From left to right: IIHF President Luc Tarif, NHLPA executive director Marty Walsh and NHL commissioner Gary Bettman speak with media on Feb. 2 at the Scotiabank Arena in Toronto.Bruce Bennett/Getty Images
In the early fall of 2022, Calgary Flames player Dillon Dubé was asked in training camp about the sexual-assault allegation that had roiled Hockey Canada over that summer. Mr. Dubé had been on the 2018 national junior team.
“Since the beginning, I guess, I’ve co-operated in any way possible. I will continue to do that,” Mr. Dubé said. “I wish I could share more. But that’s all I can share at this point.”
Had police been in contact with him?
“I would love to be transparent … I wish I could tell.”
In person and watching it on screen, most people probably nodded along. Who would say such a thing if it weren’t the case?
Mr. Dubé now stands as one of the five players facing charges in the 2018 incident.
The people in charge of the NHL applied trade-deadline rules to the investigations – If you don’t say anything, reporters don’t have anything to write.
Rather than moral reckonings, the NHL gave us public-marketing solutions. In PR terms, it was a near miss.
Now, with the all-star weekend going on in Toronto where most of the big voices in hockey coverage happen to live, it’s a heat-seeking torpedo. It’s turned back around and is looking for people to target-lock. Based on the way things work in big-time hockey, it won’t find any.
On Friday, during his habitual all-star-break address, NHL commissioner Gary Bettman did a more assured version of what Mr. Dubé had attempted.
His goals were myriad – to protect the shield, to disavow the accused, to hurry the conversation along and to say absolutely nothing.
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After having had two years to consider it, Mr. Bettman laid out the league’s legal position – “Who? Us?”
Sure, it has been doing its own investigation. And yes, it has talked to most of the main players, including every member of the 2018 national junior team. And sure, it’s been completed for months (which is new news). But no point in releasing it now that the cops have taken over.
“It would be inappropriate to provide further comment on the matter,” was how Mr. Bettman put it.
And that, as they say, was that. A man who had been forthcoming only minutes earlier with his opinions on arena construction in northern Italy began to draw strange blanks when it comes to one of the biggest scandals in modern hockey history. If you didn’t know better, you’d almost think the NHL planned it this way.
As for the accused players, well, Mr. Bettman doesn’t know these guys, whoever they are. And if he did, he never liked them. He repeatedly referred to the accused as “free agents,” though they are nothing of the sort. In another instance, they were “these players that we inherited.” By next week, they may be photoshopped out of team photos going back to minor midget.
If the accused thought they would be afforded some protection by their status as pro hockey players, Mr. Bettman was anxious to disabuse them. Everything he said was calculated to let them know they are alone and adrift and however this turns out, there is no finding their way back to the NHL.
As for that investigation, it will be released some time after the criminal case concludes. So two or three or infinity years from now. And lemme guess – it will reach a similar conclusion as the court?
This is a story of multiple failures on various levels for all sorts of faults, not all of which are illegal.
On Friday, it became clear that one of them – the NHL’s ethical and practical responsibility in this – will go unaddressed. Even the possibility of a conversation is off the table.
The moment to do so has passed. Around the time Bettman & Co. were announcing the NHL will return to the Olympics – what fortuitous timing! – it was becoming a speck on the horizon.
Though no one in hockey can talk about the game without repeating the word “culture” like a verbal tic, this incident apparently does not qualify for consideration. Despite all the disturbing things we’ve heard over the past two years, the NHL would like us to believe that the culture of hockey is fine. No need to talk about it. Just trust us.
Or, as Mr. Bettman put it, perhaps hinting at more than he’d intended – “This is not typical of NHL players.”
What a resounding endorsement.
This will become one of those stories that everyone talks about, but no one does anything about. I’ll buy that people think their pastimes and their values are in lockstep when they stop coming to games. So, never.
Most of us are unapologetic about that disconnect. Yeah, sure, I don’t like people who beat up their wives, but someone’s got to man the power play. So, you know.
The key is taking a cue from the people who run hockey – never speak of it, and it’s never a problem.
What might have been a redefining moment for the NHL becomes repurposed content instead. The cost is embarrassment, and the league is too shameless to care. Just wait’ll you see what it has planned for the next World Cup. It’ll knock your socks off.
By 2:30 p.m. ET, we had already returned to “we have to respect an ongoing court process.” Turn off the alarms. The contagion is being contained. The cleansing of the NHL’s conscience is happening in Toronto right now, this weekend, in real time. By Monday, it will be fine.
In the end, a few bodies go overboard and the next phase of standard-operating procedure begins.
First, PSAs to be broadcast as in-game entertainment. Maybe a badge on a jersey. Remember to say the word “change” a lot.
If and when cornered by someone in the media who doesn’t get how this is supposed to work, shake your head and appear mournful. It’s all awful. Just unimaginable. As a representative of the league, you wish you could say more. But, obviously, that’s all you can share at this point.