Paul Holmgren, making other team's players rich since 2006.

zomg, DP has a new blog entry. i guess at least one first line survived the nuclear holocaust.

this is ridiculous. they get to cut players' effective salaries by about half of what they proposed initially, and agree to nothing that would move the nhl towards more stable ownership or protecting future seasons from work stoppages.

there isn't a single idiot owner/gm who is bad for the nhl as a whole. do you realize how much money toronto/rangahs/philadelphia generate? it's a lot. Minnesota is heading towards that as well.

idiot owners/gms usually enjoy quite a revenue stream from the fans, and view it as a free resource to try to win. it's dumb, but the fans show up in droves for that ****.

the teams that are putting the nhl at risk are the bottom money-generators. they are the ones who incur losses year after year, that are being shared by the rest of the league. the league then uses these losses as leverage.

the mistake here is that the league is clearly ready to expand into more profitable markets. so struggling franchises are not really in any real danger of being contracted and the number of union player jobs are not in danger of being eliminated. so the leverage is has absolutely no teeth whatsoever.

Is 2 year ELC instead of 3 supposed to be a compromise for UFA at 28/8 seasons? What are the current UFA rules?

Letting a team basically own a guy until he's 28 (unless someone thinks he's worth filing an offer sheet over like we see approx every other year) seems pretty ridiculous.

i wonder if there will be players who will stick through their ELC/arb years, then go play for tax-free money in the KHL 1-2 years, and come back as 28 year-olds.

Oh I understand why the players will not take the deal. I do agree the bottom markets drag down the league. Though you think Winnipeg having a franchise helps the US based teams. You are also correct that there are some markets that can use a team though most are in Canada though Seattle will be viable with a new Arena.

Why cant the owners maximize their profits? The players will give in as the ones not playing in Europe or Russia can only miss so many paychecks. Not sure when Escrow checks stop.

Btw, whats the current deal between NHL and IIHF/KHL regarding player transfers? I know it used to be sth ridiculous like 100k

Lemme just throw this out there right now, since Seattle's got the new arena coming: if the league expands into Seattle and, for argument's sake, Quebec City, instead of relocating hemorrhaging franchises to those markets instead, it'll rank right up there with the stupidest things the league has ever done.

They would not be UFAs in that instance.

what do you mean by NFL/NBA type contracts?

well, they have some TV revenue, it's not like they're at their low point there

lol @ protecting owners from themselves

i mean, who cares when they've agreed to split the pie? 57/43, 55/45, 52/48, 50/50, whatever. after that who cares who gets paid what? Suter & Parise were worth those contracts bc that's their value on the open market. very few good players make it to market, now we want to completely remove their ability to get paid when they get there? and why, so some plug can make $1m/year more?

or 26 if he starts at 18. isn't the current system 27/7?

anyway i think the ELC/arbitration rights/UFA stuff is some kind of attempt to re-establish the 2nd contract as something that's pro-owner, whereas under the current system guys have been getting paid like they're UFA's basically.

EXPANSION FEEZZZZZ tho

i mean presumably the owners winning ~7% of the money here is going to make it easier for these crap markets to make a go of it (if some kind of increased revenue sharing system isn't part of this deal, then lol @ the owners). maybe they'll move 1-2 eventually, and expand to 32. GTA, Quebec City, Seattle, Kansas City, Vegas, Portland...might have a few options as far as markets go, idk...

first of all, review the facts. the NHL is being steered by the top 10 big clubs. they generate all the money, they negotiate with the unions, and Bettman works for them. the bottom guys don't get any say in this.

secondly, the top clubs are pointing at the losses by the bottom guys as the reason to cut player's share, either for payroll or competitive balance reasons (lol). eventually money-losing clubs will file for bankrupcy and the NHL will get take a valuation hit, which means all of their top franchises lose some value overnight. they want the columbuses and the new jerseys and the coyotes solvent, so they don't need any toronto money, but they don't want to use toronto money to help them get solvent. they want to accomplish that solely with the player's portion of the money, which incidentally helps the owners across the board. this is similar to giving a an equal tax cut to all the rich and the poor. it obviously lowers the liabilities of everyone, but it lowers toronto's liability a lot more than it lowers phoenix's liability.

the relocation fee that winnipeg had to pay immediately helped the american clubs, and if real revenue sharing will ever take place, continued winnipeg success will absolutely help the coyotes. and it will help the players. ETA: and if all of that results in a more stable NHL ownership, probably the fans.

gotcha. i guess that sucks. unless a player decides to pull a yashin or a radulov, and gets the club to buyout/cut him.

Revenue sharing is increased to $200 million.

One of the dumbest things you've ever said, and that's because you don't say many dumb things, is assuming that the NHL has control over where any franchise plays. The NHL can stop an owner from moving a team. It cannot force an owner to move a team. If the Coyotes are sold to Greg Jamison - and that deal is taking forever - they can't tell him to move the team to Kansas City. It's his team.

I understand that much and I didn't articulate my point well, I'm in the middle of class.

Expansion to 32 teams when you have some really, really bad situations as it stands would be an awful business plan. I'm not saying they have the power to reassign franchises like a video game, I'm just saying they shouldn't even be uttering the number "32" until they figure out the cancers currently plaguing the system.

I am glad you just referred to the leaves as both a cancer and a plague.

http://www.insidethebook.com/ee/inde...7_billion_now/

Might have been discussed already, but this is pretty brilliant from BETTMAN.

32 teams in the GTA would be very profitable. A businessman told me.

Going by those numbers the players should turn the deal down from a financial perspective right? Based on the fact that they can recover a significant amount of the lost revenue this year by playing in other leagues, but obviously lose the whole pie over six years if they sign.

Most players are not playing in other leagues. Of those that are, many are not making much money - I can't imagine anyone playing in Austria or Germany makes bank, for instance. Furthermore, players on long-term deals have to take out insurance to play in these other leagues, which can be extremely pricey - I could even see some of them losing money to play there.

The players won't take this deal, but if they can get the owners up to 52% this year, going down to 50% in subsequent years, they should take it. They are not getting more by missing lots of games.

The players will refuse the deal as the deadline is the 25th they will continue to negotiate a better deal. Amazing how the players will go play for next to nothing in Europe and Russia and worse conditions and travel.

Stand Firm Owners.

32 losing teams and they still have outrageous ticket prices

Cool article I just read:

Dave Zirin: "Meet the Lockout Lawyers Destroying Sports"

In what way would a second GTA team not be like The Clippers?

How are The Clippers doing now and how have they done historically? My impression is they are doing better, have been pretty empty in the past, will be empty in the future.

It appears they have had pretty good attendance since moving to The Staples Center.

lol clippers. worst run franchise of all time.