By GEORGE BARR

NHL club owners wage cold war
‘tgainst struggling Players’ Ass'n

TORONTO

As usual, the National Hockey League season has begun with a bang. However, so

fe Most of the fireworkers have been off the ice.

For the past several weeks the club

/*Wners have been waging a cold war against the newly-formed Players’ Association in the
Ports pages of the daily papets.

b 0M all the fuss being made
Y Some of the NHL brass, par-
Be atly those from the Tor-
a ® and Detroit clubs, one
. et the impression that
‘ € Players were making
Xorbitant and unfair demands.
ttually, no concrete proposals
atlg been presented by Asso-
“8tion leader Ted Lindsay.
: Comparisons (unfavorable
nes) have been made between
the Present pension plan and
Ms ne won by the Baseball
f Yers’ Association, to which
i team owners, as well as the
‘thallers, contribute. It was
Sh Pointed out that in base-
aie the fund gets a healthy
a of all TV and radio money
tay, certain well-known
°r blade concern contrib-
*S each year.
that is therefore not surprising
coh the baseball players can
i &ct a pension of $175 a
ae for life, after only 10
|, "Sin the major leagues —
With an annual contribu-
of only $308 by them.
A the national Hockey Lea-
. the’ Only the players pay into
“Ale fund. And although the
ty Star game receipts are in-
ch ed; a 10-year man is only
tyre for slightly more than
th Per month. We can’t blame
ut Sys for insisting that the
_ Jation be reviewed.
® doubt there are other

| Doj

‘ae that the players would
© discuss with their em-
ts. But the question now

Yoye

| ‘ho, D°Wn at the bottom of the pile in ¢
1 dropping their opener 2-0 to Seattle Americans.
°N Vancouver Canucks, who are favored to take the WHL cup.

digg

Ie
m they’) never be headed.

has become one of principle.
As Doug Harvey, vice-presi-
dent of the Association, ex-
claimed at the All-Star dinner,
“They’re treating us like child-
reniess

Of course, the owners’ at-
titude iis not childish at all —

hardly. In our opinion, and des-
pite Ted Lindsay’s promise that
the players would never strike,
unless some of the club bosses
smarten up and begin to live
with the times, they’re liable
to develop some severe labor
pains.

Rocket Richard at 36
still tops in NHL

Dr. Flu Manchu is cu:ting a wide swath across Canada
these days, putting hockey players, footballers and other
musclemen to bed and wrecking some’ amateur and professional

schedules.

But nothing stops Maurice (Rocket) Richard, who

at 36 defies flu bugs as blithely as he ignores Father Time,

and goes gayly on his way set-
ting new National Hockey
League records.

Last Saturday night Rich-
ard scored his 500th goal, slap-
ping a quick one past goalie
Glen Hall of Chicago Black
Hawks. The 14,405 fans in
Montreal’s Forum went wild.

Rocket Richard, the oldest
player in the NHL, is still one
of the most valuable. That’s
probably an understatement.
Without Richard the Cana-
diens are a good hockey team.
With him they are almost sure
bets.to win another NHL title,
and probably capture the Stan-
Tey Cup.

Detroit Red Wings, peren-
nial rivals; have weakened
their line-ups by trading sev-

Western Hockey League are Vi toria Cougars,
“Best team in years” is the ver-

eral players to Chicago Bla¢k
Hawks. At the same time Bos-
ton Bruins’ show — greater
strength than last year, and
may well finish in second
spot, ahead of Hawks and
Wings.

Where does that leave New
York Rangers and Toronto
Maple Leafs. Down in the
cellar, that’s where. It would
be a “errific upset if either
aggregation climbed higher
than fourth.

“Richard is even more im-
portant to Canadiens than
Jackie Parker is to the Eski-
mos,” a fan said this week.
“The Rocket adds that spark
that makes all the difference
when the chips are down.”

But there is a long

Son ahead, and anything can happen. Some fans are betting tha! when Canucks take the

Ancient Archie Moore, the world lightheavyweight cham-

pion, will show his wares soon in Vancouver.

At least he’s

signed a contract, but in the past Archie has had a habit of
failing to show up. This is the second time he’s promised to

fight here.

Gert Whgte's

~SPORTLIGHT

AN YOU imagine Germans
taking up cricket as a na-

tional sport? Neither can
Thomas Hughes, a_ sports
writer for theLondon Daily
Worker, who found this note
from a Miss Hanna Weiss, in
Leipzig, East Germany on his
desk one morning:

“I am a reader of your paper.
Please explain to me the rules
of the English national game,
cricket, and if possible add
some snapshots of it. I should
like to teaeh it to my students.”

Cricket expert Hughes con-
fessed he once tried to explain
the game to a Frenchman, but
he got so muddled up with silly
mid-ons, offs and silly points,
not forgetting “bowling maid-
ens over,” as he insisted on
putting it, that “I left him to
form his own conclusions.”

The -point which really
struck Hughes in the letter was
the lady wanting to teach the
game to her students.

“Several times I have been to
Germany, and to Leipzig, but
never have I found a German
remotely interested in the
game. Indeed, I have never
feund one who had~ heard
about it.

“And now this. Does it méan
that at last the British mon-

opoly of this sport is to be
broken — and by a woman of
all people? What a great pity
the season is not in full swing.

“How I would learly love to
take the letter and show it to
the Rip Van Winkles at Lord’s
and elsewhere. Albeit they
would soon be wide awake, and
calling for cannons and volun-
teers.

“The one question I must ask
Miss Weiss is, why cricket, and
where did she hear about it? It
is quite widely known that
Hollywood has a team — Boris
Karloff is the demon bowler;
that in islands in mid-ocean
where Englishmen are there is
generally a cricket team. But
Germany!

“I can just hear the ‘Mein
Gott, was ist das?” rising to
a crescendo as Miss Weiss leads
her students on to the green
fields of Leipzig’s magnificent
Hall of Sport.”

nm xt at

Postscript to George Barr’s
story on the National Hockey
League moguls warring against
the players:

The Players’ Association filed
a $3,000,000 antitrust suit
against the six NHL clubs in
New York last week, and asked
the court to void the standard
player contract.

October 25, 1957 — PACIFIC TRIBUNE—PAGE ll

a