Unified Again, NHL Players Give Goodenow Veto Clout

NHL players, completing two days of meetings in Toronto, repaired their fractured unity and gave their union’s bargaining committee authority to reject contract proposals from the NHL that are deemed unacceptable by union chief Bob Goodenow.

Although no more than 10 days remain for a settlement to be reached in time to play a 50-game season--the minimum length set by the NHL--no talks have been scheduled between Goodenow and Commissioner Gary Bettman. “It doesn’t look good for them to be talking again this week,” a union source said. “And with the holiday coming up, who knows?”

Wednesday’s gathering drew about 240 players, who were told by Jerry Hausman, an economist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, that the NHL’s proposed payroll tax would act as a cap and severely restrict salary growth. That reportedly swayed players who previously had urged the union to accept a tax to make a deal.

“Once they saw how the cap operates, they saw how dangerous it is,” union spokesman Steve McAllister said.

“A few guys had some concerns and didn’t understand the ramifications.”

Said Pittsburgh Penguin defenseman Larry Murphy: “There’s no deal to be made without a tax. That’s what came out of this meeting. They (owners) are not going to get all the concessions we made and then lay a tax on top of it. If they withdraw the tax, the deal will be done in a day.”

An NHL source confirmed a report in The Times that NHL negotiators have discussed a concept that does not include a tax. He said the idea was merely a possibility and was not a concrete proposal. Each club received a fax Wednesday to that effect.

“It (a no-tax formula) is always tossed around, but it’s got to be real different than where it is now to be a proposal,” the source said.