With Hockey Strike Over, Rebuilding Begins

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RENEE MONTAGNE, host:

The National Hockey League and the Players' Association have reached an agreement in principle that would allow players to get back on the ice. The deal still needs to be ratified, but it is expected that players will head for training camps come September. Richard Reynolds reports from Toronto.

RICHARD REYNOLDS reporting:

Toronto is a hockey town. The local team, the Maple Leafs, has not had an unsold seat in over 40 years. Across Canada, people follow hockey religiously. "Hockey Night in Canada," two back-to-back games broadcast on national television, is consistently one of the most popular TV shows in the country. Gauging by much of the reaction on phone-in radio shows, such as this one on Toronto's The FAN, most hockey fans are happy to have their game back.

(Soundbite of The FAN)

Unidentified Man #1: I'm a fan of hockey. I'm just happy it's back. You know, the prodigal son has come home. We've all been through like the seven stages of acceptance, denial. Let's just bring it back, enjoy the hockey.

REYNOLDS: But not all is good in hockey-land. Many fans are still furious at the teams and the players for taking away the game for an entire season. And like in many sports, they are upset at the high and increasing cost of tickets, which is not expected to drop despite the deal.

(Soundbite of radio show)

Unidentified Man #2: This deal has done nothing for the fans. The fans have been without a game for over a year, where they've lost a season.

REYNOLDS: The tentative deal, struck in New York after a 24-hour marathon bargaining session, still needs to be ratified. But nearly every hockey journalist expects that to happen. The big question is how much damage has been done to the game by the lockout? Ken Campbell is one of Canada's leading hockey journalists. He writes for the Toronto Star.

Mr. KEN CAMPBELL (Toronto Star): I think it's hurt them very, very badly and, I mean, you only have to look at baseball's example to see the history in that. Baseball, which is far more entrenched in the United States than hockey can ever hope to be, basically took almost 10 years to get back to the level of popularity that it enjoyed before.

REYNOLDS: For people like Campbell, who follow hockey closely, the strike was no surprise; nor was the loss of an entire season. The last collective agreement was set to expire at the end of the 2003-2004 season and the owners had made it clear, they wanted to change the way revenues were divvied up. Specifically, they wanted players to get less of the revenues. They wanted a salary cap. They wanted support for smaller teams, and they wanted guarantees that players' salaries wouldn't hurt teams financially if hockey revenues took a dive. While details won't be confirmed until the deal is voted on next week, nearly every report says that the owners got exactly what they wanted.

Mr. CAMPBELL: You know, the owners vowed that they were going to change the system, that they were going to change the rules, they were going to take back the revenues that they felt were going too much to the players, and the players, I mean, as you would expect, were saying, `Well, no, we like things the way they are.'

REYNOLDS: The owners and the players each meet next week, the players here in Toronto, the owners in New York. By Thursday, we will know if there will be another hockey season starting in September. Campbell and others say that Canadian powerhouses like the Maple Leafs and the Montreal Canadiens will probably recover quickly from the strike. It is the smaller teams in the US, like Florida and Atlanta, that may have a much harder time recovering from the year without hockey.

For NPR News, I'm Richard Reynolds in Toronto.

MONTAGNE: This is NPR News.

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