Jim Kelley

Jim Kelley writes regularly on the NHL for Sportsnet.ca and can be heard on Primetime Sports on the FAN590.

The playoffs are upon us, but before we go deep into the best hockey of the year, there are a few things that need to be addressed:

The Brendan Shanahan rumour:

You’ve probably heard it by now, scattered reports (from unnamed sources, of course) that the long-time hockey star and executive office newbie is being prepped to replace Colin Campbell as executive vice-president for the NHL’s hockey operations, including taking over Campbell’s role of handing out discipline.

I don’t put a great deal of stock in it for two reasons: 1) Shanahan is woefully inexperienced in the inner workings of the oft-times Byzantine world of the NHL and 2) what person in his right mind wants to be exposed to scathing criticism from both inside and outside the league for rulings that on many occasions King Solomon himself couldn’t cleanly decide.

However, if I were Campbell I’d make sure my doctor checks me and my entire family and issues a clean bill of health, and that I stay away from racetracks and the officials’ rooms before games, and just about anything else that could be parlayed into a behind-the-scenes dismissal.

After all, a sudden family health emergency moved Bryan Lewis out of the job Campbell now has and, surprisingly or perhaps not so surprisingly, it came about in the off-season after the "no goal" debacle that ended the 1999 Stanley Cup Final with Brett Hull’s foot in the Buffalo Sabres crease and an ugly and extended debate as to whether or not the game and Cup-winning goal was legitimate under the rules of the day. Rules that, by the way, were changed that same off-season in which Lewis became unemployed.

Andy van Hellemond, a Hall of Fame referee, got the axe pretty much the same way. No real allegations of wrong doing, just a "concern" about his penchant for visiting the ponies and how it might give the wrong appearance to the public. Next thing you know van Hellemond has an off-season change of direction and is no longer the director of officiating.

It happens all the time in the corporate world and even the corporate world of sports. Not a firing per se, just a quiet change that comes about after a period of unrest and during a summertime lull when very few are working or even paying attention.

The Shanahan rumour sounds very much like a trial balloon sent up to gauge the sentiment for change. Campbell has been under fire in the past, but this past season has been particularly difficult in the criticism department, especially after deciding no discipline was required after Mike Richards’ hit on David Booth and Matt Cooke’s hit on Marc Savard. Both were ferocious hits to the head on players who never saw them coming. The ensuing firestorm touched off a wave of protest in and around hockey and had many high-placed people within the league and in the ownership ranks upset about both the way it was handled and the battle with the Players Association that followed.

The PA has been largely dormant, what with the internal battles that have seen executive directors replaced like Mike Keenan used to change goalies, but the controversy seemed to create enough of a groundswell of support for former Major League Baseball Players Association head Don Fehr to take the head job. That hasn’t been decided yet, but you can be assured Fehr’s appointment is not a scenario the league would happily embrace.

It remains to be seen if Campbell, as loyal an employee as the NHL has ever had, pays the price this offseason, but given the situation and the way the NHL does business, well, there’s a reason Shanahan’s name is being bandied about.

The Season Ender:

The Philadelphia Flyers beat the New York Rangers on the last day of the season and qualified for the playoffs. Fair enough, but the game was decided by a shootout and for some (your humble correspondent included) it left a bad taste.

The NHL has never put a high priority on the shootout. It’s hockey’s version of the home run derby, but with real world consequences. Essentially it was a gift to the fans for enduring the lockout, but it was clear from its inception that it wasn’t something even the league truly liked. They certainly didn’t use it in the postseason, the so-called "games that really matter."

I get that, but was there a more important game, a game that "really mattered" more to the Rangers or the Flyers, than that finale? Wouldn’t it have been better to settle it not with a gimmick or even an extended four-on-four overtime, but the way the "games that matter" have always been decided? That would be with all players involved through however many overtimes necessary instead of what looked for all the world like a condensed version of skeeball on ice.

I understand the rules are the rules and I can’t and won’t expect them to change for one game. Even Rangers coach John Tortorella, no fan of everything the NHL does said he was fine with it. Knowing him like we do, one could argue he’s not being entirely truthful, but we’ll take him at his word for now.

Yet here’s the thing: This is Gary Bettman’s game now. The rules in play are the rules he put in: four-on-four overtimes, shootout skills competitions that decide the outcome of games; strange, sometimes incomprehensible rulings regarding supplemental; a points system that most fans find entirely unworkable when it comes to tracking standings; points for losing games; despite endless promises to the contrary, stagnant scoring across the board; four officials on ice (and still countless missed calls or different interpretations of the same infraction); a video replay system that corrects some calls, ignores others that everyone in the building sees on overhead video boards, but can’t be reviewed; a television policy that, in the United States at least, that makes the game harder than need be to find and, lest we forget, allows the one over-the-air "national" broadcaster to bail out of an undecided game to run things like a Preakness prerace show; teams with more points seeded lower in the playoff pairings because another team happens to win a division title, sometimes by playing the bulk of its games against rivals who are so far below a standard level of competency they might be better qualified to compete in the AHL.

Oh, and did we mention player safety issues, including blows to the head, some of which are still deemed legal and others that fall solely to the discretion of an executive vice-president who sometimes gives the appearance of wanting to effect real change and sometimes appears to be covering for owners who would rather see perpetrators stay on the ice despite the havoc they cause. All the better to keep the turnstiles turning.

The NHL today is Gary Bettman’s NHL and one needs to ask a very simple question: do you like what you see on a nightly basis?

For a lot of hockey fans the answer isn’t a resounding yes or no, more like the constant cycling of old arguments that rival the constant cycling in the corners for puck control rather than highlighting the free flowing part of the game that puts an emphasis on skating, passing, shooting and, dare we say it, the occasional scoring off the rush. That too is the result of Bettman’s tenure, not all of which has been bad or even controversial, but there are a great many areas in which the game can be a great deal better and a whole lot less confusing. In that regard, one can reasonably argue that Bettman has moved it in a direction all his own and not always for the better.

The Officiating Question:

Count back to a time before Terry Gregson and Stephen Walkom and van Hellemond and Lewis and, well, Bettman’s NHL has had his share of directors of officiating.

That begs the question: does the league hold to a standard, or is the standard held to the interpretation of the many different men who have headed the league’s office of officiating?

One could forcefully argue that the standard slipped last season, especially when comparing the regular season calls vs. calls made, or in many cases not made, in the postseason. Hard to say where that came from, but then it’s still difficult to ascertain if Walkom willingly went back to on-ice duties or if he was "encouraged" to do so. There were rumours that the on-ice officials weren’t exactly happy with the way they were being managed either, but there was a sea change in the offseason with Gregson, best known for being on the ice with longtime partner Bill McCreary for the infamous "no-goal game" in 1999, replacing Walkom.

There was a great deal of concern about calls made and not made regarding plays in the slot and crease last season, and at times it appeared the NHL itself didn’t know exactly what to do about crease crashing and defensive play (or at least how much force a defenceman could use) in the slot area while trying to clear a path so his goaltender could see the puck.

As the season went along, it appeared Gregson was happy with the amount of physical contact in front of the net and even with the play right in the crease, but overall one could argue that the goalies lost a few "rights" if you will regarding having enough room to play the puck. It gets a good deal more intense in the postseason and teams and certainly individual players will push the bounds of acceptability when the Cup is on the line. This is where Gregson will be tested and, unfortunately for both the players and the fans, no one is yet certain as to how he’s going to rule on the close ones.

I’ll be watching the Philadelphia-New Jersey series for some indication, but it’s fair to keep an eye on Pittsburgh-Ottawa and maybe even Washington-Montreal in the East and Detroit-Phoenix in the West.

It shouldn’t be this way. In an ideal world, the director is a person with a good long resume and a world of administrative experience. He should be a man who keeps the course. We don’t know for certain if Gregson can meet that standard and that’s worrisome until he proves otherwise.