Daly claims NHLPA requested Monday meeting

Monday’s potential CBA meetings are still considered tentative, but there’s no denying the fact that the players took the initiative.

NHL exec Bill Daly admitted as much to Sportsnet’s Daren Millard.

“Their request, their agenda,” Daly said. “We will see if they have anything good to say.”

Speaking of supposed “agendas,” Daly told TSN’s Darren Dreger that the NHLPA misrepresented the owners’ demands, stating that while the NHL isn’t budging on certain areas, there is some flexibility.

“Nothing was ever said or even suggested that we needed the details of our proposal ‘down to the comma,’” Daly said. “We told them the issues we wanted addressed in the system. We told them we have provided a proposal that we think will effectively address those issues. But we told them that we are open to discussing other ways to address those issues if they want to propose any. In fact, we used the exact example of ‘if we need 5 and we have proposed 3+2 to get there, that we are happy listening to and considering 4+1 instead.’ I’m not sure why they chose to characterize the way they did. As I’ve said before. I can only control what we say.”

Perhaps both sides will discuss such simple compromises on Monday night.