Anyone else getting the sense this is straight out of Bettman's negotiation playbook. We have seen these exact tactics with the players during two lockouts.
What this thing needs is a second deadline. The "current council" deadline expired this week, much like the start of the season deadline did a few years ago. Flames will come back around Christmas once the dust has settled and communicate that they have reviewed all options and they are going to take one more run at this and provided they can get a deal done by February 2018 with an arena ready by the start of season September 2020. The sides will come together around that deadline and either hammer out a deal, or we repeat the cycle after another window of no negotiation...
The only risk in this negotiation is that there are not the same hard deadlines as during an NHL season.
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Go Flames Go
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