Leaking stories to the press is accepted practice for people on the inside who want to anonymously advance a cause by letting a few choice documents stray into the hands of an eager reporter. Voilà , journalism by stealth. The cabal that unseated Paul Kelly as executive director at the NHLPA after just 22 months seems to have benefited from the leaks. For example, members of the media were sent an anonymous letter prior to the union's annual meeting in June in Las Vegas. The lengthy screed catalogued Kelly's alleged shortcomings. No media outlets printed from the letter (the author remains a mystery).
The Kelly critics had more luck initially this week when a damning legal opinion penned by former Ontario chief justice Roy McMurtry was leaked. McMurtry's opinion concluded the union had cause to fire Kelly.
This time, however, a major media outlet bit, regurgitating large chunks of the opinion. (Kelly was not quoted.) With a major push-back under way against Kelly's firing within the membership of the NHLPA, the usurpers hoped that the McMurtry leak would defuse criticism of their putsch in Chicago last month.
Uh, no. The McMurtry connection annoyed retired writer Russ Conway, whose work in newspapers and books formed the basis for Alan Eagleson's fraud conviction in 1998. Conway went on Toronto's AM 640 with Bill Watters to raise the old issues mentioned in a 1993 U.S. Justice Department indictment against Eagleson. For example, hadn't Kelly put McMurtry's pal Eagleson in the slammer? Had Kelly's indictment of Eagleson not shown that McMurtry took NHLPA Wimbledon tickets from Eagleson, that McMurtry was on the board of Voyageur Insurance (the company that stiffed the players under Eagleson's watch), and that McMurtry received a $5,000 campaign contribution from All Canada Sports, Eagleson's sham company that skimmed from rink-board ads intended for Hockey Canada?
Within two hours of Conway's blast, the "new" NHLPA operatives issued a press release saying they "were unaware of [McMurtry's]past interaction with Alan Eagleson".
Right. That should go over big with the players in a conference call on Sunday night. All of this invites the question as to how the NHLPA could not have known about past interactions between McMurtry and Eagleson as set out in the 1993 indictment. We wanted to ask McMurtry, but in an e-mail to The Globe and Mail, McMurtry's office declined an interview, citing lawyer-client privilege.
Don Of a New Season
Yes, the NHL season commenced Thursday night with a doubleheader on Hockey Night In Canada , and as always, there was just one story after 30 years.
The avuncular Don Cherry was upon us once more. And from CBC's point of view, if he ain't broke, don't fix him.
So Cherry delivered a medley of his favourite hits. On Ron Wilson's penalty kill: "Here's what I would have … this guy, you see the two guys on the side … Detroit … watch what happens … and you got Schenn playing the left side, he's a right-handed shot … I know if he got it he was going to rifle it around. They didn't know what they were doing."
Got that?
Then a primer on Georges Laraque: "If you guys want to learn to fight, he backs up, he backs up … he does this all the time. You see how Colton's [Orr]reachin'. He gets you reachin'. And when you're reachin' you're in a little trouble."
Try playing the Don Cherry drinking game. Take a slug of your favourite libation each time he warns defencemen not to put their sticks in the way of a shot, cites how Nazem Kadri is being screwed out of an NHL career, shouts, "Hold it, don't run it yet" to an unseen producer in the production truck. Hours of fun for the whole family. But murder on your liver.
Burke's Law
HNIC's opening musical montage featured just one NHL GM. Three guesses. Hints: Tie always askew. Uses binoculars to watch the fights. Winners get a full season of tougher hockey in Toronto.
Glen Healy on Habs new coach Jacques Martin: "For those of you who have not seen his press conferences, he will bore you in both languages."
Bogus Boss
What joy for the band of baseball brothers tuning in Wednesday for the final spasms of the Blue Jays season. Viewers were suddenly treated to the spectacle of Bruce Springsteen seated in the front row of the Fenway Park bleachers. The Sportsnet TV crew and Blue Jays radio guys moistly lauded the Boss for his baseball bonafides, sitting with the grunts not the Harvard types. Half an inning later, the seats were empty and, listeners were told, a helicopter was taking Springsteen to parts unknown. What a story! Except that while "The Boss" was sitting in the Fens at about 8:20 he was also due in Giants Stadium at the Meadowlands of New Jersey that same night at 8:45 to start the first of five concerts in that venue. And the Boston media were strangely silent about the great musician in their midst. And Springsteen is a devoted Yankees fan who hates the BoSox. Hmm. Could it be the Toronto boys were punked by a Springsteen fake who was "born to run" away?