Report: USA Hockey source of hold up on Hudler’s transfer card

Update (6:13 PM): More on this via a Twitter exchange I had with Dmitry Chesnokov of Puck Daddy:

dchesnokov Hudler scored a GWG in Dynamo’s win over a bitter rival Spartak.

onthewings @dchesnokov How’s that work, if the reports on his transfer card are true?

dchesnokov @onthewings KHL president Medvedev said he didn’t care about what the IIHF do.

onthewings @dchesnokov I’d seen that. I didn’t know how much of it was bluffing.

dchesnokov @onthewings The Czech hockey federation issued a transfer card. KHL don’t care about IIHF transfer cards anymore.

dchesnokov @onthewings IIHF = joke. They depend too much on the money from the Russians. If the KHL leaves the IIHF, the organization will die.

onthewings @dchesnokov Hope you’re right–the Wings need the KHL to override the IIHF or they’re screwed.

dchesnokov @onthewings KHL hinted a number of times they were growing tired of the IIHF. As I have always said, it is between NHL and KHL. IIHF = joke

If Dmitry’s right and the KHL’s just going to ignore the IIHF rules, it’s good for the Wings in this specific situation because it would mean retention of the status quo as determined in the days around Hudler’s arbitration. The precedent, however, wouldn’t be a good one to set. The weakening of a reasonable (relative to the KHL) international body would hurt the NHL’s pipeline to Europe.

Really, the best resolution from the perspective of the IIHF would be for USA Hockey to just sign the card, but that creates problems for the NHL as the KHL would come off the victor in this little turf battle. - Matt

In the first mainstream media non-blog (Cult of Hockey is technically MSM, but a blog) comment on the latest chapter of the Hudler Saga, Canwest News Service’s Erin Valois reports that the IIHF has partially confirmed the news regarding Hudler and his transfer card. I say partially because it’s not the IIHF that is denying him the card; it’s apparently USA Hockey, the federation that had jurisdiction over Hudler while he was in the NHL and one of two needing to give permission for him to play overseas (the other being the Russian one).

Citing an email to Peter Adler that David Staples must have used as a source Wednesday, Valois quotes the communications director of the IIHF, Szymon Szemberg, who claims USA Hockey has not signed the card, therefore leaving Hudler ineligible to play in the KHL (assuming the KHL plays by the rules). Szemberg speculates the NHL asked USA Hockey not to sign and it’s all but certain he’s right.

I guess it’s still possible that the federation could still sign the card and make this go away, but it’s not looking likely if they haven’t already. I can understand the League asking USA Hockey not to sign. They wanted to protect an NHL asset from the predatory KHL. I get it, and even would have appreciated it if it could have been done in a timely manner.

What I don’t get is why this is only coming out now. Couldn’t the federation have made its decision clear a few weeks ago, before the Wings went out and put themselves against the cap in order to make up for what everybody assumed was the already-decided loss of Jiri Hudler? If the KHL ends up saying, “Just kidding” on its apparent threat to have Hudler play anyway, the Wings are royally screwed by the cap.

This is crap. Hudler forced back before his apparent “victory” in escaping the NHL around the time of his arbitration would have been bad enough. The Wings would have at least had the cap space to keep his malcontent self on board. Now, however, they have no such space and no easy way to clear it up. If he’s forced to return to North America, I hope he’ll be able to find happiness playing for another team, because chances are the Wings will be shopping him, even if they have to take a crappy deal from some laughing GM.