NHLPA Fires Paul Kelly, leader of The Union

[Declan]

The National Hockey League Players' Association is once again looking for a new leader.

Paul Kelly has been fired as the NHLPA's executive director following more than 10 hours of meetings in Chicago that began Sunday and carried into the early hours of Monday. The decision to relieve Kelly of his duties less than two years into his leadership of the association was made by the 30 NHL team representatives who make up the NHLPA's executive board.

“Following the Executive Board’s review of the overall operation of the NHLPA, it was decided that Paul Kelly should no longer continue to serve as Executive Director'', said a news release put out the association Monday morning. "We appreciate Mr. Kelly’s service to our Association."

The statement also said that the executive board would put together a search committee immediately to find Kelly's replacement.

A report on TSN.ca said that Kelly spent much of Sunday evening waiting outside a boardroom at the Drake Hotel while the executive board deliberated. According to the report, interim ombudsman Buzz Hargrove, the former head of the Canadian Auto Workers, was summoned into the boardroom twice to participate in the discussion before a final vote was taken.

Kelly was invited back into the board meeting along with general counsel Ian Penny where he learned his fate.

Hargrove, who replaced Eric Lindros when he resigned last February, had compiled a review on Kelly’s 22-months at the helm of the NHLPA and he presented his finding Sunday to the 30-member executive board, which is comprised of the 30 team players reps.

During Hargrove's leadership review, each staff member in the NHLPA’s Toronto office was interviewed. Sources indicate that the employees were divided on Kelly’s proficiency.

NHLPA staff members Glenn Healy, the director of player affairs, Pat Flatley, the assistant director of player affairs and Penny attended the proceedings. A source stated that both Healy and Flately were pro-Kelly, while Penny wanted to see a change at the top.

There was a report Monday morning that Flatley resigned his post after the Kelly announcement.

There also have been charges made from the pro-Kelly camp that Lindros continued to play a behind-the-scenes role in the attempted coup.

When Lindros removed himself as ombudsman earlier this year, alarm bells went off that all was not well with the NHLPA, which since the lockout has been in turmoil. After the lockout was settled in the summer of 2005 long-time executive director Bob Goodenow stepped down and his replacement, Ted Saskin, was removed in May 2007 amid allegations that he monitored players’ e-mails.

The advisory board of former players Ken Baumgartner and Steve Larmer as well as Hargrove, Ron Lloyd, Ron Pink and Ian Troop were in Chicago. Advisory board members George Cohen and Dan O’Neill did not attend the meeting.

Pink is a Halifax lawyer who was an applicant for the NHLPA executive director's job when Kelly was hired in 2007.

www.theglobeandmail.com/sports/kelly-out-as-head-of-nhlpa/article1270408/

[pathoffman35]

As said by many other hockey fans and even pundits, something is awfully fishy here. Hopefully, it won't mean a work stoppage in 2011

[Declan]

Welcome to the Forums Patrick!

[Declan]

Jeremy Roenick was shooting from the lip on Friday, going to bat for fired NHL Players' Association boss Paul Kelly while tearing a strip off the players' union hierarchy.

"I feel bad for Paul. I think that the way that they treated him was not right, and not fair," Roenick told hosts Darren Dreger and Bill Watters on Toronto's AM 640 radio station regarding Kelly, who was dismissed last Monday after less than two years on the job.

"I don't think Paul Kelly was doing a bad job, he was obviously very well qualified. Is the PA nervous about whether he can handle maybe a future lockout or a future strike, if that's the case? This has been very premature."

Kelly was hired in October 2007 to succeed Ted Saskin, who was fired as the union's executive director after he allegedly accessed players' private emails.

Earlier this week, reports citing anonymous sources alleged that Kelly was let go because he had read the transcript of a players-only meeting. Kelly rejected such talk on Thursday, calling the allegations a "false and misleading attack on my character and reputation."

Roenick, who recently retired after 20 NHL seasons, took issue with the fact that the NHLPA's 30-man executive committee, made up of player representatives from the NHL's 30 teams, decided to turf Kelly. Roenick said such an important move should be voted on by the entire union membership.

"That's been the problem with the NHLPA for many years - it's been a very small clique that have tried to make all the decisions, and the decisions that are made are not unanimous decisions by the union," Roenick said.

"It's unfortunate that the NHLPA continues to make a mockery of itself and take away its credibility by doing things that are very . . . there's one group who is trying to control it."

Roenick also suggested the members of the executive committee, most of whom are in their early 20s, might be easily swayed by the union's leaders.

"The education of those players is going to be very low," Roenick said. "I would say that most of them have high school educations, not college educations, and - not to put athletes down - but they are not the brightest bulbs in the box.

"That being said, they are really influenced by the smarter people - the lawyers, and the guys who seem to have gone to college and wear the suits and ties and represent themselves as being the smart people. The players look at these guys and put their faith in them, and sometimes they shouldn't do that."

www.nationalpost.com/sports/story.html?id=1963928