from Larry Brooks of the New York Post,

Maybe this will be the trigger that engages, educates and mobilizes the NHLPA membership.

Maybe Sixth Avenue’s latest reach into the players’ pockets with its attempt to coerce the union into extending the CBA by three years in exchange for authorization to compete in the 2018 Olympic Games will unify a Players Association that has been demoralized since enemies within undermined Bob Goodenow’s righteous fight against imposition of a hard cap through Owners’ Lockout II that claimed the 2004-05 season.

Out of nowhere — or perhaps, more accurately, out of Gary Bettman and the Board of Governors’ playbook — came the demand last week of linkage between the CBA and the Olympics. It was a classic hardball maneuver from the league that previously cast its reluctance (if not downright opposition) to commit to South Korea, over the IOC’s refusal to cover the cost of the players’ insurance and travel to the Games as it had done previously.

But when International Ice Hockey Federation chairman Rene Fassel on Wednesday informed Bettman that his organization would find the necessary $10 million to cover the cost, the league pulled its bait-and-switch. Suddenly, that wasn’t good enough.

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