Paul Lukas of ESPN's Page 2 is talking about captains. Apparently John Franco was named Mets' captain in 2001 after Turk Wendell caught a Devils' game and wondered why the Mets didn't have a captain.
Just think. With this lockout, how many baseball teams will now never think to name a captain?
Seriously. Think about it.
And check out Lukas' column. Uni Watch is always a great read.

So Cal Nichols, chairman of the Oilers, says that if the NHL doesn't get its cap, he's going to get the Oilers out of Edmonton.
Interesting.
Larry Brooks reports the NHL and the players are discussing hard and soft caps in the neighborhood of between $40 million and $50 million.
Very interesting. The Oilers had a payroll of $33.375 million last year. That's below the cap being discussed. Since most caps, hard and soft, have a minimum, it's entirely possible the Oilers would have to raise their payroll in a capped NHL. So I'm not exactly seeing how the cap would help the Oilers. Sure there would be cost certainty, but the certainty would be that the Oilers are losing money. Still.
Forbes explained the Oilers' money problems in their annual hockey valuations article: " The team's small budget practically prohibits it from competing for the Stanley Cup, but attendance is among the highest in the league. The franchise's main problem: a small business community and low corporate sponsorship revenue."
So unless a salary cap would somehow bring a flood of big business into Edmonton, I'm not seeing what a salary cap has to do with the Oilers being a successful franchise.
If the Oilers are selling out like crazy and still not making money, then they have bigger issues than salaries. Unless they're thinking they're going to qualify for some kind $10 million cap.
Oh. And George Vecsey from the Times misses hockey.
So do I. Without it, I spend way too much time crunching numbers.

Wow. No NHL draft, no Sidney Crosby.
The Quebec Major Junior Hockey League says his contract is in effect with them unless he's drafted by an NHL team. So that means Europe isn't an option if there's no NHL draft this summer.
Crosby might wind up a key part of the negotiations between the players and the league.
Crosby is the most exciting hockey player to come down the pike in quite some time. It's in the NHL's best interest to get him on the ice as quickly as possible. If Crosby is as good as everyone thinks he'll be, he'll bring a lot of hockey fans back into the NHL's tent. Those might be fans turned off by the lockout. They might be fans who haven't watched hockey since the 80s. They might be fans bored by the NBA's upcoming lockout (login info.).
The NHL has spent the last few years systematically screwing itself, expanding into markets where they weren't wanted, taking speed and skill out of the game, and finally locking its players out. The owners aren't stupid. They realize hockey is hurting. And they know that even if they end up with a cap, there's still a lot about hockey that needs to be fixed. A genuine, untarnished superstar is the best way to start repairs.
The players and owners haven't been able to find much common ground. But I'm guessing both sides can agree that a star like Crosby will help the league. Maybe that's where Wednesday's negotiations need to start.

Blah blah blah.
Lockout lockout lockout.
Larry Brooks says the players hate Commissioner Gary Bettman. How much do they hate him? They might be willing to negotiate a salary cap with a different commissioner. I kind of doubt that, but who knows? Bad breakups make people do crazy things.
I bet the owners are trying to figure out how true this is, though. If all it takes is a Bettmanectomy for them to get a cap and get hockey going again, you know they'll make the cut.
Tim Panaccio at the Philadelphia Inquirer says Bettman is trying to break the union (login info.). I thought that was fairly obvious. It's not like he's trying to grow the union, right? Unless there's some sort of commissioner's union I don't know about. A very small union.
Over in Boston, Nancy Marrapese-Burrell says the players are going to end up with a cap. I think the players' best defense against this is to keep all of the NHL's elite players in Europe if a cap is implemented. Picture an NHL without Jaromir Jagr, Peter Forsberg, Rick Nash, Martin Brodeur, or Markus Naslund. That's a tough sell to fans (even NHLer Mark Recchi is getting in on some AHL action). If the owners aren't passing along the savings in the form of steeply discounted tickets, they're going to see a lot of empty seats. And the TV ratings will manage to fall even lower. So if the players stand firm, they can make a cap a huge loss for the NHL.
And yeah. Like everyone else, I wonder who Mario Lemieux, an owner AND a player, is rooting for in the lockout.