The Written Word
for July 16, 2000

I find myself arguing with myself these days which is remarkable if only because I have enough people to argue with in the world around me. But what I am split on is the amount of money paid to athletes.

Last week we learned that Mark Messier, a 39 year old hockey player who was to lead the Vancouver Canucks to the Stanley Cup and couldn’t even get them in the play-offs was paid a bonus of $2 million dollars to sign with the New York Rangers and $4 million a year for the next two years. Now if I were to carry on and tell of some of the other enormous settlements being made it would take all the space I have and much more. But Messier is an excellent example of how the world of athletic compensation has gone mad.

Here’s where I argue with myself for I draw a distinction between Messier’s case and that of Tiger Woods, who is about to become the first billionaire athlete. I do so because Woods makes a very small part of that out of the purses for which he competes. The game of golf, far from suffering from the 7 or 8 million Tiger will make on the Tour this year profits handsomely by his presence. Indeed, every professional golfer ought to get up each morning and bow towards Florida where Tiger lives because it is he who has driven the prize money up dramatically. (Prompting one wag, me, to observe that there’s good news and bad news for the touring pro. The good news is that Tiger has increased the purses by 1/3 or more – the bad news is he’s kept the difference for himself.) Tiger makes his big money by endorsements not out of the game and what I have to say is in no way critical of other athletes that do the same.

But what the Mark Messiers of the world have done is drive their sport out of the reach of ordinary fan. What guy can come home of an evening and say to his wife and three kids, drop everything, we’re going to watch the Canucks play the Canadiens? Only a very rich guy indeed can even dream such dreams. The cost of players has driven out of the arena all but the rich and the customers and clients of the wealthy.

Now I don’t begrudge the worker his wages. In the days before the players union we saw capitalism at its worst … it was reminiscent of the mines of Wales. Players like Maurice Richard and Gordie Howe played for peanuts. It was not until the arrival of the World Hockey Association and competition and then the union that saw owners have to pay decent wages. And it is a short career with the ever present danger of injuries. But having said that the pendulum has swung so far that the game of hockey, for Canadians at any rate, is on its death bed. Even the most illustrious franchise of them all, the Montreal Canadiens, may not survive with the Toronto Maple Leafs only surviving because Toronto is the corporate capital of Canada. What is for sure is that Canadian teams cannot compete today and will be able to compete even less in the years to come.

This has hit baseball and basketball too – but they have always been essentially American games. But the greedy owners prepared to pay greedy players unbelievable amounts of money have all but killed off NHL hockey in Canada. And it’s got so bad, it will probably leave our lives not with a bang but a barely audible whimper.