NEW YORK — The latest round of NHL labor talks ended with the two sides not even getting into the same room with each other.
The players’ association and league negotiators met separately Wednesday with federal mediators in suburban New Jersey, holding discussions that didn’t immediately appear to have moved the sides any closer to a deal to save the hockey season.
There was hope going into Wednesday that negotiations could get back on track to the point they were last Thursday before talks fell apart.
When the NHL agreed last week to increase its make-whole offer of deferred payments from $211 million to $300 million it was part of a proposed package that required the union to agree on three nonnegotiable points. Instead, the players’ association accepted the raise in funds, but then made counterproposals on the issues the league stated had no wiggle room.
NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman then said that the offer was being pulled from the table. However, mediators informed the union on Wednesday that the proposal was still available, but it carried a take-it-or-leave it ultimatum.
“It wasn’t much of a decision,” said Brendan Morrison, one of 13 players to attend Wednesday’s talks. “I thought the gap would be closed much quicker, but it hasn’t come to fruition yet, so we have to keep working.”
All games through Dec. 30 have been canceled, about 43 percent of the season, along with the New Year’s Day Winter Classic, and the All-Star game.
No new meetings have been scheduled.
Mediators rejoined the process Wednesday, at the request of the players’ association, after they were unable to move the sides any closer to a deal during two days of talks last month.
Whether they will stay involved beyond Wednesday remains to be seen.
“We did several different caucus meeting rooms, and really there’s nothing new to report,” NHL deputy commissioner Bill Daly said Wednesday, the 88th day of the league’s lockout. “We don’t have a conclusion to the process.”
The union was expected to get back in touch with federal mediator Scot L. Beckenbaugh on Wednesday night, and he was then supposed to reach out to the NHL.
After three straight days of talks between the sides ended last Thursday, union executive director Donald Fehr began the first of his two news conferences by proclaiming he believed the sides had agreements on such issues as actual dollars, and then returned moments later to reveal the NHL rejected everything his side offered.
The 2004-05 season was lost completely before the players’ association accepted a deal that included a salary cap for the first time. While no major philosophical issues such as that exist in these negotiations, the sides still don’t appear to be ready to come to an agreement.
“I never thought the issues were as big as they were back in 04-05,” Morrison said Wednesday. “Apparently, I was wrong.”
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