The moral dilemma with Bieksa's Buddies (Part 2)

Just to prove that I did, indeed, attend the game and am not $400 richer...

 

 

 

 

I fully realize that I could have simply taken these pictures off the internet, but...take my word for it? At the very least, you should be able to appreciate the grainy stunning quality of these iPhone pictures, no?

 

To actually comment on the game, the Thunderbirds showcased a lot more skill than I anticipated, while Bieksa's Buddies were gracious enough to let them.  Give or take a Tanner Glass bodycheck along the boards.

 

Good time.

 

-HC

The moral dilemma with Bieksa's Buddies

In lieu of the past month's lockout, Kevin Bieksa has rapidly assumed the position of Vancouver's off-season darling.  He skates alongside the city's young and aspiring hockey players.  He gives us near-NHL-calibre hockey in the name of charity.  He even admonishes the local scalper community for driving up the ticket prices.  It's as if Captain Planet died and was born again as an NHL defenceman.

That said, I hope you'll forgive my reservations about that third act of valour.  For those out of the loop or who need refreshing, Bieksa was featured on the front page of Wednesday's Province for lashing out at scalpers reselling his game's tickets for as much as five times the original value – a healthy $100 per seat!  My first reaction when reading the article was, alongside all similarly honest and hard-working folk (of course), "Good on ya, Juice!"  About time someone publicly called out the black-hearted among us, no?

But somehow I found myself magnetically drawn back to that inflated figure: $100 per seat.  I have four tickets.  (Open my calculator app...)  Well that takes care of half the month's rent for a lot of people.

Here we see Bieksa considering what he
might actually do to someone he caught
scalping his tickets...

Do I dare incur Bieksa's wrath?  Don't get me wrong.  I don't find it a morally thrilling endeavor to scalp, but is it really the evil he makes it out to be?  First things first, is Bieksa or anyone else particularly surprised that this is happening?  Surely he knows how much actual Canucks tickets can go for on Craigslist.  And I'm pretty sure anyone within a square mile can hear the scalpers outside Rogers Arena on a game night.  Obviously Bieksa takes special offense here as this is his event, but if it's on moral grounds that he disagrees with scalping, where has his outrage been all these years?

Most importantly, however, what exactly is the moral dilemma presented by scalping?  I ask the question out of genuine curiosity, because the situation at hand puts me between an easy paycheck and a code of conduct that Bieksa likely shares with many others.  His objections stem mostly from the fact that the tickets are for charity.  I understand the stigma associated with making a profit in that context and I do question the morality of it myself, but objectively speaking, there are zero proceeds being lost here due to scalping.  The maximum amount of money has already been made for the organizations in question.  For that reason, I struggle to see how the charities are relevant in this situation.  What we have, I believe, is a discussion in the morality of business.

Never in my life as a liberal arts student did I think I would be an advocate for capitalism, but let's consider other comparable scenarios here.  In the business of real estate, you might buy a house and sell it for profit as the market turns in your favour.  In the business of living out of your parents' basement, you might do the same with a well-packaged action figure or hockey card.  No ethical dilemmas there, I would imagine.

Or say, for example, in another completely random scenario, that you're a professional hockey player and the commodity you possess is your athletic ability.  Take the value of your ability on any given year.  Due to a wealth of factors, including market demand, free agency, salary inflation and the  terms of the era's (yikes) collective bargaining agreement, can you possibly imagine a situation in which you might be paid more than what your same athletic ability was worth at an earlier time?  If you can't, then you clearly do not follow NHL hockey or any professional sport, for that matter.

Here's the thing: In this current lockout and all the frustration surrounding it, does anyone ever blame the players for accepting the money thrown at them all these years?  No.  And nor should they.  Surely, when the opportunity arises, you sell to the highest possible bidder.  At the very least, you sell according to the given market value.  For that reason, I fail to see why I should be morally prevented from re-selling my tickets.

I speak mostly as the devil's advocate, because you won't actually see my tickets on Craigslist.  I will be happily going to the game in place of a student's fortune.  And for the record, Bieksa deserves a tremendous amount of respect for what he's been doing in the community.  I simply think his comments regarding scalping could be understood differently with an alternate perspective.

So here's to watching one-half of an NHL scrimmage tomorrow.  And here's to those making an exorbitant profit on them, too.

-HC

*See the online discussion regarding this article on the Canucks.com forums here.

The deepest blue are Canucks

Outside of Vancouver – with the exception of the most observant NHL followers – the Canucks' group of defencemen may be among the league's most underrated.  For virtually as long as the team has been in existence, the Canucks have lacked a bonafide Norris Trophy candidate and this past year's edition was no exception.  But what the Canucks' blueline may lack in a world class player à la Shea Weber or Zdeno Chara, they make up for in, arguably, unparalleled depth.  This was reflected in the Norris's most recent voting results, as the Canucks were one of only two teams to have three defencemen receive a vote for the award – Dan Hamhuis, Alex Edler and Kevin Bieksa.  (The other team was the New York Rangers with Dan Girardi, Michael Del Zotto and Ryan McDonaugh.) 

Offensively, this was further exemplified by the Canucks' fifth place ranking in defensive goal-scoring (see table to the right).  Among the top five teams, Vancouver and Los Angeles were the only ones to statistically do so "by committee".  Alex Edler led the Canucks' defencemen with 11 goals, accounting for just over a quarter of the Vancouver blueliners' total output.  Comparatively speaking, the other three teams topped the league by virtue of one standout player.  At 19 goals a piece, Shea Weber and Erik Karlsson scored nearly half of their teams' defensive goals, while Niklas Kronwall's breakout 15-goal campaign accounted for more than a third of Detroit's total. 

Statistically, that may all change for Vancouver if newly-signed Jason Garrison (who himself accounted for 53% of the Panthers' goals by a defenceman – the highest proportion in the league) can match his 16-goal output from last season.  And while Edler's play in the post-season left many wondering how he ever got voted best defenceman by Canucks fans, the reality is, when he's at his best, the big Swede could be just a few years out of a Norris nomination.  All things considered, however, Vancouver remains a balanced force on the blueline with no individual head-and-shoulders above the rest.  Garrison and Edler will share their equal portion of the load with Bieksa and Hamhuis, not to mention the ever-enigmatic Keith Ballard and the ever-improving Chris Tanev representing the blueline's potentially high-reward wild cards.

No one's saying that a player like Weber wouldn't put Vancouver over the top, cause that could very well be the case.  But Canucks fans would be wise to appreciate the group of guys we do have, 'cause collectively, they're among the league's very best.  So in salute of Vancouver's standout rearguards, here are the Top Five¹ of the group's 40 total goals from last season:


-HC

¹ Technically 4 of the Canucks defencemen's 40 goals, as Edler's shootout goal does not count towards official statistics.  Bonus fact: Edler had four shootout goals to lead all league defencemen.

*See the online discussion regarding this article on the Canucks.com forums here.