NHL Lockout almost over?
 

http://tsn.ca/nhl/news_story.asp?id=127314

And why couldn't they have come up with this a year ago?

We will just have to wait till something happens. I dont think a majority of people, even die hard hockey fans care. But I HOPE both sides get their shit together and save their sport.

Does anyone still miss hockey? Not trying to troll, just honest curiousity, haven't seen a hockey thread in awhile.

I miss hockey.

Most people I guess have gone on with their lives.

Not really.

This sounds a LOT like what the owners were offering a year ago.

Do you think this will actually fix the problem, though? As an Oiler fan, I still don't see a lot of hope, considering a team like Detroit could still just have a payroll of $50 mil and pay the luxury tax...doesn't help the Oilers lure any bigger name players to town...

And for myself, as a huge hockey fan, didn't miss the NHL much at all...just watched a lot more NFL, and played more hockey myself.

Very much so

North of the 49th, there are daily reports. My local sports' station is inundated daily with email and callers regarding hockey and the NHL. Over 1 million watched the Memorial Cup.

Hockey will never die here.

I'm just watching a lot more baseball now, but yes, I missed hockey - especially between November and March.

No they can't. 36M is the hard cap. 22M is the floor. 29M is the luxury tax threshold. The players association fucked up royally.

If $36 Million is the hard cap, then it makes me feel better as a fan of a small market team...

Why now, though...they couldn't have agreed upon this when the season could still be saved?

Now the real problem. Who wins the Sidney Crosby lottery?

Hockey ...
 

Not at all, hockey to me is worse than the NBA and I don't even like the NBA all that much either.

I don't know why now, but they need to get the deal done now so they can sell luxury boxes, advertising and regular season tickets.

Do you have another source that has that listed as the final numbers? From how I'm reading this article, they're just using those numbers to illustrate a point (of where the luxury tax kicks in). They only say IF the low end is 22 million and IF the ceiling is 36.

It'll be interesting to see how this ends up numbers wise, but personlly, I still wish they had used a system closer to the NFL's with one set of cap rules for all teams, not a fluctuating cap that puts every Canadian team behind the 8 ball right off the bat, with the smaller Canadian markets really sitting in a bad spot. The idea of having a $25 million minimum team salary with a maximum of around $35 million for the entire league was about what I was hoping for. Again, my arguement could be a moot point depending on how the percentages work, but doing it team by team opens up the possibility for things to get just as unbalanced in the future.

Only advantage to this is that a team like the Rangers will only be able to attract half the overpriced hacks that they previously could and the remainder will get spread out to the other big markets.

Ah well, here's hoping.

Dude, when I went to Canada this Spring Break '05, hockey was in lockout mode, but TSN's Sportscenter was seriously like 75% hockey. They love that shit.

Dola, deal got done now because sponsors for next season have apparently been flexing a lot of muscle on the NHL to get a deal done or a lot of money would have been walking right out the door, and with no big TV money assured, that could/would have been a crippling blow to the league.

And as mentioned, preparations for next season, the threat of Crosby going to Europe and playing his career there (as unlikely as that is) and all the rest would be pretty big factors as well.

Well, you would think cancelling an entire season of hockey and missing out on those revenues would be a big factor too, but what do I know?

i miss hockey very much

So if the floor ends up being 24 and the cap is 34 than the tax still kicks in at 29M. I guess if it's 24 and 36 the threshold could be 30M, but its not going to be higher than that based on the projections.

And, I still miss hockey. I didn't really miss it until the day after the Super Bowl, but then it really kicked in.

Meh. I watched a lot of college hockey, and with the Pistons run, I haven't really thought about the NHL at all.

It's always the case with these negotiations. One side or the other never has the foresight to see that they will invariably lose.

SI

I find I miss hockey more then I did before. Probably has to do with the fact that I am playing a lot of EHM. Or maybe I'm playing EHM because I miss hockey. Whatever is true, I want to professional hockey soon.

I was always more of a college hockey fan, but I do miss it, especially at this time of year when the Stanley Cup playoffs should be on.

Wait, you were in Canada and didn't tell us?

this cap will be fascinating. i mean, the rangers are just about over the cap with like 5 players.

my beloved "cost-conscious" devils are already nearly at the cap, too. i guess the 24% rollback is in effect but it wasnt mentioned. regardless, this is going to be WEIRD. we may see massive massive massive player movement if it is a hard cap in the mid $30s.

i cant wait to see how cheap season tickets are. if they are as chap as they should be, i just may try and snag some. or at least 10 game packages or something.

just drop the puck already!

Why do I have the feeling that the savings will not be passed on to the fans in regards to ticket prices...

They will have to temporarily because they'll need to get some butts back in the seats. But it will be only temporarily.

SI

Sabres already had ticket price rollbacks in effect and I anticipate more of them after the lockout is over.

It's hard to miss hockey when you go to a large amount of college games in the Boston area. I do however miss watching two NHL playoff games at once by putting two TVs in my living room for the playoffs

Don't you remember that the player's association could have had a cap the $42 million and saved the season. I bet a lot of players are wondering why they pay union dues.

A good ticket price for me would be one that costs less than the drive to the game. If that's the case, I could see myself going to a few.

(The Island is 3.5 hours or so from me, and $30 or so in gas, and Boston is 3 hours & $25). We'll see how it turns out.

~rpi-fan

Well, ticket prices won't go down in markets like Edmonton because they've been operating at this sort of cap already. That'll be the interesting thing in markets like ours where fans will start to get on the owners that ticket prices aren't coming down, when in reality, for teams like the Oilers, they'll continue to operate as they always have, now they *might* be able to hang onto some home grown talent for a few extra years, or be able to plunk a bigger name free agent into the mix with the same expenditure levels.

Now as far as the bigger markets go, well that's the truer test.

I miss hockey. I can't wait until everything gets back up and running again. And the 2 million difference in cap room for bigger market teams isn't too big of a deal. I think teams like the Rangers have proven that money doesn't always turn into wins.

Maybe you shouldn't live in the middle of nowhere. For me it costs about $12 + parking to go to Philly, about $14 + parking to go to the Meadowlands and whatever a train ticket to NY costs (its ~13 on the weekend, not sure about weeknights)

NHL? what is that

Actually that's not true. With the rollback, the Rangers are at $18.5 million for 6 players (you may have your number so high because of Jagr's salary, but Washington is paying a large portion of it. He would only count approximately $4.18 million towards the Rangers cap).

NHL with a salary cap is going to be the cat's tits.

Man, GroundCat can't wait for the first NHL game with the cap included!

interesting.

of course, thats kind of shady, isnt it? other teams paying for players that arent on their roster, counting towards their cap?

but maybe im just too used to the nfls cap.

yeah i wonder how that is going to work...

Isn't it the same as how they calculate A-Rod's contract with the Yankees?

The Rangers pay for part of A-Rod's salary and the Yankees are only charged with $18+ of the $25 million.

Neely made the hall! So did Kharlamov. Then why hasn't Henderson?

Glenn Anderson should also have been in by now... :

And Mikey missed out...

Back to your regularly scheduled programming...

Exactly.

Well, I would go with at least one person to defray the cost a little. It does suck living so far away from the NHL teams, though... at least I have RPI hockey!

The article I read mentioned the rollback, but pegged it at 34%. That's either a typo or a fairly huge change that hasn't been mentioned.

Apparently benefits and performance bonuses would also count towards the cap, which is a fairly significant change.

Well, looks like the NHL broke the players' union. Good for the sport in the long run, IMO.

I knew they would. Now we have to see if the rest of the players try to get them decertified.

Not good for the sport- since the incompetent idiots who drove the NHL into the ground in the first place are in charge. Bain Capital's takeover would have made more sense.

Seriously...looks like the players literally left $6 million on the table, dating back to the last breakdown of negotiations.

Penguins.

Yeah, but they arent dealing with as big of a pie as they were previously. Who knows, the players may actually get a higher percentage of revenue under this agreement.

6M per team, and it's alot more than that those idiots lost.

One Man's Take on the Story:

http://www.tsn.ca/columnists/bob_mckenzie.asp

That story gave me a headache.

So it could be you can have a ceiling for a cap as high as your revenue?

I don't see any problems solved for small market clubs.

Yeah- that just sounds like a way to cap costs by the owners but ultimately solving nothing.

SI

Exactly. Give it a year before people bring back the dreaded C word again (Contraction)

I've never seen any news that made it seem like some teams could have a cap that high. Everything has said that the highest ceiling would be in the $36-38 million range.

The question is, is everyone putting out opinions based upon the original article? I think, until something is put out by the NHL and NHLPA, the system is just conjecture...

I am very scared that small market teams are still in trouble, though...

I just heard a radio report that the NHLPA has said that reports of an agreement are premature.

I would be shocked if the NHLPA agreed to this system. Thye would be far better off waiting another 6 months to try to get a more favorable deal if this is the best on offer right now.

They're not getting a more favorable deal. This was something that was clear months back right before the season officially got cancelled. The owners had all the leverage because they were sticking together. The big market clubs could have went out and said how certain plans would have worked for them, but they stood strong in support of the small market teams. Once the players agreed to any type of salary cap, they were screwed. As time passes on, the owners are in better financial position everyday. The lower revenue teams aren't losing the money they once were, and teams like the Rangers don't care about the lockout, because the owners make more money in other ventures.

It's the players who are losing everything. They are the ones who are taking money-making years off their careers. They are the ones who are all of a sudden 35 when the league starts up again, and whose wheels don't work as well as they did when they were 33, and can't come back at the same level. They are the ones who are suffering big-time injuries playing overseas; they went there with the intent on staying fresh--now they have to worry if they can regain their old form. The owners don't care. When the lockout ends, their money will still be green.

Yep, and that is the way that owners can 'win' a strike/lockout. If they stick together and realize that losing seasons will eventually pay off for them in the end, they can't be stopped. That was the problem with baseball and some owners who weren't as into the fight as others. They stuck together poorly and the MLBPA pounced on it. So now you get a system where there hasn't been a banning of steroids until 2004 because the players wouldn't hear of it.

No the problem with baseball is the NLRB fucked everything up.

If it is indeed a team-by-team salary cap based on 54% of team revenues, here's an example from the 2002-2003 season:

		2002-2003
		Revenue	54% Cap
1	New York Rangers	113	61.02
2	Dallas Stars	108	58.32
3	Toronto Maple Leafs	105	56.7
4	Philadelphia Flyers	101	54.54
5	Detroit Red Wings	89	48.06
6	Colorado Avalanche	88	47.52
7	Boston Bruins	84	45.36
8	Minnesota Wild	79	42.66
9	Los Angeles Kings	78	42.12
10	Chicago Blackhawks	74	39.96
11	New Jersey Devils	73	39.42
12	Montreal Canadiens	71	38.34
13	St. Louis Blues	67	36.18
14	Columbus Blue Jackets	66	35.64
15	Vancouver Canucks	66	35.64
16	San Jose Sharks	65	35.1
17	Tampa Bay Lightning	65	35.1
18	Washington Capitals	62	33.48
19	Ottawa Senators	59	31.86
20	Anaheim Mighty Ducks	59	31.86
21	Pittsburgh Penguins	57	30.78
22	Florida Panthers	57	30.78
23	Atlanta Thrashers	57	30.78
24	Carolina Hurricanes	57	30.78
25	New York Islanders	56	30.24
26	Calgary Flames	51	27.54
27	Buffalo Sabres	50	27
28	Edmonton Oilers	48	25.92
29	Nashville Predators	46	24.84
30	Phoenix Coyotes	43	23.22
	Luxury Tax @		42.12

From everything I've read, this is NOT the case. The Shoalts' Globe & Mail article is being heavily criticized today. There are inconsistencies that don't add up. This will have been a completely wasted year if the disparities between top and bottom are still this great wilth the potential to increase. All indications are that the 'payroll range' is indeed based on 54% of league revenues. A $10-$15 million gap between top and bottom is much more palatable.