Agree on we'll see what happens. But a couple of points:
1) RJ would have had to have had a physical both after the trade, and at the end of the season. If he passed the EOS physical - he could be bought out. He must not have passed the physical, and he apparently has major surgery scheduled (which the Flyers could not have been ignorant of).
2) My "laughable" experience is not with a union 400 people. But the NHLPA is not that size either. To sign a NHL contract you must be a member of the NHLPA, and since each of the 32 teams have between 45-50 players under contract, that's about 3-4x as many participants as you seem to think. But even beyond that, your contention that the number of participants makes a union completely unique is completely baseless. I would bet that Alan Eagleson would have been RIGHT at home at the AFL-CIO. From what I've read of the NHLPA - you get a lot of the same internal attitudes where the vast majority of the member just want to work and the vocal minority runs the show including the politics and powerplays of any similarly purposed organization.
3) IMO, one of the major characteristics of unions (of any size) would be that they voraciously defend their members, regardless of the underlying facts and circumstances. The NHLPA is in line with that behavior.
Somehow you seem to think that you know more than every person on the internet. Hubris much? You don't know me, or my experience. I did not claim to be an organized labor expert, but have had to deal with unions as part of my professional experience. I'm not claiming to have intimate knowledge of how the NHLPA works, or have any specific details of the RJ situation beyond what's been reported.