of the bracket system, I’m all for reseeding after each round. This rightly makes the climb for super long shots Montreal and Chicago even steeper. 3. During Wednesday’s In Conversation with Ron MacLean, GM said 13 Maple Leafs had stayed put in the Toronto area and another four or five had crossed the border and commenced their 14-day quarantine in Canada while the club readies for voluntary small-group workouts.

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Ensuring the Leafs’ training facility, the , meets all of the health and safety guidelines of Ontario, MLSE and the NHL has been “very time-consuming,” Dubas explained, especially with no playbook to work from. Those Maple Leafs in Toronto for Phase 2's opening next week are being tested for COVID-19 today. Team looks to conduct physicals next week with players who clear the test and voluntarily show up for small-group workouts. — luke fox (@lukefoxjukebox) June 5, 2020 Particularly interesting is that the Leafs are lobbying the government to find out if their returning players can quarantine both at home and their sanitized workplace. Remember, the NHL would prefer one of its two hubs to be in Canada, but if the country is still imposing a 14-day quarantine period when it’s time to start the tournament, both locales will be in the U.S. 4. The league can’t still be considering Minneapolis/St. Paul as a hub city, can it? 5. Actions speak louder. Fans will get a gauge of how their favourite hockey team views its bubble players and prospects by whom is invited to black-ace this summer… and who is not. Mark Spector breaks down the expected list of Oilers nicely here. Kenny Agostino is champing at the bit to start skating in Toronto, and half of Leafs Nation is already polishing up the Conn Smythe for Nick Robertson. Meanwhile, in Washington, GM Brian MacLellan titillated his fan base by saying he’s looking at calling up 19-year-old Capitals prospect Connor McMichael. McMichael tore up the OHL this season, racking up 47 goals, 102 points and a plus-32 in 52 games for the London Knights. “It would be a great learning experience for Connor,” MacLellan said of 2019’s 25th-overall pick. “He seems to be a guy that can pick up things from good players, from watching them, being around them. The feedback from him last training camp was he was engaged, he learned a lot from [Nicklas Backstrom]. He learned a lot from our veteran players. “It takes a big leap for his development, just to be in that environment, to see how guys work, to see how guys practice, off-ice workouts, nutrition stuff, see our main guys doing it on a daily basis in a competitive environment. I think it would be invaluable for him.” With clubs concerned about the long layoff leading to a spike in soft-tissue injuries, we could see some of these black aces jump into the spotlight as the tournament grinds on. In addition to an expanded roster of 28 skaters, each team is allowed to bring an unlimited number of goalies to their hub. “Oh. So, no Zamboni drivers will get to play, then?” my wife said. Good point. 6. Much was made of the Maple Leafs’ midseason coaching change, and for good reason. But ’s promotion triggered a change at the AHL level, as rookie Marlies coach made the challenging jump from instructing teenagers to adults.

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By Moore’s own admission, taking on a mixed room with wide-eyed prospects in their early 20s and seasoned vets in their 30s threw him for a bit of a loop. Even simple things like how players of different ages expect a drill to be run can vary. “Some of the older players, when you ask them to do something a little bit outside the box in practice, they’re a bit hesitant. The challenge in getting them to buy into something different, was definitely something that I didn’t expect as much to happen as it did,” Moore said. “The younger players are still a little different in the sense that they’re either first- or second-year pro. They don’t have as many expectations as to what this level is and what’s been done the past and what practices should or could look like. So it wasn’t as hard with them to get them to buy into something a little bit new or different.” I asked a couple of Marlies, a rookie and a vet, to discuss that transition from Keefe to Moore. Kenny Agostino, 28: “For one thing, Keefer was in his fifth year with the Marlies. He’s a veteran professional coach. He knows a lot of the guys, played with a lot of guys, he’s won a championship with a number of those guys in that room, so there was definitely a level of comfort and ease that you can feel. Which, as a player, it’s encouraging knowing a guy who’s comfortable in his routine. You know what kind of coach he is early on. You know what he’s expecting out of you. “[Moore] is a first-year coach coming into a team midway through the season, coaching men, not kids. There’s a lot of factors. There’s a lot of adjustments from both his side and our side. He brings in new terminology, which also is an adjustment for both us and the coaching staff. I think you can’t just flip a switch and expect all that to just mesh smoothly midway through a professional hockey season. It’s just unrealistic. “He probably learned a lot, and I know we learned a lot about him as a coach. And I think it’ll be much different and much smoother now that he’s familiar with a lot of returning players next year. “A jump from coaching kids in high school to men is not an easy adjustment for anyone. So I think for both sides there was an adjustment period.” Joseph Woll, 21: “Brilliant hockey minds. But at the same time, [both coaches] try to take an approach to where they form relationships with the players. That was something Sheldon did perfectly. He was the guy that knew the game well and was an unbelievable coach from a technical standpoint, but at the same time he was someone the guys really looked up to and wanted to play for. He holds you accountable if you did something wrong. That was similar to Greg this year. It’s probably difficult for him to come into the year to a brand-new team and come from the USHL. It’s got to be a jump. So, I think that was probably difficult for him, but I thought he played it perfectly with us, and I think the Leafs helped make that transition as seamless as possible.” 7. It will be nearly impossible to compensate for the lost electricity and atmosphere in those fan-free playoff buildings. Kudos to Blue Jackets GM Jarmo Kekalainen for finding a silver lining in the silence: Bench coaches won’t have to holler their instructions through a Thunderdome. “It’ll be easier to communicate with the players when they can actually hear you. From the regular playoff crowd we had last year in Nationwide, I don’t know if they could hear what the coaches were saying. The crowd — our fifth line — was so loud,” Kekalainen humble-bragged.

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8. In the absence of fans, and with the host team expected to be quarantined in a hotel, is there any advantage to competing in your home hub arena? How long does it really take to figure out how the puck bounces off the boards? “Familiarity, I think, is the only thing,” Columbus captain Nick Foligno says. “I don’t really see the advantages of us playing in Columbus if we get to be the hub city.” “When it comes to playoffs, our fans are on top of you. It can be intimidating. But when you have it the way it’s set up right now, it reminds me of the world championships. I mean, you go over there and a lot of times… it’s kind of neutral. Everyone just loves hockey. So, it’s going to be whoever can play to their system the best. It’s going to be the team that can get to their identity to click.” 9. Among the union, Anton Stralman has voiced the strongest concerns we’ve heard so far regarding the dangers of a return to play. “Is it worth it?” the Panthers defenceman asked The Athletic‘s Joe Smith. “I know everybody wants hockey back, but safety has to come first. And it’s a little bit worrisome, I can’t deny that. Even though most players are young and healthy, I’m sure there are players like me that have underlying health issues. I don’t know how my body will react if I get this virus.” Stralman’s perspective is a unique one. For years he has battled bronchiectasis. The respiratory disease makes it difficult for sufferers to clear mucus from their lungs. It comes with a chronic cough and chest pain. Stralman only recently stopped taking medication for the condition. “It’s not just the 50 guys on the team; there’s a lot of people that need to be there to make this work. If some of those people get sick and potentially die from that, who is responsible? And is this something I want to be part of? It’s about safety, not just for me but everyone involved. That raises a lot of questions on if we should do this thing. And if we do, would there be a price to pay for it? “I’m not sure that’s the right thing to do.” Stralman’s stance, at least publicly, is an outlier. Much more common are comments like this, from Zdeno Chara. “There definitely is risk involved. You have to accept risk in your lives,” Chara said. “Every time you step on the ice, there’s a risk of getting injured.” 10. The highest level Kodie Curran had reached on this side of the pond was the AHL, for 20 games. In a triumph for old guys everywhere, however, the 30-year-old defenceman and late-blooming Calgary native has spun his MVP season in the Swedish Elite League into a two-year contract with the Anaheim Ducks. GM Bob Murray chuckled at the weekly reports he’d receive from his European scouts on Curran, an option they’d been eyeing for years. “The notes were always the same,” Murray relayed to reporters on a conference call Wednesday. “Bob, we’ve got to sign this guy. Bob, we’ve got to sign this guy. Bob, we’ve got to sign this guy.” To us, the signing of Curran, a veteran left shot, also signals that Anaheim won’t be bringing back UFA Michael Del Zotto.

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“We felt another one of our issues was that our defence was too young. And with young forwards, it really hurt us,” Murray said. “I expect some really good competition on defence this year, and we should be deep enough.” 11. Murray is the third-longest-tenured GM in the league. This marks the first time in 18 years that Anaheim (29-33-9) failed to qualify for the playoffs in consecutive seasons. During his postmortem with the media, Murray gave Dallas Eakins a mixed review, praising his new coach’s preparation and organizational skills but criticizing his special teams and consistency in holding the room accountable. “Up and down the lineup, some of the kids were allowed to get away with murder this year. That’s over. Accountability in this group is going to change. I’ve said that a couple of times. I’m hellbent on that happening going forward. The coaches are going to hear that loud and clear. They already have,” Murray said. “[Eakins] had to get rid of some of the things that came from Edmonton. I think those are gone now. He was very hard on some young people in Edmonton, and it kind of backfired on him. I’m not saying it’s all his fault, by the way. “He took the foot off the gas a bit with them. He’s going to be much more consistent and on point with everybody next year.” Those are some pointed public comments. I’d love to be a fly on the wall when Murray and Eakins meet face-to-face before the summer, which is the plan. Speaking to TSN radio in Toronto Thursday morning, Del Zotto stuck up for Eakins. The defeceman believes his coach was “thrown under the bus,” arguing that accountability issues should fall on the GM and a balance of veterans in NHL dressing rooms is critical in grooming the rookies. “Every team wants to get younger, but there is no accountability. It’s not on the coaches. If the GM or the owner decides they want to rebuild, then they’re going with young guys,” Del Zotto said. “That seems to be the NHL now. Teams want to get younger and younger, for whatever reason, as opposed to just playing players who deserve to play.” One more from Murray, summing up his exit meeting with star Rickard Rakell, whose 15 goals and 42 points marked his lowest totals in five years: “It was very insightful. I think he’s a very determined young man right now. I’ll just leave it at that.” 12. Something to look forward to: The Arizona Coyotes will wear their beautiful throwback Kachina sweaters for “home” games when hockey resumes. “They’re awesome jerseys. It’s one thing for the fans to get excited about something. When our players get excited to wear something, that’s when you know it’s pretty good,” GM John Chayka told Hockey Central @ Noon. “I got texts from our players even when we announced it that they were pumped up, excited to get back wearing the jersey.”

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