Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman broke this story, as he tends to do, and it’s more important than you might think:
“Make tomorrow better than today”
— Elliotte Friedman (@FriedgeHNIC) July 13, 2026
That’s the motto of Glenn Healy, Executive Director & President of the NHL Alumni
Today at their golf tournament, Healy discussed the recent NHL/NHLPA CBA, where the league and union agreed to contribute north of $4M combined towards a… pic.twitter.com/vrCrFJbpbu
NHL.com’s Mike Zeisberger has more from the NHL Alumni Association’s annual Alumni Celebrity Golf Classic in Collingwood, Ontario today:
The recent collective bargaining agreement between the NHL and NHL Players Association features a $4 million-plus donation from both parties combined for a post-retirement wellness plan.
The final details of that program were ironed out last week, allowing Healy to announce details of it to the 40 former players on hand for the NHL Alumni Celebrity Golf Classic at the picturesque Coppenwood Golf Club on Monday. With Hall of Famers like Paul Coffey, Doug Gilmour, Bryan Trottier, Mike Gartner and Mark Recchi showing their support, the association president outlined just how deeply its members now can get help once they’ve taken their final NHL shift.
“The way it’s set up now, if you’ve played one shift in the NHL you will get a family doctor. If you played one shift in the NHL you get a mental health wellness professional for you, your wife and your kids,” Healy said.
As impressive as that may be, it runs far deeper than that. For those who played 400 games, they’ll receive dental and prescription eyewear coverage too. And for former players who haven’t reached that threshold and can’t afford the healthcare that they need, the League and NHLPA have established a slush fund for those, as Healy puts it, “in financial distress or find themselves in catastrophic situations.”
“This is Christmas Day for us in the sense that we took into consideration while building a better tomorrow than today, a wellness plan,” he explained. “That was always a goal.
“We wanted to be proactive because, in the past, we seemed to be reactive, waited for problems and then reacted to them. Too late. Be proactive. Preventative. Get on top of your own health. Go get bloodwork. Check to make sure that, for males, particularly when it comes to prostate cancer, don’t wait until it’s too late.
“All of us have something when it comes to health. Even as something as simple as: How many former NHLers still have their own teeth? These are all things we were looking to help deal with.”
Continued, with this:
“People still have issues. They still need somewhere to go for help. Look at what happened to Claude Lemieux.”
The entire hockey world was in shock when Lemieux, a four-time Stanley Cup champion, took his own life on May 28. He was 60.
“It shook all of us in a big way,” Healy said. “Look at who showed up in Florida for his service. Wayne Gretzky. Joe Sakic. Steve Yzerman. That says a lot. We are going to fight for him, and for the hope that there won’t be a next one, even though there will be. We’re going to do everything we can to make a difference, bit by bit.”
