Updated: 9:50 p.m.
There was a lot of talking regarding the NHL lockout in New York today. Unfortunately, the league and NHLPA were talking with a mediator and not each other.
Federal mediator Scot Beckenbaugh went back and forth between the NHL (at its offices) and the NHLPA (at a nearby hotel) for more than 13 hours on Friday. It was another day of frustration in a lockout full of them, and the second consecutive day that the league and NHLPA havent gotten together for true negotiations.
Perhaps each side was able to get things accomplished with the mediator that they havent seemed to solve in the room together. More than a half a days worth of talking has to result in something, right? Whatever the case may be, it will continue; the league announced to New York reporters at 10:45 p.m. ET that mediation will continue Saturday morning at 10:30 a.m. ET.
The two sides seemed to be building goodwill and closing in on a deal when they talked for several hours Wednesday nightearly Thursday morning. But within a day, all that positivity went poof. The New York Posts Larry Brooks wrote that players were angry when commissioner Gary Bettman said some general managers, regretting those massive contracts they once OKed, would like the chance dismantle teams to get down to the proposed 60 million cap in 2013-14.
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So now the NHLPA is once again voting to once again give its executive board the power to file a disclaimer of interest. The players association had the chance to exercise that option at 11:59 p.m. (ET) on Wednesday, but kept talking with the league instead. Now theyre considering it again; voting is expected to end early Saturday evening.
NHL
Today is Day 110 of the lockout. If there is going to be a season beginning Jan. 19, there will have to be an agreement made within the next week.