I’m often asked what the GMHL is all about. By the many friends I have in traditional hockey situations, by strangers who e-mail and phone me, and by prospective owners and coaches. I can’t go into a rink or a coffee shop in my area without answering this question. Again and again.
Which is all to the good. Shows people are interested. Curious. And, often, dissatisfied. The surprising thing is that it is most often the coaches, or ex-coaches, who are most dissatisfied. Not with the new league, but with the old ones. Words like p0litics, favoritism, stupidity, cronyism, and greedy sprinkle their conversations. These ex-fathers, ex-coaches, and those still currently involved, describe situations too painful to think real. And too real for them to hide the pain they have often been through.
Where did it all go wrong for them? In most cases, lack of choices was a part of the picture. Example: There is only room for two goalies on a team, so the third good one must go back to house league. Can’t go to the next town, where they are short of goalies. Or up to the next level. No flexibility for that. No choice. Just go back to one game and maybe one practice a week, the rep team only carries two goalies. Typical situation in smaller towns. I estimate this exact scenario plays out a hundred times a year in Ontario, and maybe much more.
So they won’t let kids migrate. Through Atom and Peewee, Bantam and Midget, hundreds of young players with enough talent do not receive the development promises made by their leagues and hockey overseers. In the smallest towns, in big-city private leagues, in community and church and school leagues, there is only room on each team for so many players. Rep hockey is supposed to be about development to the next level. Yet it too is subject to this numbers pressure.
Why then, when these players become older, are they prevented by the Canadian Development Model, from moving away from their restrictive numbers situations? These recent changes in age eligibility for Junior play closed the door for even more players to find a team that could use them.
The GMHL was full of these boys this year. A, AA and AAA players who wanted more but could not get it in their home town sanctioned hockey teams found a home in the greater Metro Hockey League. Many were within a few miles of their former rinks, some were much further away. Most were more challenged, saw much more ice time, played faster, harder, smarter hockey. But not all.
Hmmm. Gotta be more to this than just a few kids who would have been held back in Midget. They’re just the tip of the iceburg.
When Hockey Canada decided to limit movement away from Midget they said it was to keep the best young talents at home, where they belonged, to save midget hockey, to keep them out of the grasping hands of unscrupulous Junior owners who would sign them and sit them, investments for future trade and sale.
Their own Sanctioned Junior owners, by the way. And save Midget hockey? Their ‘development league’ hockey? But if a boy is good enough to make a Junior team, doesn’t that free up a rare spot for another player who does need that level of development? Oh yes, and all in the same year they begin testing the waters about a new ‘super midget’ league for the ‘most gifted, elite players’. A super midget league that would play outside of the usual midget schedules. Hmmm again . . . so that isn’t taking them away from home? Playing in big cities all across the province, at something in the order of $ 15,000.00 a year (their figures) is ‘saving’ home town midget hockey? Oh yeah, forgot to mention it, didn’t they, but this super midget league would be privately owned. Not for profit on the surface, just that everything goes through a management situation that milks the cash flow first.
Yes, folks, Hockey Canada put hundreds of good midget players all accross Canada on the shelf to create a series of private, very expensive, elite leagues. Deny it? Nope. They just say I don’t have my facts straight. They say it hasn’t happened yet, that the new elite cash-trap hasn’t been formed yet. For sure it hasn’t in Ontario. If only because there is a lot of screaming going on in the hallowed halls of the hockey barons . . .screaming by those who want in. By those who smell the rat for what it is. And by those who will have to pay twice as much if their boy is good enough because they will fear that if he doesn’t join he’ll never reach his potential.
Fear has ruled the lives of these gifted boys’ parents all their playing years. What if the coach doesn’t pick him this year? What if he has a bad month? What if he is a bit too independent when told to do something he doesn’t want to do? What ifs gnaw at Mom and Dad as they watch their young son learning to become independent in the rest of his life, but not at the rink, not in the dressing room, and never on the ice. Team is one thing. Blind obedience to a coach is something else altogether. And some of these boys have found their lives turned upside down because they were tired of being screamed at, tired of being told to fight, tired of being sat, tired of never being able to speak their minds.
We have quite a few of these boys in the GMHL now. They are often the leaders, the ones who know right from wrong, the ones who found the courage to say no. And the courage to change.
Where are we going with all this? I’m saying the GMHL is the alternative. It is the choice. It is the way out, and the way up.
But only if we coach what we preach. The league has the right plan. It is another way to play the game. More collegiate, more about development, more about being the best you can be at this game. And much of its strength as a league came from kids not having choces in the other leagues. Things are different here. Most of the time.
Last year I watched several coaches go to two lines when they wanted to win a game. Too often. Last year I watched a coach manhandle a player for not following orders about taking out an opposing player. Last year I watched boys who were signed be quietly dropped from rosters. Last year I watched late signings of big, tough players, nearly all of whom were particularly good at fighting. Last year I saw fear creeping onto the faces of some parents. In the GMHL.
Sure, we saw all the good things. But we were not above slipping back. The league needs to be more vigilant, have more teeth to control coaches and owners who drift from the avowed principles they signed into. I like where the GMHL is going. As long as it is going forward. We did enough backslipping last year.
Are we up to the challenge? We have to be, if we as owners, players, and fans are going anywhere at all.
Stu
In the arenas I have been hearing all the rumours flying about the GMHL. Some of them interesting, others utterly stupid. The most common rumour I hear is that the GMHL is in some way a goon league. Well I hate to burst the bubble of anybody who thinks this is true…BUT. The results are in, the Penalty Minutes per Game would tend to dismiss such a rumour. I recently obtained raw information for analysis. I compiled the total league penalties in minutes for the GMHL and OPJHL.
Greater Metro Junior Hockey League News 