A hockey player who used to be a defenseman for the Vancouver Giants tried to start up a lawsuit that would go before just a judge, but that was shot down by the courts, and he will instead have to go in front of an entire jury. This is going to take place in mid June.
The man was playing in the minor league hockey system, for the Milwaukee Admirals, during the 2008-2009 season. In the summer of 2008, he was involved in a car accident. He says in his lawsuit that the accident made it so that he was not able to make the final roster for the NHL club that is connected to the Milwaukee Admirals, the Nashville Predators.
In playing for the Admirals, the man was able to make a salary of $62,500. If he would have been on the Predators instead, though, he would have made half a million dollars for that season.
The man, who is from Salmon Arm, Canada, did make it to the big leagues the next season, but he thinks that it was a year delayed because of the crash. He then played another year with Nashville and then two seasons with the Toronto Maple Leafs. As of right now, he is a free agent in search of a team.
When a car accident strips people of wages because they are not able to work, they could be able to seek compensation for the money that they lost. The NHL does make this a bit more complex since he still earned a wage, though it may not have been as much as it could have been otherwise, making this a very intriguing case.
Source: The Province, "Former Vancouver Giant alleges in lawsuit that car crash injury cost him a year in the NHL" Gordon McIntyre, May. 16, 2014