Card Games and the Dew-wars

The Hockey Canada electronic carding fiasco  has reared it's ugly head again this year. The electronic system allows GM's to sign a player without the player knowing anything about it and this opens up the door to corruption.

In the old days a player had to actually sign his player card, so he always knew if he was carded. That didn't mean it was perfect, most GM's went at least to kindergarten so they knew what erasers were used for - report cards and player cards.

Anyway, again this year we we are hearing stories about  players who are unknowingly signed then have their rights  sold to another team.

And we're hearing about players who signed the ridiculous commitment letters in April and May only to find out that they have to get released to play at the next level because they were signed months later without being notified. As predicted in an older post here. We will remind all the young players of this scam again in the Spring.

This is all positive stuff designed to foster Hockey Canada's Mission Statement "Lead,Develop, and Promote Positive Hockey Experiences" ... just like the 30 day suspension Jr A teams can levy against players who get traded across the country then refuse to report does. 

HOCKEY CANADA FIX YOUR CARDING SYSTEM -make the players sign the cards again !!!

In other news...

The KIJHL voted not to expand to Quesnel and Williams Lake. The main push for expansion north was Kamloops GM Barry Dewar. 

He didn't get expansion and he can't move there under KIJHL rules so a pissed off Dewar is considering selling his team to Kamloops Minor Hockey.  That is very interesting and could even  give the KIJHL another couple of years at 20 teams.But expansion will happen or else...

In a wide ranging  interview by Marty Hastings (that you can read here)  on the "Kamloops This Week" website Dewar let it be known that he still wants expansion and wants it so badly that he even tried but failed to form his own league with several defecting KIJHL teams in tow. 

After the expansion was turned down Dewar brought in  Matt Kolle (he was the guy heading up Quesnel's expansion bid)  as an assistant GM, to sort of desensitize the other KIJHL Governors and get them used to having him around... Because it really is just a matter of time, they will either join or start their new league.

Read the interview, there are a whole host of questions to be asked, here are just a few.

1/ What business man wants to water down his product ? Maybe he's an environmentalist, the northern player pipeline will now stop at Williams Lake and Quesnel, we won't have to worry here in the south. 

3/ Or does the new league get created just to keep the franchise fee split between 10 instead of 20 teams.

3/He want's a Commissioner to run roughshod over the league like in the BCHL... there will be derisive howls of laughter from this corner when everyone realizes that somewhere around 70 thousand plus is the starting price for a Commissioner then add on  a salary for the secretary as well, not the paltry sum they get away with paying the President and secretary now ... the majority of owners don't even want crossovers because they cost to much. Just wait. 

4/ His new league didn't include the teams from the East and West Kootenays... they have different business models -translation, private vs community owned teams.Good bye small town hockey ?

Dewar is a good hockey man who has run a competitive team that has graduated a ton of players to the next level. He's just frustrated the people of Kamloops don't come out to the games and knows the two expansion teams will be powerful money makers.

He also makes a good point about the Minor Hockey deal going sideways when someday a new president gets elected because he wants a team for his kid. It happens all the time.

Not much more to say on this, we've known all this for a while now, but it was never really out there, but now that it is we're telling you about it.