Hockey legend turned politician Ken Dryden has been the only person to make any sense of the NHL lock-out:

"I think that there are a number of fans in this country who have sensed over the last number of months that actually maybe it was more habit than it was passion."

A recent poll says only 28% of Canadians miss NHL hockey. Canadians. Aren't we supposed to live for hockey, learn to skate before we learn to walk and all that jazz? If hockey is in trouble here, the news can't be good south of the border.

It is extremely hard to have any sympathy for the players and their megalomaniac union, who by all standards are wildly overpaid. On the other hand, Gary Bettman and the NHL brass are mostly responsible for the conditions that led to the current mess. It was Bettman's deal to end the last lock-out in 1994 that flung the doors open for teams to exist in cities that cannot sustain them and for the ridiculous player salaries.

Since 1992, Bettman's was supposed to:

  • Expand into US new markets;
  • Generate new TV deals; and
  • Improve the marketing of the game.

What he's accomplished:

  • Presided over two lock-outs, and quite probably at least one lost season;
  • Presided over a referee strike;
  • Changed all manner of rules in the game despite not being a "hockey guy";
  • Expanded hockey into unsustainable U.S. markets while reducing the number of Canadian teams. Moving the Quebec Nordiques to Phoenix seems particularly stupid in retrospect; and
  • Created a horribly backwards relationship with the NHLPA that makes it impossible for good-faith negotiations.

...And here we sit as fans. I passed through the 'annoyed' stage, followed by the 'watching minor league hockey' stage, and am now firmly entrenched in the 'don't give a shit' stage. This is something of a revelation for a guy that has matching Maple Leafs salt and pepper shakers.

If nothing else, this lock-out has driven home the fact that hockey is no longer a Canadian cultural institution. Any semblance of that ended in 1992 when lawyer Gary Bettman arrived from the NBA to cash in. Hockey is a business -- a poorly run business at that -- and it took me 13 years to figure that out.