A Fine is Fine, but the Offense is Off the Mark May 23, 1999

By JOHN NOGOWSKI
Tallahassee Democrat

They can't even cheat.

When you read that the East Coast Hockey League dropped a $30,000 hammer on the toes of the Tallahassee Tiger Sharks, you had to laugh -- unless you were team owner Dave Elmore, who will pick up the tab for this errant behavior.

After a season most notable for what wasn't achieved, this club will own one distinction: being the fourth ECHL team fined for salary-cap violations. That's not exactly something you can hang a banner for, but we will now remember this otherwise forgettable team.

This was not a good hockey team -- 27-34-9 -- with no star players, terrible inconsistency and, ultimately, extremely little drive.

Down the stretch, maybe they could have had some defensemen carry white flags around instead of hockey sticks, since they weren't doing anything with the sticks, anyway, and certainly weren't playing defense.

Reportedly, Tallahassee's "soft" play was one of the damning traits of the team in the eyes of ECHL president Rick Adams. Once the ECHL's suspicions had been roused by Tallahassee's brutal front-office work, prompting a mid-season audit of the team, word was out that whatever under-the-table payments there were had been halted.

Brubaker gave us a look at the process

Adams visited Tallahassee for the team's final home game, witnessed the players' waltzes around the ice and concluded that "they weren't putting out because they weren't getting paid."

When news traveled that the ECHL would hold a hearing on the matter, Tallahassee's lack of mettle became part of coach Jeff Brubaker's defense. He said more than once, "if we were cheating, we would have had a (Nick) Stajduhar, we would have had a (Brendan) Concannon and a bunch of other guys that we just couldn't afford."

To make matters even more humorous -- if you look at it the right way -- one of the reasons that Brubaker and company were hoisted by their own petard, so to speak, was a Democrat report on the Tiger Sharks' inability to get players to report because of league-wide salary-cap cheating or, at least, superb rule-bending.

Thanks to Brubaker's candor, it was a fascinating inside look at how the ECHL operates. But Brubaker was not as candid -- or as careful -- about what was going on in his own front office, hence his $1,000 fine from the ECHL.

The league has to treat everyone equal

"I really think that it was excessive," Leon County Civic Center Executive Director Ron Spencer said Saturday. "None of these violations were, quite frankly, that severe. Ours were more of a source of ignorance and misunderstanding than actual, deliberate cheating. But the league has to treat everybody equal, I guess."

What proved unfortunate for Brubaker and the Tiger Sharks was that once certain disgruntled players were cut loose (Jason Clarke) or didn't play worth a darn (Greg Taylor), they were quick to call the ECHL office and spill the beans.

But what if, when a player is brought in, he agrees to a deal that pays him less than what he asked for -- on the condition that management will try to give him more money when it can fit it in under the cap? Then, for various reasons -- the player stinks, the team has other concerns -- management doesn't come through.

Is the player entitled to that money? Contractually, no. Emotionally, hard to say.

I agree that the Tiger Sharks deserved a fine. But not for salary cap violations. I'd fine 'em for incompetence: on and off the ice.

Origianally posted Sunday, May 23, 1999