"I love my game but I hate to hell what I'm seeing now."

That's from Ted Lindsay, the Detroit Red Wing great, who is now 87, speaking to the Detroit News yesterday.

He's right. One of the ambassadors of the game, Lindsay has long been a standup guy for the city, the team and the league. Now he is watching the National Hockey League implode with a second labor shutdown that continues to drive away fans and cost the league's owners and players.

It's amazing watching this again. It was just a few years ago that the NHL seemingly lost it all, losing a postseason and championship year due to labor strife. They had lost their deal with ESPN, perhaps one of the most valuable in sports to the exposure, which is doubly important because the teams are seen on games given added importance and featured prominently in the channel's sports news shows, both "SportsCenter" and the "NHL Tonight."

I remember fondly watching Barry Melrose each night during the Stanley Cup playoffs in the 1990s, when both ESPN and ESPN2 showed multiple games. All the hockey a fan could want was on TV, an interest that was born out of the Tie Domi and Bob Probert battles of the 1980s. Then the ownership decided to go for the short-term quick buck, refusing lower revenues and heightened exposure. Sure, it's not fair that ESPN could have them by their shorthairs but hey, we all should know life's not fair.

So they gave up the revenue, then tried to undo the high salaries they'd given and there was a lockout and a lost season. They were on a channel no one watched, but after a few years and promoting itself in the Winter Classic (a game I don't understand people would want to attend... an intimate game taken to a large stadium, who cares?) But nonetheless, they were pushed by NBC and they slowly made their way back, and now it's all lost.

I lost interest after the first shutdown. I didn't miss hockey. There's too much other entertainment. In the 1990s, I watched little network TV. Now, shows are better, by DVR is filled and when baseball and college football ends, I only have weekend football (English Premiere League in the mornings and NFL on Sunday afternoon.) That's plenty. I don't need hockey and really won't watch. I went to a game a year or two ago, saw the Wings beat the Calgary Flames. In two years, I maybe watched a handful, perhaps six or seven, other complete games worth of hockey on TV - in total.

And I'm a Wings and Canucks fan, and I'd check out their playoff games, flipping to them to see what the score was.

Now, if I would care at all, it would be a negative view of their brand, resentment at both sides. But I don't care. Too bad for NBC, which seemed on the verge of challenging ESPN (about the only thing I care about in this sorry story), by using its new sports channel, which used to be Versus (which used to be the Outdoor Channel), to promote the NHL. Now, I am thrilled that Comcast has added the Fox Soccer Channel's high definition channel to my line up. Oh joy. ESPN2 already has HD for its weekly one or two game. (Next, please, Comcast, add Fox Soccer Plus, so I can get the second game on at the same time.)

Some people in my family resented the baseball strike of 1994-95, when MLB lost a World Series, more than a decade later, angry at the lost postseason. "I'll never watch those guys again," I heard. And it was a real anger. This is different. I don't feel that with NHL. And that may be worse for the league, feeling nothing for something that will never matter again.

Oh, and Ted Lindsay is a class act. I remember when he changed his name legally from Theodore, knowing that Ted is how he is known and wanting to use his name and fame to help families in need. Shame the value has been lost in what he could offer, all his hard work flushed down the drain due to greed.

So, will the NBA actually start on the date that casual fans - or at least the national media - starts to pay attention annually? Yes, I'm thinking of the annual Christmas Day double- or triple-header.

According to reports, the players and owners have agreed to a deal that will allow for a 66-game season this year, starting on 12.25.11.

Good for them, though I haven't missed the NBA at all. Don't have time for it. I may have missed it, say, come June. Some of the playoff matchups are fun to watch.

But the league was smart enough to avoid labor trouble at the end of the year, forcing fans to miss a playoff, as both baseball and hockey did. The damage to both leagues was incredible, though baseball rebounded strongly with steroid-driven home run derbies.

Many fans turned their backs, though, and it seems impossible for a league's history to include DNP (labor) just like some leagues took time off for something truly monumental, such as World War II.

I think the true NBA fans will be quick to forgive and casual fans will not have noticed, so the negative feedback from fans will be minimal. There's going to be a champion and there's going to be a playoff, meaning all is just about as it should be.

I'm looking forward to the big story announcing the end of the NBA season.

Why? Not because I hate the NBA.

I like the occasional Pistons game. I like rooting either for or against Boston and always against the Lakers and now the Heat.

I enjoy the Pistons in playoff contention.

I don't like watching the slow-to-end games, the hype, the trash talk, the endlessness of the season. I swing back and forth when it comes to the entertainly annoying Mark Cuban.

But mostly, I'm hoping 2011-2012 is flushed so that we are further removed from both the NHL lockout and the MLB strike that cost the Indians a real shot at a World Series. People hated those two for so, as some fans can be so unforgiving.

The damage the NBA will do to itself will last for years, especially for fairweather fans who resent the fame and fortunes of so many of the jackasses who are talented hoopsters.

Plus, with no NBA season, no underclassmen from college will be in a hurry to leave. Now, if we could only legally pay the NCAA hoopsters....

There's been a couple significant instances of 'big news' coming out due to the NBA lockout, such as the cancellation of the preseason, or games into the regular season.

It's not breaking news; it's expected.

Breaking news about the NBA would be if there's a resolution and any part of the season is played. Of course this thing is going to last. There's no group of people, I think, more out of touch with regular folks than players in the NBA. These guys can't even relate to NFL offensive linemen, who share with them the classification of professional athlete.

And in the fight between millionaires and billionaires, no one making less than $200,000 a year has any sympathy for either side. (I have to think where ESPN stands in this, having brought the NBA into its fold at the expense of hockey, the NHL, which underwent its own de-fanification.)

No sport is as obnoxious about its wealth, its posturing and its out-of-touch views than the NBA, so I say let them cancel the year, let's let this go into the following season and let's see how few people actually miss it. The whines from players over the years has increased to the point of it being unreal how clueless these guys are. They've ruined the golden egg, the one sport with no masks, the best face time, and absolute most money to share (with only 12 players per team, versus say the NFL and their massive rosters).

As the more evident it becomes that people don't miss the NBA, both sides will have to continuously lower their demands, and we can lose these $20 million-a-year guaranteed salaries for people who don't contribute that much.

Baseball has high salaries, yes, and the Yankees abuse the system, it seems, but no one has seemingly been as arrogant and greedy as NBA players.