The National Post had an interesting story on the plight of NHL referees.
The gist of it is they have a hard job and they're not always evaluated fairly. Some refs might have even lost their jobs without just cause. Mark Spector places a lot of the blame at the feet of the NHL, where refs have no clear guidance on just how to do their jobs. Sometimes obstruction is an issue, but when it's called too much, the league complains about powerplays. And because the rules really change period to period, the players have no idea how to adapt. If the league would commit to a style of officiating, the players could learn how they're expected to play.
Oh well. Good thing there's no hockey.

How bad is the lockout? Scotty Bowman is getting his hockey fix in Fort Wayne, Texas.
Bowman, one of the greatest coaches across all sports, is in Texas visiting his daughter.
Actually, I wouldn't mind checking out a UHL game. They're experimenting with no center red-line in their preseason. Minor league hockey tends to be slower than the NHL, so the removal of that line might really give the illusion of NHL speed.
That can be the UHL's new slogan: "If you squint, we're almost the NHL."

This is what it's come to: writing about video hockey instead of real hockey.
Motley Fool has a pretty interesting story about how Sega is going after EA's sports video game supremacy. Sega's weapons? The ESPN brand and a cheap-ass price.
I'm a big fan of EA's NHL 2004, which has a pretty big fantasy/managerial element. You sign players and worry about salary, but also play some hockey. But it seems it's too geeky for the average game fan. So really Sega has three hockey weapons.
Having written all that, I think hockey really needs to start up again or I'm going to end up writing about my pretend NHL 2004 seasons. Like how I just lost the Stanley Cup to the Vancouver Canucks.
My one hope is that this sad little post touches the NHLPA and the owners and they decide to put hockey back on.

The Boston Herald talked to some AHL players to see how they'd feel about crossing the Players Association. It's nothing scientific, so of course the answers are pretty much what you'd expect: some players would cross the picket line to play in the NHL and some players wouldn't. And of course, that's assuming the NHL would try and re-start their league without actual NHL players.
Over in the Philadelphia Inquirer, Tim Panaccio has former Canucks' GM Brian Burke's plan to end the lockout. He says the NHL's best bet is a cap AND a luxury tax, with a minimum payroll thrown in for good measure (login info.).
I'm not sure. It doesn't seem like the players would ever go for something like that. I don't know. Maybe everyone should just be paid by the goal. That seems kind of fair to me.