NEARLY three years after the Rangers unilaterally and unaccountably withheld July 1, 2005, signing bonuses due Bobby Holik, Jed Ortmeyer and Darius Kasparaitis, the NHL grievance process is finally about to yield a verdict.
Slap Shots has learned that arbitrator Richard Bloch, who concluded hearings in Manhattan two weeks ago with testimony delivered by GM Glen Sather and 2005 management right-hand man Peter Stephan, is scheduled to render a decision by the end of next month.
The case would seem to be open and shut. For inconceivable reasons that the Rangers attempted to portray as conceivable in front of the arbitrator, the team withheld the scheduled bonuses of $2M to Holik, $1M to Kasparaitis and $150,000 to Ortmeyer. Even as the NHL was still in the midst of the 2004-05 lockout that would end on July 21, 2005.
A year ago, the Rangers lost a grievance to Eric Lindros in excess of $1M for withholding his rightful games-played bonus for the 2003-04 season.
It’s unfortunate they’re such a cash-poor team, isn’t it? Oh well, maybe they can jack up their ticket prices at an unprecedented rate for the playoffs.
The Ranger$ were the only team in the NHL to withhold signing-bonus payments during the lockout. While Kasparaitis reached a settlement with the Rangers earlier this season as part of the agreement that allowed him to play in Russia rather than in Hartford, Holik and Ortmeyer pursued the case and their money.
Holik, whose 2006 bonus payment of $1.52M (after the rollback) also was withheld and is part of the grievance, was working on a five-year, $45M contract. Ortmeyer, who was working on a three-year deal worth $1.2M, actually played the 2004-05 lockout season for the AHL Wolf Pack.
But because the Blueshirts were so intent on denying Holik his money (Kasparaitis was a secondary figure), they also were required to withhold the bonus from Ortmeyer in order to establish some sort of consistent rationale for their irrational and petty behavior.
“It’s never a good idea to comment on litigation while it’s still pending, but I would say that the whole thing surprised me,” Mark Witkin, who represents Ortmeyer, told Slap Shots on Friday. “It never stopped being a surprise.
“It had a whole lot of surprising elements, from start to finish. I’ll just leave it at that.”
Now the surprise would be if Bloch, who was the NFL arbitrator who upheld the Eagles’ 2005 suspension of Terrell Owens, finds in favor of the Ranger$.
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Never has there been a more despicable promotional spot than the one MSG runs on Devils telecasts depicting an edgy New Jersey fan – in front of an area dominated by graffiti, no less – luxuriating in the Scott Stevens hit that concussed Lindros in Game 7 of the 2000 Eastern finals.
The spot, for which some creative genius no doubt received a pat on the head, concludes with the actor-fan taking the famous and stomach-turning picture of an unconscious Lindros flat on the ice in a semi fetal position, and pasting it up against the wall.
“Dummy!” he exclaims in triumph.
“Dummy” is right, as it applies to any and all in the MSG Network who approved the spot as fit for viewing.
Disgraceful.
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You might want to keep on an eye throughout the playoffs on impending Minnesota free-agent left wing and power-play point man Brian Rolston, and on impending Montreal free-agent right wing Michael Ryder, because the Rangers sure are.
There’s a word for the Ottawa fan boy-writer who called on the Senators to break Sidney Crosby‘s ankle with an imitation of Bobby Clarke‘s 1972 Summit Series slash that did the same to the USSR’s resplendent Valeri Kharlamov. It’s the same word that applies to the editor who allowed the plea to actually appear in the newspaper.
It’s spelled, M-O-R-O-N.
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We all make mistakes, to which personal experience can most certainly attest.
It was, however, beyond bizarre to hear Gary Bettman state with assurance during an appearance Thursday on the WFAN Smug One and the Hyena show, that the Maple Leafs’ Ace Bailey, who nearly was killed on the ice by Eddie Shore on a check from behind in a 1933 incident, was the same Ace Bailey who was killed as a passenger on Flight 175 on Sept. 11.
The Ace Bailey who died when his plane crashed into the World Trade Center, was Garnet Bailey, the Bruins’ winger who scored the winner late in Game 1 of the 1972 Cup Finals against the Rangers, and who, following an eight-year NHL career, was the director of pro scouting for the Kings at the time of his death.
“The reference to the Baileys was unintentional,” Bettman told Slap Shots in an e-mail statement through the NHL public relations office.
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Finally, speaking of mistakes. “When a goalie makes a mistake, everyone sees it and a red light goes on,” Henrik Lundqvist said with an impish grin Thursday during a one-on-one chat about Martin Brodeur‘s Game 1 Frozen Moment. “If that happened to writers, a red light might be flashing in your house all day.”
It was a little joke.
We think.