‘I wear my unionism with a badge of honor.’ New NHLPA head Marty Walsh talks salary cap, World Cup, Pride and more

Credit: Marty Walsh (© Columbus Dispatch-USA TODAY NETW)

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TORONTO – As he put affectionally put it, two lifelong passions merged for former U.S. Labor Secretary Marty Walsh Thursday as he held his first press conference since being named executive director of the NHL Players’ Association in February.

The first passion: unionism through and through, something he was born into growing up in Boston as the son of Irish immigrants, sitting at the dinner table learning from his father, a laborer, about the importance of representation. He carried that mentality with him into his political career. And even when he was criticized for being “too close” to organized labor, he explained Thursday, “I wore my unionism with a badge of honor.”

Walsh, 55, was mayor of Boston from 2014 through 2021 and left his position to join U.S. President Joe Biden’s cabinet as Labor Secretary in 2021. Under Biden, Walsh oversaw regulations to protect the rights of more than 150 million workers nationwide. He had previously been president of the Laborers’ International Union of North America and was head of the Building Construction and Trades Council in Boston.

Walsh’s second passion: hockey, of course. He grew up a diehard Boston Bruins fan, cheering for the likes of Gerry Cheevers and Terry O’Reilly. One of his most meaningful childhood memories, as he reminded media Thursday, came in 1975 when he was battling Burkitt’s lymphoma, a form of cancer, at seven years old. Bobby Orr, on crutches after having knee surgery, visited Walsh at the Boston Children’s Hospital. Walsh was a Bruins season ticket holder from the late 1980s through the mid 1990s to boot.

So it was not remotely hyperbolic for Walsh to claim two of his true loves bled into one when he officially took his post as executive director Feb. 16 after all 32 members of the PA’s executive board approved his appointment. The NHLPA search committee, which included players such as Kyle Okposo, Ian Cole, Zach Hyman and James van Riemsdyk, has found, at first glance, a new leader who prioritizes labor rights and the integrity of the sport.

“The players deserve a leader who knows who they are, knows their family, and we can move from there,” Walsh said. “I’m a different type of leader. In the past history of the NHLPA we’ve seen different leaders who have done great things here. I think I’ll bring a different perspective than probably every single one of them.”

Walsh was the first secretary to leave Biden’s cabinet. In the PA job, he replaces Don Fehr, who had held the position since 2010, steering the player union through a 2012-13 lockout and additional collective bargaining negotiations coming out of the pandemic stoppage in 2019-20, an accomplishment for which Walsh went out of his way to praise Fehr on Thursday. The search committee was formed in April 2022 to find Fehr’s successor.

Speaking to media for upwards of half an hour, Walsh, brand new in the job, had no shortage of hot topics to address. With Fehr being phased out and his public presence fading away, it was as if a year’s worth of questions had built up.

The most prominent concerned the NHL’s salary cap and the possibility of an increase beyond the projected $1 million for 2023-24 after commissioner Gary Bettman teased that the league would be open to it. The general temperature from Walsh Thursday suggested he liked the idea of a cap increase but was not open to making one particular concession in exchange for it.

“Would I be interested in seeing the cap go up: yes, but the players are not interested in raising the escrow right now,” Walsh said. As for his general thoughts on an NHL economic system that is foreign to him, including the hard cap, he indicated he “needed to take some time” to consider the next CBA negotiation which is still two and a half years away.

The possibility of player participation in the Olympic and World Cup of Hockey was raised repeatedly at the presser, too. Walsh expressed interest in wanting to “start the conversation” and “get something on paper” to make a World Cup a realistic possibility for 2025. He declined commenting on the issue of Russian participation during the ongoing war with Ukraine.

The topic Walsh was asked to address the most: the issue of players wearing or choosing not to wear Pride jerseys during warmups. Walsh expressed his desire for every NHL dressing room to be an inclusive space. As a Massachusetts state legislator in the early 2000s, he played a major role in helping pioneer same-sex marriage laws. He also signed the city of Boston onto a brief before the Supreme Court to help secure U.S.-wide marriage equality in 2015. While Walsh echoed Bettman’s assertion earlier this season that players have the right to make their own decisions, Walsh opted to shed more light on those who are doing their part promoting inclusivity in the game.

“I’m personally supportive of the LGBTQ+ community, I always will be, and the more I get an opportunity to talk to people about this and learn more about it I will,” he said. “But I think it’s people’s individual right if they want to wear a jersey… it’s a warmup jersey before the games. I don’t believe the LGBTQ community should feel NHL players are turning their back on them. The majority of players have worn the jersey. The super majority of the players have worn the jersey.”

On the whole, Walsh has plenty of work to do as he gets to know the NHL players, the owners, commissioner Bettman and the collective bargaining agreement. It would not be a surprise to see a slow burn early on; he made more than one reference to the next CBA being “two and a half years away,” implying he might take his time sinking his teeth into the issues of the largest magnitude.

When the time comes: while Walsh bleeds devotion to laborers, his history suggests he’s more of a uniting voice than a combative one. He has never led a work stoppage in his career and has a long track record of bringing opposing sides back to the table, from helping end a ninth-month nursing strike at St. Vincent Hospital in 2021 to to lending assistance to both sides during the Major League Baseball lockout in 2022.

ODDS AND ENDS

Walsh addressed several other important topics in Thursday’s presser.

On the sexual assault investigation of 2018 Canadian World Junior players:

Earlier this week, the IIHF announced a ban on all players from the 2018 World Junior team from future international events until the investigation on their potential involvement in a group sexual assault is concluded.

“We’ll have to wait until the findings come out,” Walsh said. “Right now, it’s an ongoing investigation. I can’t comment on the investigation at the moment. But any situations that arise with a player, whatever it is, in finding whatever it is, it’s something that we will take very seriously at the NHLPA. In these situations, you’re innocent until proven guilty, and we represent the players.”

On mental health and the player assistance program:

Over the last couple seasons, we’ve seen the likes of Montreal Canadiens goaltender Carey Price, Detroit Red Wings turned St. Louis blues winger Jakub Vrana and Florida Panthers goaltender Spencer Knight enter the NHL/NHLPA player assistance program. Walsh said he recently met with NHL Alumni Association president Glenn Healy and that players’ long-term mental health was the primary topic of conversation.

“I represent the National Hockey League players currently today, and someday, they’re doing to be alum, so we want to make sure the transition from being a player to being an alum is a smooth transition,” Walsh said.

On his connection to the Boston Bruins and owner Jeremy Jacobs:

Walsh has a connection to the NHL owners in the Boston Bruins’ Jeremy Jacobs, who had donated $13,000 to Walsh’s political committee in 2017. It remains to be seen if and how relationship will be leveraged in future collective bargaining; Jacobs, 83, still carries immense influence on the owners’ side as chairman of the NHL Board of Governors. But Walsh, who pointed out he knew every Boston pro sports team owner during his mayoral tenure, downplayed the significance of the relationship.

“It’s a good relationship,” he said. “But the next question is probably: they supported my campaign. They did. But in my entire career as a legislator and as mayor, supporting my campaign is one thing, but using that as leverage is never going to happen and never has happened.”

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‘I wear my unionism with a badge of honor.’ New NHLPA head Marty Walsh talks salary cap, World Cup, Pride and more

ODDS AND ENDS

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