The long-awaited investigative story on the late Ottawa Senators owner Eugene Melnyk was finally posted by The Athletic this week.

And it packs a punch.

Expected to drop at some point in 2021, and then put off well into 2022, the exhaustive tell-all was published Thursday, 17 days after Melnyk’s death. It’s not exactly an Easter card read for the Melnyk family, including Melnyk’s two young daughters, although the story offers a measure of good with the bad.

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Melnyk’s generosity for charitable causes and his sentimental touch are presented as part of the man’s mercurial mix. One source suggested to me that the tyranny of Melnyk is somewhat understated in the piece, which was the culmination of months of investigative work by three reporters interviewing numerous ex-employees and former players.

Ian Mendes, the lead reporter on the project, said the work simply was not 100 per cent ready in 2021, “as people were afraid to help us for fear of retribution or litigation,” Mendes said, in response to a question about the report’s timing.

“After his passing, I think a few more people were willing to share their experiences and that got us to a place where we felt comfortable to report. But I do believe the tone and arc of our story changed quite drastically after he passed away. We pivoted. We said to ourselves, ‘How do we proceed from here?’ And the consensus was, ‘Let’s write the most accurate portrayal of this man’s legacy.’”

The timing of the online release has been debated in Ottawa. Is two-plus weeks an appropriate passage to dish on the deceased? Others are viewing the reading as cathartic and necessary, regardless of the date. Not surprisingly, the Senators were taken aback by the publication of the piece so close to Melnyk’s passing.

In a response to The Athletic, Senators president Anthony LeBlanc termed the timing of the story “remarkably insensitive,” and added that the rush to publish a piece with so little new information was “questionable and opportunistic.”

By Thursday morning, the team had prepared a statement to provide to reporters who requested one. But by the afternoon, the statement was withdrawn at the request of the Melnyk family.