Jeremy Roenick rants about NHL lockout

[Bronx33]

http://www.cbc.ca/story/sports/natio...ick050626.html

Never shy to voice his opinion, Philadelphia Flyers centre Jeremy Roenick thinks NHL players lost the battle with team owners over a new collective bargaining agreement.

* INDEPTH: Faceoff 2004-05

Jeremy Roenick thinks NHL players are getting their butts kicked in the negotiations over a new CBA. (CP File Photo)

Before the 2004-05 season was cancelled on Feb 16, commissioner Gary Bettman tabled a proposal that included a $42.5 million US salary cap and warned that future offers from the league would not get better.

Four months later, the NHL and the Players' Association are still trying to hammer out a new CBA. According to reports, the two sides have agreed to a team-by-team salary cap with a ceiling ranging from $34 million to $36 million and a floor ranging from $22 million to $24 million.

* RELATED: Player bio: Jeremy Roenick

That doesn't sit too well with the outspoken Roenick, who publicly said he supported the notion of a salary cap back in February (and later retracted the statement) and was also accused – along with a handful of other players – of going behind the union's back to try and get a deal done with league officials in February.

"We got our (butts) kicked," Roenick said of the current labour negotiations in Sunday's Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.

* FROM JUNE 24, 2005: NHL, NHLPA to resume talks Monday

The newspaper reports that the 35-year-old Roenick believes that NHL players are going to give up more than any union has ever given up in the history of professional sports when the two sides finally come to terms on a new CBA.

And while Roenick believes hockey fans will return once the league starts up again, he said he doesn't want to hear NHL players maligned for their role in the lockout.

* FROM JUNE 23, 2005: NHL players to get worse deal: Lemieux

"If people are going to sit and chastise professional athletes for being spoiled and being cocky, they need to look at one thing and that's the deal that we are probably going to end up signing here in the next three weeks," Roenick told the newspaper. "They'd better understand that pro athletes are not cocky. Pro athletes care about the game.

"Everybody out there who calls us spoiled because we play 'a game,' they can all kiss my (butt). They can all kiss my (butt) because we have tried so hard to get this game back on the ice."

Roenick said everyone – the league, the union, the players – are all responsible for the lockout, he just wishes the NHLPA listened to its constituents more closely.

"They could have listened to their players," he said. "They could have listened to the players who had an idea of where this thing was going. They could have listened to me, they could have listened to Robert Esche, to Jarome Iginla, to Chris Pronger, and to sign a deal close to what we had in February. ... Now that we're at this point, I realize I was right. That deal we could have signed in February beats the (heck) out of the deal we're going to sign in July."

[Dudeskey]

Interesting how he changed his position on the cap... He was right in lockstep with Linden, Goodenow & co almost a year ago.