Why the NHL Fined the Dallas Stars $100,000 for an Optional Practice on December 26
Update at 4:10 CST: Here’s the official release from the NHL confirming the Stars’ were fined $100,000 for violating the Collective Bargaining Agreement:
NEW YORK (Dec. 30, 2024) – The National Hockey League announced today that it has fined the Dallas Stars’ organization $100,000 for the team’s practice on Dec. 26, 2024. This team activity was in violation of Article 16.5(b) of the Collective Bargaining Agreement between the NHL and the NHL Players’ Association.
The fine money goes to the NHL Foundation.
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As we broke a couple of days ago here at Stars Thoughts, Pete DeBoer and the Stars held an optional practice on December 26 that violated the Collective Bargaining Agreement between the NHL and NHLPA.
The relevant portion of the CBA is Section 16.5(b), part of which states that (b) December 24, Christmas Day, and December 26 shall be off-days for all purposes, including travel, and no Club may request a Player’s consent to practice on such days for any reason
While DeBoer later clarified that the “optional” was “voluntary ice,” that doesn’t appear to have made any difference to the league. DeBoer confirmed today, December 30, that he is aware the team will be fined for holding the practice, but did not have any comment beyond that. This comes on the heels of additional reports by Elliotte Friedman that there was a coach on the ice with the players on Boxing Day, which may have made the difference between the “grey area” of players skating by themselves and the clear violation that incurred the fine with at least one coach being present on the ice.
Some questions I’ve gotten about this issue are why the team is fined if it was an “optional” practice. And that’s where I wanted to parse DeBoer’s words to add a bit more clarity on why this practice was a problem, and why the NHL is taking it so seriously.
During morning skate on Friday, December 27, before the game against Minnesota, DeBoer said this (emphasis mine): “I was at the rink yesterday—we had an optional—and of course the young guys all show up for the optionals, which they’re supposed to do.”
I think the key words there are “we had” and “supposed to do.” DeBoer’s usage of first-person plural is pretty unequivocal, and even his walking it back to rephrase it as “optional, yeah, voluntary ice” when asked about it the next day doesn’t change that. It was the team’s usual practice sheet, and he laughingly stated that the same policy about its not being optional for young players applied in the same way it does to all optional practices (such as the one today in Frisco, in which Mavrik Bourque, Logan Stankoven, Oskar Bäck, Justin Hyrckowianand Lian Bichsel are all skating as I write this). In other words, if this was “voluntary,” it was only that in a technical sense, not in practice (so to speak).
I also feel confident reporting, based on what I’ve heard, that this was more than just a skate-around for anyone who felt like getting in some work. In order words, this wasn’t just players popping on and off the ice at their leisure, but rather being expected to report for the “optional” at a specific time, during which the head coach was present, which makes a big difference.
Friedman also reported (along with Mike Russo and Joe Smith of The Athletic) that a memo went out to all GMs before Christmas reminding them that just providing ice time would be a violation of the agreement, as you can read in this except from Russo and Smith’s piece:
The question, then, is why this rule exists. Players like Jason Robertson try to skate every day during the season, and if some of them were staying in town anyway, what’s the big deal about just letting them skate for an hour to work off their Christmas dinner?
Firstly, it all goes back to the fact that this is a negotiated break—time off—for the players. It’s in the CBA, and the NHL obviously wants to make sure they aren’t seen as promoting abuse of their workers, particularly with the next CBA already being quietly discussed before talks kick into high gear in 2025. Even the perception of forcing players to work during their vacation is one the league wants to avoid, and certainly one that the Players’ Association would fight tooth and nail against. If even one player is “expected” to get said work in, then the other players immediately have to have a very good reason not to do the same, lest they risk being seen as lazy. That’s not fair, but it’s a mindset that’s pretty baked into the fabric of the NHL.
The other thing to consider with that point is that, if the players were expected to be there, then some athletic support staff likely was as well, including trainers and equipment folks who already work exceptionally long hours, and who do not have the same leverage as players when it comes to their time off.
Secondly, Friedman also mentioned in the latest 32 Thoughts podcast that the last time the players considered the idea of allowing for travel on Boxing Day just to make logistics simpler for the first game out of the break, they overwhelmingly voted against it. Time off during the season is precious, and with most players having family in town, the last thing they would want is the knowledge that there is a practice they “should” attend, particularly if they are young players, as DeBoer mentioned on Friday. In hockey, after all, if you’re not early, you’re late. And optionals are only optional if you can afford the negative repercussions of appearing not to care about getting some extra work in.
Finally, there’s the embarrassment to be reckoned with for everyone concerned. For the Stars, it’s not a good look for the organization to even appear to have pressured younger players (or any players) to show up to work during what was contractually specified as time off. For the NHL, it’s got to be insulting that despite sending an explicit memo warning teams against doing things like this, the Stars went ahead and did so anyway. And for the Minnesota Wild, they had to feel (as Russo and Smith reported) like they got a bit short-changed, as they had to travel at 7am out of Minnesota to play in Dallas that night rather that risking disciplinary action from the NHL for traveling the day before, as Toronto did in 2022.
How this will all shake out for DeBoer and the Stars remains to be seen. Ideally, once the NHL makes its statement about the impending fine, the Stars organization would issue a transparent statement of their own explaining where the breakdown happened and how they will avoid any similar mistakes in the future, but they may just refer the media to the NHL’s (probably terse) statement.
Yes, the players are all very well-paid, and they’re all living the dream that 99% of hockey players never do. But it’s the principle of the thing that matters here, and perhaps always. Maybe other teams are doing the same thing, and their head coaches just didn’t blow their cover, and their own players abided by the code of the room by not griping about being forced to practice on a holiday. If so, that’s even more reason for the league and the Stars to make a strong statement here in order to warn off other teams who might have gotten away with similar practices in the past.
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Practice Update from December 30
On Monday afternoon, DeBoer also gave a couple of injury updates. First, he said that Colin Blackwell is “gonna be fine” after getting elbowed in the face by Tyler Bertuzzi last night in Chicago. He also said that Mason Marchment is probably a few weeks away, although they still haven’t gotten a definite timeline with the swelling still obscuring things (the swelling being in Marchment’s face, I feel safe assuming).
DeBoer compared Marchment’s timeline to Matt Dumba’s, which has been “a few weeks” of recovery. With Dumba, DeBoer said the defenseman is “getting close,” and the defenseman was in the ice for the optional practice today, skating with a full face shield, or “fishbowl” on his helmet. Dumba last played against Calgary in the Stars’ 6-2 victory on December 8.
Notably, DeBoer said that Dumba’s injury did not happen in-game, and my sense right now is that the circumstances of Dumba’s head injury aren’t something anybody has an appetite to reveal—not that this will decrease speculation by fans, of course. But to Dumba’s credit, he has continued to be his normal, upbeat self around the rink. Hockey players always tend to feel better when they’re back on the ice with their teammates, after all. (Unless it’s an off day.)