10 Top Books
By Jason Hammond

In the 10 years that Avenue has been publishing, local writers have been, too. We take a look at some of the best works over the last decade

How does one pick a best book? It’s not like hockey where the team scoring the most goals is the obvious winner. Instead, it’s more like judging figure skating: there are elements a judge looks for, but in the end any decision is going to be at least slightly subjective.

And so, while hoping that I won’t be compared to a certain French figure skating judge, here is my highly idiosyncratic survey of some of the best books written by Calgarians in the past decade. This list really is the tip of the iceberg, though, and I encourage you to visit your local library or bookstore to find even more recommendations.

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6. Best Book For The Sports Fan
Money Players: How Hockey’s Greatest Stars Beat the NHL at its Own Game, by Bruce Dowbiggin

Dowbiggin, a well-known sports broadcaster and columnist, takes a look at the behind-the-scenes money issues that seem to drive the NHL more than the on-ice product these days. With the ongoing lockout of the players by the owners, this book is also extremely timely.
See also: Offside, by Cathy Beveridge. A young-adult novel based on the true story of a Calgary hockey team that begins using prescription medication to help their play.

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http://www.avenuemagazine.ca/december2004/features.html

Best book this season

There are several new pro hockey books out for the holiday season. Far and above the best is "Money Players" by Bruce Dowbiggin, published by McClelland & Stewart Ltd.

If you really want a well-researched background book on what is going to be the hockey's hot issue in 2004 -- why the NHL may shut down in a showdown over the upcoming collective bargaining contract between owners and players -- this is absolutely the best reading available.

A longtime hockey writer and broadcaster, Dowbiggin provides insight and an education into the behind-the-scenes business side of pro hockey. Based on numerous examples and first-hand accounts with team executives, players, agents and players union officials, he shows how the balance of power has shifted in the NHL. And with detailed reasons, it becomes quite clear why players and agents have outsmarted NHL team executives at their own business game after the owners controlled players for decades.

In describing how hockey team management has helped create the current financial state of the NHL, Bruins president Harry Sinden has one of the best lines in the book: "The only people dumber than us," he says, "are the people in baseball."

"Money Players" makes a great Christmas present for somebody who cares about the inner workings of pro hockey.

Reading for the holidays
Last minute reading list for hockey enthusiasts
Wednesday December 22, 2004

Let me begin by saying that the whole notion of 'last minute' here has nothing to do with the coincidentally similar notion/strategy/reality of the NHL labor negotiations between the league and the Players' Association. It has everything to do, however, with final gift ideas for the forlorn and forsaken NHL fan on your shopping list, who instead of experiencing the game would be inclined to read about it from a few diverse and interesting perspectives.

To that end, I offer up three vastly different books (a major tip off as to what this displaced hockey analyst has been doing with his inordinate amount of extra time). If these offerings share anything in common beyond being non-fiction, it has to do with historical hockey perspective. Unfortunately, as enjoyable as I found all three of them to be in their own right, none are predictive regarding the future of today's NHL.

Anyway, here are three great reads for the hockey fan on your holiday list.

Happy Holidays to all.

Moneyplayers: By Bruce Dowbiggin

This is a must read for the hockey fan that wants to know how the NHL got to this point from a labor standpoint. Published in 2003 by McClelland & Stewart Ltd. (www.mcclelland.com), Moneyplayers takes the reader through changes the league went through in the 1990's -- some well thought out and positive and others that were fatally fatuous. Dowbiggin expertly delineates the cause and effect nature of all of these decisions for both the players and the owners.

Don't misunderstand -- this is not a dry documentation of the business wrangling of the past dozen years or so between the NHL and the NHLPA. It does not read like a case study manual. On the contrary. It is a veritable page-turner thanks to the naming of names in the intriguing interplay between old owners and the swelling ranks of the newcomers. And you forget what a cast of characters it was in the early '90s: Alan Eagleson and his criminal fall as the union boss; fellow felon Bruce McNall and his meteoric rise and precipitous plummet as owner of the L.A. Kings and as chairman of the NHL's Board of Governors. And President Gil Stein -- he of the one-year tenure and self-nomination for induction into the Hockey Hall of Fame. Crazy, but true ... and that is to name but a few.

Any wrath now directed towards NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman and NHLPA head Bob Goodenow due to the current lockout may dissipate after reading Dowbiggin's telling account.

Putting a Roof on Winter: By Michael McKinley

For a much more far-reaching history, I recommend McKinley's effort published in 2000 by Greystone Books. Putting a Roof on Winter is an account of the game of hockey from its origin, tracking the early migration all the way from the Irish offering of hurling or hurley to the iterations seen on the east coast of North America in the mid-1800s. At the crux of McKinley's book is the definitive move of hockey from an outdoor game to one played indoors, all because of the effort of one John Creighton in Montreal in 1875.

The subtitle of the book is From Sport to Spectacle, which summarizes why it has relevance in today's hockey climate beyond mere historical data. Creighton gave credibility to the game that he had become familiar with in Halifax. Because he was English and educated, his game became acceptable beyond the Irish and the French. Bringing hockey indoors further "legitimized" the game. From there McKinley traces the formation of the various leagues across Canada and in Northern Michigan and the resultant competition for the best players. Accordingly, the tale of Cyclone Taylor's odyssey and the formation of the first professional hockey league -- the six-team International Hockey League comprised of three clubs in Michigan, two in Pittsburgh and one in Canada -- show that 'buying a championship team' is hardly a new concept in sports.

In fact, part of the pleasure derived from reading Putting a Roof on Winter is in proving the old adage that the more things change, the more they stay the same. From economic issues to radical rule changes, strong-willed personalities, hucksters and Canadian-American snobbery-animosity, the game of hockey has seen it all before today's dilemma. McKinley's fine form reminds and reassures us that, at least in the big picture, hockey is great enough to survive even this bleakest of winters.

Ballad of the Whiskey Robber: By Julian Rubinstein

At its core, this isn't really a book about hockey, but it doesn't matter. It is a wonderful read and ultimately may deliver the most compelling hockey message of all in the face of the seemingly outlandish labor discourse. The context of the story alone is fascinating enough, but the expert detailing of the conflict between Romania and Hungary and the chaotic shift of Hungary from Communism to Capitalism gives the piece a palpable, emotive quality.

Published this year by Little Brown and Company (www.twbookmark.com), Ballad of the Whiskey Robber is the saga of Attila Ambrus -- a character for the ages if there ever was one. Let's just say that if Ambrus were a work of fiction, his exploits would be more believable. That he is real is, well, unbelievable.

That is where Mr. Rubinstein shows his skill as a writer. His treatment of Ambrus is a deft and poignant example of compassion and humor that makes Attila resonate as a character. In fact, people in the story flow freely throughout -- come and go, some integral to the plot, others incidental -- yet all were easy to visualize and get a sense of their being. Which is critical with this book because I -- like most who might read it -- have never been to Hungary. But, it matters about as much as it did to Attila that he wasn't a hockey player when he tried out for the local Hungarian pro team.

Ah, yes. Hockey. Well, from a hockey perspective, Attila and his teammates prove that one characteristic is universal -- no matter the locale or the level of play. That being, left to their own devices, hockey players are apt to fill their time away from the rink by living life to its fullest. The work/hard, play/hard mentality remains a part of hockey's sub-culture. As Rubinstein so eloquently portrays, no one, however, ever took that mantra to the extreme like Attila Ambrus.

So, while Ballad of the Whiskey Robber is a tale in which hockey is just one of several interwoven subplots, Attila's passion and desire represent the most refreshing display of playing for playing sake that I've come across in recent memory. Now more than ever -- given the current state of the NHL -- that is a sentiment well worth rekindling.

Darren Eliot, a former NHL goaltender, is a hockey analyst for SI.com.

Money Players

Dowbiggin is right up there with Stephen Brunt and Roy MacGregor as being one of the best sports journalists this country has to offer. Money Players gives us the background to how the hockey business, as purveyed by the National Hockey League, has got into the financial fix that it has. Dowbiggin gives us a unique look at the well-trodden background of labour relations, from the time of Ted Lindsay's abortive attempt to start an NHL players union, through the Alan Eagleson era, up to the present day personalities of Gary Bettman and Bob Goodenow. With impeccably thorough research and interviews with a broad cross-section from each of the main constituencies in the NHL's labour/financial debate, Dowbiggin offers a real insight into the workings of salary arbitration, free agency and the increasing professionalization of agents, and labour relations itself. This book is not for the casual fan, unless they have an affinity for discussions about labour relations, but will help those who are interested have a great deal more ammunition when they're talking around the water cooler, or at a sports bar.

Moneyplayers, by Bruce Dowbiggin

McClelland & Stewart, 301 pp., $34.99, hardcover.

Moneyplayers: How Hockey's Greatest Stars Beat the NHL at Its Own Game is not about get-rich gifted guys but rather how the NHL's epic blunders will detonate collective-bargaining-agreement negotiations between players and the league next September. Award-winning hockey writer Bruce Dowbiggin suggests that the fat deals of the game's best didn't cause franchise ills but are the result of a self-populating testochracy: jock-sniffing ownership, inept management, skilled player-agents.

Dowbiggin credits, quotes, paraphrases, and alludes to Alison Griffiths and David Cruise's Net Worth (1991); his book's first half summarizes their excellent history of league money woes. But Net Worth builds sympathy for players who'd been mortified and subjugated even before the reign of players'-association rep, über-asshole, and now ex-con Alan Eagleson, before the emancipation of salary disclosure, free agency, salary arbitration, and trading-card licensing control. Dowbiggin explains what happens when boys once treated like farm stock bound for the abattoir finally become--via NHL Players' Association executive director Bob Goodenow--educated and active in democracy.

There's no Canucks gossip here, but zealots should connect the dots between Dowbiggin's points and smaller local ones, and wise up: why does Turbo Todd Bertuzzi's new contract have more to do with Joe Thornton's deal than with line chum Markus Naslund's? How has current NHLPA president Trevor Linden been transformed from a skinny, grinning sniper from Medicine Hat into the next premier of our province?

Dowbiggin finished Moneyplayers earlier this year, just when Eagleson's old "good of the game" versus "good of the players" fallacy got more complex. The book's epilogue doesn't explain the Paul Kariya/Teemu Selanne (aka Sawyer/Finn) ship-jump or the carnivalesque playoffs that saw US$30-million-payroll teams topple $60-million ones. And he only hints that next summer's World Cup of Hockey--guaranteed to the players in their last CBA--will produce, deliberately, revenues to see players through a lockout. Although Dowbiggin also offers three intriguing models for a new CBA, there's too little analysis of such timely incongruities.

But so-called blue-collar fans, boohooing traditionalists craving more offence for their office pools, more chin music from the Swedes, and cheaper tickets and beer--those stoked to blame either greedy players or NHL head suit Gary Bettman if the game goes down--should read Moneyplayers, do the math, and think again.

The fastest game

Whew! As usual, there's a hockey book for everyone out there

The NHL version may be in trouble, but the legends are fore

If, as expected, the current NHL season is to be followed by a lengthy shutdown, what is a card-carrying fan supposed to do?

For one thing, he or she might stock up on some good hockey reads. There are plenty of new entries on that list and by the time the anticipated lockout arrives, no doubt there will be more. Even if the interruption doesn't materialize, reading about hockey remains one of the next-best things to playing it, watching it and talking it.

Unlike the game itself at the highest professional level, nothing could ever interrupt the flow of ink devoted to Canada's game. The writers never go on strike, for one thing. But the fact is, of course, that our sport has roots that extend far beyond the National Hockey League. As much as it dominates the overall picture, the average fan understands that the NHL is in the business of entertainment.

Pro sports, by their very nature, go through these cyclical shakedowns. Sometimes teams fall by the wayside. Sometimes entire leagues pass into the pages of history. But the games, in some form or another, go on.

Those who wish to understand why there are, once again, such dark days looming on hockey's economic horizon are advised to pick up Money Players (MacFarlane Walter & Ross, 312 pages, $34.99) by Bruce Dowbiggin, the Calgary-based writer and broadcaster. He's done a thorough pull-together of how the NHL has arrived at this latest crossroads - with the current collective bargaining agreement to expire in mid-September of next year.

Dowbiggin has specialized over recent years in analyzing the life, times and crimes of Alan Eagleson, a character who figures prominently in the chain of events leading to the most current ones. The Eagle was the head of the players' association during the lengthy era in which the owners more or less dictated the rules of the good, old economic hockey game.

But the average NHL player's salary this season is about $1.7 million (U.S.) No one feels a great solidarity with the players when it comes to any showdowns. But the owners hardly warrant sympathy either. As Dowbiggin eloquently and painstakingly points out, they have nobody to blame for their problems but themselves - unless, perhaps, the player agents who have consistently taken them to the cleaners.

Hockey is alive, if not particularly well, in some cities of the U.S. South that have no tradition in the sport but still built arenas and paid exorbitant expansion fees to a league that needed the money to maintain its over-the-top lifestyle. The costs, as always, get passed along down the line to the fans, who are being subjected to increasingly stultifying, defensive tactics, bred by teams determined somehow to qualify for the playoffs and the windfall payoffs they entail.

This does not make for particularly uplifting reading, and there's not much new in the Eagleson stuff. But Dowbiggin's presentation is bright. Money Players should be required reading for anyone who cares about the long-term future of Canada's game.

Agent Impact

Ron MacLean has the gift of gab. As host of TV’s Hockey Night in Canada, MacLean’s prized prose is usually delivered with polish and puns. By comparison then, his quote on the cover of the book, Money Players : How Hockey’s Greatest Stars Beat the NHL at its Own Game, appears dry and uninviting.

“An excellent look at the men being paid huge salaries to give us hockey,” reads the sell line on the latest release from author Bruce Dowbiggin, which examines the impact of escalating player salaries on the NHL. MacLean’s summary seems to state the obvious until you understand the “players” in the game are not just the guys on the ice. They also are GMs, owners and agents.

And it’s that last group, writes Dowbiggin, who are the smartest “players” at the table. He stops just short of calling owners and GMs incompetents, routinely outsmarted and out-negotiated by player agents.

“My inescapable conclusion is the owners have created this problem for themselves,” Dowbiggin says. “Because of easy expansion money and because (former NHL Players’ Association boss Alan) Eagleson had made it so easy for them for 25 years, they continued to spend money they didn’t have and put themselves in this particular bind.”

Dowbiggin goes further, citing repeated errors among GMs, many of whom are former players. Compare that, he writes, to the edge that agents educated in business and law hold over management. “(Take) a guy like Mike Gillis, who not only was an NHL player, but went to law school, articled in a big law firm, who’s done other things in his life and then returns to hockey,” Dowbiggin says.

“Compare his competencies up against Mike Milbury’s, for instance, who basically stayed in the hockey realm the whole time and now runs the (New York) Islanders.”

Not all the blame should go to GMs, says Dowbiggin, since the relationship between many team owners and their own GM is dysfunctional.

“Even though these (owners) make tons of money and have successful other businesses, they’re still intimidated by the hockey culture,” he says. “A lot of these guys, including Gary Bettman, are intimidated by their hockey people. What other industry allows middle management to run its business?” Dowbiggin expects the next collective bargaining agreement to come down to the wire. The current CBA expires next September. “My hope isSthey’re going to find a concept that can work,” he said. “If everyone keeps their powder dry and understands this is a process and the real crucial time will come in September of next year, then they have a chance to make a settlement.”

For more news and information, pick up The Hockey News today, or get it delivered to your home or office.

If the NHL doesn't restore the game's drama soon, fans might call for a lockout
By ROY MacGREGOR
Friday, November 7, 2003

I'm weakening.

After a quarter century of berating professional hockey for failing to get rid of fighting, I'm fast coming around to thinking that the bizarre rise in fisticuffs this season might be the best thing the game has going for itself.

The only way, perhaps, to make sure the fans aren't lying unconscious in their seats when the sweepers come in to take away the beer cups and popcorn bags.

There's not really much point in joining the widespread braying that is being directed lately at the "product" the National Hockey League has been delivering up so far in the 2003-2004 season. Many of us have been saying for years that the game has deteriorated to the point where dramatic action is required. What truly surprises those of us who have so long been dismissed by the hockey establishment is that everyone -- fans, players, executives -- now seems to be singing from the same sheet.

The game is desperately in trouble. It has been known for years that a financial crisis would be upon the NHL in 2004, when a lockout will surely occur if no labour solution is found. What was quite unexpected, however, was that a crisis of entertainment would strike first -- and may, in fact, prove to be the more serious of the two.

At the rate things are going this fall, fans may soon be calling for an early lockout.

Those who wish to know how screwed up the books are in pro hockey have only to turn to Bruce Dowbiggin's superb new Money Players: How Hockey's Greatest Stars Beat the NHL at Its Own Game. This year, it's mandatory reading for all of us who -- please understand -- do indeed hope for the best for the game.

Those who want to know how screwed up the game itself is, however, have only to pick up the morning papers and scan the box scores for the attendance figures. Wednesday's schedule, for example, featured Vancouver at Nashville (9,644 tickets sold for a rink that holds 17,113), San Jose Sharks at the defending-champion New Jersey Devils (11,627 seats out of 19,040), Los Angeles Kings at Florida Panthers (13,276 of 19,250) and Atlanta Thrashers at Buffalo Sabres (10,584 of 18,690 seats).

That works out to roughly 60 per cent capacity in a league that has traditionally bragged of playing to 90 per cent capacity.

Much can be made of the failure of NHL hockey to make it in non-traditional markets such as Nashville or South Florida, but much more must be made of the simple fact that the games have been so stunningly boring this year that many lifelong fans -- even in the most rabid northern markets -- are simply giving up.

It doesn't mean they don't love hockey; it means they can't find hockey.

Those who used to argue in favour of low-scoring games, saying they can be as exciting as a good pitchers' duel in baseball, now say nothing of the sort, realizing there is a profound difference between a 1-0 match featuring 30 shots a side and a 1-0 game with 11 shots by one team, perhaps a dozen by the other.

Those who still adore the Canadian game -- and there are millions of us -- can only look at the stick work, the constant interference, the stultifying coaching strategies, the Michelin Man goaltenders and the silly regulations that persist and scratch our collective heads.

If Ilya Kovalchuk, the 20-year-old wonder with the Atlanta Thrashers, can have 12 goals and 20 points in only 13 games, how good would he be if the game would only open up? How exciting would it be to see, once again, third periods where anything can happen?

Hockey is the only one of the big sports not to move to improve conditions for its stars. Basketball turns a blind eye to travelling, baseball creates the designated hitter (make of it what you will), football protects its quarterbacks, but hockey, only hockey, tries to bring the truly talented down to the level of the average.

That's why last spring's Stanley Cup final between the Devils and the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim was so bad only the play-by-play crew was still watching by the third period of Game 7.

That something is going to happen by September, 2004, is undeniable -- a labour deal or a lockout -- but a growing number believe something equally dramatic might have to happen on the artistic side.

One NHL executive -- himself once a player who would lift fans from their seats -- says "rebellion" may even be brewing among the truly talented. He thinks the truly talented are increasingly tuning out their hidebound, defensively obsessed coaches.

And the more success a Kovalchuk has, the more other creative types will want space to try out their own magic.

Think of it: a players' revolt.

If players are willing to fight for that, we'll all cheer them.

rmacgregor@globeandmail.ca

Money talks back
By DAN CARRUTHERS
The Reflector: Mount Royal College newspaper

On Sept. 15, 2004, the National Hockey League as we know it will cease to exist. In the conflict between the league and its players' association, there seems to be no end in sight. Neither side wants to give in to the other¹s demands, nor will they make any sacrifices to help improve the situation. The League¹s Collective Bargaining Agreement expires next September and there is little hope that the two sides will be able to resolve their differences prior to the deadline.

Acclaimed sports writer Bruce Dowbiggin lays out the case for each group, offering a fascinating view of the NHL through the eyes of player agents and owners in his latest book, Money Players: How Hockey¹s Greatest Stars Beat the NHL at its own Game.

Dowbiggin presents several case studies that chart how the NHL¹s overall player payroll went from $195.2 million in 1991-92 to $1.1 billion in just over ten years. It¹s a problem that has prompted the future Hall of Famer Brett Hull to speak out against the league¹s standards, saying that 75 per cent of players are overpaid. It¹s a statement echoed by team owners, who are handcuffed by agents to keep marquee players on their rosters. The players' association, however, refuses to accept a salary cap, a system that has helped make professional football competitive for all teams. "There should be a marketplace," explains NHLPA director Bob Goodenow. "The clubs and players should have the ability to decide values." How then, Dowbiggin asks, do you determine the worth of a player like Bobby Holik, who signed a five-year contract with the New York Rangers worth $45 million in the summer of 2002? By spending a hectic day with player agent Mike Gillis, who represents Holik, as well as superstars Pavel Bure and Tony Amonte. Dowbiggin provides an up-close and personal look at how business is conducted off the ice. The book also profiles financial issues regarding extravagant rookie contracts, a section reserved almost exclusively for Eric Lindros and Alexandre Daigle. Dowbiggin also discusses revenue sharing, an initiative the National Football League has embraced, to ensure that competition is not only healthy on the field but also in the economical sense. While the NFL distributes 74 per cent of its revenues, the NHL shares a mere 12 per cent.

With 30 teams in the league, there is an ever-growing disparity between the "haves" and the "have-nots", making it difficult for clubs in Pittsburgh, Buffalo, and Calgary just to break even. Encouraging financially healthy teams like Detroit and Colorado to spread their wealth has proven to be a difficult task, as team owners are more concerned with the success of their own organization than the sustenance of a healthy, competitive league. Allowing Goodenow and NHL commissioner Gary Bettman the opportunity to state their respective cases, Dowbiggin provides an unbiased view of the situation.

It is evident throughout the book that the author is a true fan who actually cares about the current state of the league. Intelligent suggestions are given to improve upon the existing CBA but it is clear to the reader that these improvements will be easier said than done, considering the lack of compromise between the two sides.

Hockey stars v. owners: Fans lose this game
By JEFFREY SIMPSON
Wednesday, October 29, 2003

Calgary — Before the last National Hockey League season, 91 players made more than $3-million, and 346 earned at least $1-million. Players' salaries skyrocketed sevenfold in a decade. No wonder commissioner Gary Bettman bemoans the economics of hockey.

Mr. Bettman is right. He and the NHL owners, however, are largely to blame for hockey's economic woes, according to Calgary Herald columnist Bruce Dowbiggin whose book, Money Players, should be mandatory reading for serious hockey fans. It will be, alas, a depressing read.

Barring a miracle, a strike or lockout will wipe out much or all of the 2004-2005 season. The current collective bargaining agreement ends in mid-September, 2004. Owners and players have dug in for the mother of all labour battles. The owners have levied a tithe on themselves to prepare for the lost season; the players have also assessed themselves and managed to amass millions of dollars, tax-free, through the sale of hockey cards, something Revenue Canada has permitted.

Mr. Dowbiggin has been writing intelligently and lucidly about hockey for a long time. Money Players displays both his knowledge and clear writing. It's the best book on hockey since Roy MacGregor's Road Games in 1994.

How things have changed since Mr. MacGregor's book. Salaries were just starting their explosion. The players had finally ridded themselves of the crooked and supine leader, Alan Eagleson. Four expansion teams had been added, putting millions of dollars into owners' pockets. New arenas were sprouting, many of them publicly subsidized in the supposedly free-enterprise United States.

The seeds of today's problems were sowed in those years. The subsidized buildings and expansion fees produced new revenues for owners alright, but in their rush to compete, they heaped wildly unjustified salaries on players.

It only took a handful of owners to spoil the economics for everyone else. Once rich/stupid owners bid up the cost of labour, arbitrators had new standards by which to drive up other salaries. As Mr. Dowbiggin shows, the NHL Players' Association scheduled its best cases first in the annual arbitration sweepstakes, thereby setting ever-higher yearly markers.

The players captured most of the "rent," as economists would call it, from all this free money the owners' found. The owners were incapable of restraining themselves, in part because players can form an association, but the owners cannot set collective pay policies lest they be accused of collusion.

Ordinary fans, of course, were the big losers. Ticket prices soared beyond the reach of all but the rich or the supremely dedicated. It's a recipe for turning off the next generation of fans, a dangerous prospect for a league more dependent on revenues from tickets than the other major professional leagues.

Hockey degenerated into defensive snoozefests, full of endless icings, clutching, grabbing, interference and generally boring play. Coaches, afraid of being fired, resorted to this strategy to keep their jobs. The Stanley Cup finals last year epitomized stifling defence. Terrible television ratings told the story. In reply, the league took the audacious step of measuring the goalies' equipment.

Every other league has addressed problems of dull play. Not the NHL, professional sports' most hidebound league, with no effective revenue-sharing, an aversion to change, and a labour-management mentality that makes Canadian Auto Workers president Buzz Hargrove and the president of General Motors seem like boon companions.

The NHL claims to have lost $300-million last year, a figure the players' association disputes. Mr. Dowbiggin reports, however, that a fan skeptical of the losses reported by the Los Angeles Kings got total access to the King's books. The trained accountant wound up sustaining the Kings' argument.

Many NHL teams have serious attendance problems. Thousands of empty seats regularly stare down at the players. The franchises with problems systemically pad their publicly announced attendance figures.

Mr. Dowbiggin is charitable to a fault with the agents, some of whom he greatly admires. His broad sympathies lie with the players, if for no other reason than they have been less stupid than the owners, although no less greedy. Lost in his account is much about poor old Joe Fan.

The owners want "cost certainty" through some kind of salary cap. This means they seek an agreement that imposes a discipline they cannot impose on themselves. They know the next U.S. television contract will be a bummer, because ratings are so bad. The value of their franchises has plummeted in many markets. The players, of course, want few adjustments to the status quo so their staggering gains can be protected. The union wants a free market; the owners a form of socialism.

Read Mr. Dowbiggin's book. Understand what's happening to Canada's national game. Then weep.