The NHLPA does not need another Bob Goodenow or Ted Saskin, it needs Paul Kelly to be himself.
According to several sources the election -- make that the coronation-- of attorney Paul Kelly as the new Executive Director of the National Hockey League Players' Association is a sure bet.
The official announcement will be made on Wednesday. If you can't wait, it will be announced by 'hockey insiders' Tuesday night.
We here at Sportsnet.ca, however, won't wait for either. We'll simply skip the specifics and go right to telling Kelly what to do and in this case, it's a relatively simple decree: Don't listen to media!
After all, I don't know anyone in media carrying around a law degree, an A-1 legacy as a prosecuting attorney, an impeccible resume as a businessman and Alan Eagleson's go-directly-to-jail card in his wallet, as Kelly does.
Kelley isn't being hired to turn around the failing newspaper business. He also isn't being asked to re-invent sports television, reignite the embers of radio, come up with an insanely profitable website or even save hockey as we know it.
Oddly enough, the players are prepared to hire and pay Kelly about two million dollars a year to represent their interests.
Now that may come as a bit of a surprise to many who have already decreed that Kelly must be the second coming of Bob Goodenow, Fr. David Bauer, Ken Dryden, King Clancy, Pierre Trudeau and Trent Klatt rolled into one.
It may even come as a shock to those who maintain he must save the game for all that is holy and pure in Canada.
Kelly's to-do list must begin with making certain the players get what they are entitled to under the current CBA. He also needs to restructure the business end of NHLPA and its licensing arm (something that has fallen into the leadership abyss) and he needs to tell Commissioner Gary Bettman and Deputy Commissioner Bil Daly where to stuff it when they try something wrong-headed, non-sensical or illegal.
On top, he needs to find a way to keep some 700 members interested enough in the process so that the league no longer views then as little more than mobile skate racks (mostly of the unheated variety). Do that and the union will be on track to handle the next negotiation with the kind of unity the management might respect.
That in itself is no small task.
But it is what labour bosses do.
The idea that somehow Kelly needs to do things that will return the game to the fans is a noble one, but it's also akin to asking Bettman and Maple Leafs Sports and Entertainment to put another franchise in Southern Ontario simply because fans would like it.
It's a nice thought, but if you really want it to happen, send a cheque and some moral support to RIM boss Jim Balsillie and his lawyers.
Kelly hasn't been retained to be Dr. Feelgood, or even to make Bettman and company miserable (though it does tend to come with the territory). He's coming on board for the reasons above. That's what Goodenow did and Ted Saskin failed to do.
Saskin may have gotten the boot because he secretly read player e-mails, but that's just a charge that will get the PA out from having to pay off his contract. The reason Saskin is gone and Kelly is on board is that Saskin was too much like Eagleson and not enough like Goodenow.
Though you might not have liked Goodenow's style, he did make the players wealthy. He also fought for their rights and was merciless on everything from the monstrous to the mundane.
If Goodenow felt the commissioner or the powers that be in the league overstepped their bounds, he fought. Not necessarily just to beat his nemesis (though one had the distinct sense that he enjoyed doing that), but to uphold, defend or define a principle.
In keeping to that standard he moved the PA from owner's lapdog to an association of players who learned both the ability, and importance, of saying "no."
He galvanized what had primarily been a union in name only and moved them out from a position of servitude to Eagleson and his pals in ownership and into their rightful place as a meaningful and important part of the game.
No union leader in the history of hockey had ever done that before.
You can argue that Goodenow may have gone too far in demanding the players attempt to outlast the owners in the last go-round, the 2005 lockout that eventually led to his demise. But you could also argue that the players and their agents caved and left themselves powerless in the face of a determined and somewhat ruthless opponent and, with the ascension of Saskin, betrayed themselves as both a union and a force to be reckoned with.
If Kelly can fix even a portion of what ails the PA then he will have earned both his salary and the faith of the search committee placed in him.
If he can build the players' union back into an association the league once again has to listen to, respect and occasionally fear he will have accomplished a minor miracle.
One gets the sense that he won't need the media to tell him how to do that.
