The Cap Might Not Go Down in 2010: Lyle 'Spector' Richardson

Good point wprager. The lucrative TV deals are HUGE and it's what Bettman has been chasing and chasing...

Dare I call it... his Moby Dick... ?

Maybe...

davetherave wrote:

shabbs wrote:That may be Chicago's only way out of this cap mess if they sign their core to ultra-long contracts in order to spread out the cap hit.

15-year $75M contract averaging $5M/year cap hit...

20-year $100M contract averaging $5M/year cap hit...

Could it happen?

I guess it all depends on the economic scene at the time and if they want to get big shorter-term money elsewhere...

Shabbs>don't forget the so-called 'cap mess' is a creation of the Mainstream Hockey Media to keep all of us talking about something...and sending traffic to their web sites.

The NBA, NFL and MLB all spend MORE money on players than the NHL...do you hear the kind of squawking about 'cap mess' from the media covering those leagues?

As for players want 'big shorter term money elsewhere'...think about this.

If you're a pro athlete whose career could be shortened by any kind of unforeseen injury, wouldn't you prefer the security of a guaranteed long term deal for you and your family?

Do you think the majority of hockey players like moving their lives from city to city, uprooting everything to chase a bigger dollar?

Look at Daniel Alfredsson...he took 'less' to stay in Ottawa. Why wouldn't Toews, Kane, Keith, et al do the same to stay where they are? And especially if your team is successful?

If you have been following the NBA business at all you would know that David Stern has warned teams about a likely drop in the Salary Cap and Luxury tax threshold. On top of this many mid-level players are being squeezed just like the NHL due to management fears about next year.

RobbyJ> I DO follow NBA business...not as closely as NHL business, mind you.

I am not at all surprised if, as you say, David Stern is wagging his finger at the teams.

But my point stands. These other leagues spend far more than the NHL on players, and have far more elastic parameters.

The Mainstream Media in that case, seems to simply nod their heads...with only the occasional harrumph.

Have a read here. This is a league which generates a greater portion of its revenue from TV contracts than the NHL and those TV contracts are already in place.

http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?id=4312837

RobbyJ wrote:Have a read here. This is a league which generates a greater portion of its revenue from TV contracts than the NHL and those TV contracts are already in place.

http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?id=4312837

Robby, many thanks.

You do know, I hope, that Gary Bettman came from the NBA to the NHL...and that the problems with television contracts go back to the late '50s when the NHL's owners rebuffed an overture by a major network.

By the way, don't think that I am in any way supportive of the NHL's business practices regarding revenue or the salary cap.

As you may recall from a number of my posts, I have drawn attention to the long history of issues in the NHL that predate The Bettman Era and extend back to the origins of the league.

I have also referred our fellow members to a number of books that examine the NHL's shortcomings, notably Stan Fischler's excellent "Cracked Ice"; Holzman and Nieforth's "Deceptions and Doublecross: How The NHL Conquered Hockey"; Bruce Dowbiggin's "Money Players" and the controversial "Net Worth" by David Cruise and Alison Griffiths.

So while I am very interested in exploring the whys and wherefores of player compensation and team revenue, I am no way an advocate for the current approach.

To put our discussion in perspective, I am sure you, like I, found this excerpt from the ESPN article fascinating:

Tuesday's memo also listed the seven teams that must make luxury-tax payments to the league office by July 22 based on last season's payrolls.

The dollar-for-dollar tax, assessed to any team with a payroll above the $71.15 million threshold that was in place in 2008-09, will result in the following invoices to be delivered to the respective teams before Friday's deadline: New York ($23,736,207), Dallas ($23,611,661), Cleveland ($13,707,010), Boston ($8,294,664), Los Angeles Lakers ($7,185,631), Portland ($5,899,356) and Phoenix ($4,918,136).

The 23 teams that stayed below last season's tax threshold, meanwhile, will each receive just over $2.9 million, which is taken from the combined tax pool paid by the seven aforementioned teams. The memo notes that the remaining $20.4 million of undistributed cap funds is headed for the NBA's Revenue Assistance Plan, which distributes money to low-revenue teams.

---


Almost $72MM as a threshold? There's some serious money for you.

Look at MLB where there is no cap at all... the Jay's payroll is just under $100M and in the middle of the pack. The Yankees are at the top at $209M... unbelievable.

How do you compete with a team who's payroll is TWICE as much as yours?

shabbs wrote:Look at MLB where there is no cap at all... the Jay's payroll is just under $100M and in the middle of the pack. The Yankees are at the top at $209M... unbelievable.

How do you compete with a team who's payroll is TWICE as much as yours?

Like the Jays - you don't.

Part way through the season, you assume it's already over, and you offer up the best pitcher in baseball to the highest bidder.

It's a ridiculous system, and quite pathetic, really.

Acrobat wrote:

shabbs wrote:Look at MLB where there is no cap at all... the Jay's payroll is just under $100M and in the middle of the pack. The Yankees are at the top at $209M... unbelievable.

How do you compete with a team who's payroll is TWICE as much as yours?

Like the Jays - you don't.

Part way through the season, you assume it's already over, and you offer up the best pitcher in baseball to the highest bidder.

It's a ridiculous system, and quite pathetic, really.

Yeah, they need to get up to the $150M mark to really compete with the Yankees and Red Sox in their division.

Doesn't look like the NHL cap is going down...does it?

davetherave wrote:Doesn't look like the NHL cap is going down...does it?

Of course not.

Interesting bit of info from the Wikipedia entry on the 2004-05 NHL lockout:

Prior to the lockout, in late 2003 the union proposed a system that included revenue sharing, a luxury tax, a one-time five percent rollback in player salaries, and reforms to the league's entry level system.

The league rejected this proposal almost immediately because it essentially maintained the status quo in favor of the players.

Shortly before the lockout commenced in 2004, the NHLPA offered another proposal to the league that was believed to be similar to their earlier proposal.

The league again rejected the union offer, claiming the union's new proposal was worse than the offer they rejected in 2003.

At this point, negotiations stopped until early December, when the NHLPA made a highly anticipated proposal based on a luxury tax that increased the proposed one-time rollback in players' salaries from 5 to 24 percent. The NHL rejected the offer and countered with a proposal that the union quickly rejected.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2004%E2%80%9305_NHL_lockout

History repeating?

Dave, are you suggesting that the NHL is planning or thinking about a luxury tax? I thought the posted article was about the NBA? Sorry, didn't read all of it. Or is the point that the NBA has a luxury tax but it's not working to keep salaries down?

I don't buy the Luxury tax concept. And I do believe the cap will drop by at least 1.5-2M. There will be a lot of empty suites around the league this year.

wprager wrote:Dave, are you suggesting that the NHL is planning or thinking about a luxury tax? I thought the posted article was about the NBA? Sorry, didn't read all of it. Or is the point that the NBA has a luxury tax but it's not working to keep salaries down?

Prager>as the above points out, the NHLPA proposed a luxury tax that was rejected back in '04...but that may be the way the Union reaches a compromise with the Owners.

The players DON'T want a salary cap...why should they? It only limits their earning power.

The owners may see the situation differently than they did before the lockout...the cap has--for all intents--served its purpose...for them. It has allowed teams to weed out the non-performing assets, i.e. the aforementioned 'mid pack' who have priced themselves beyond what they deliver on the ice.

The owners want what most successful conglomerates want...a core of older employees who are locked in to the end of their useful lives, and a continually replenished crop of eager youngsters who can be brought 'into the fold'.

The mid-pack is where you find the so-called 'malcontents' who create problems between labour and management.

Of course, you'll probably never hear it described this way by the Mainstream Media.

While all the brouhaha swirls around what may or not happen with the cap, it obfuscates the battle lines that were drawn long ago.

One has to have looked at the contentious history between the NHLPA and the NHL going back to the Eagleson days...and the war declared by Bob Goodenow.

The story of Goodenow's rise and fall is a fascinating one.

Frankly speaking, the current crop of talking heads and media mush from the Mainstream Journos totally glosses over this ongoing conflict.

The reality is that the players--in the majority--want as MUCH as they can extract. (This talk of 'hometown discounts' being just feelgood 'fluff' IMHO.)

Right now, the players are giving up from 15% to 25% (if memory serves me correctly according to what I have read) of their salaries into an escrow fund that subsidizes the owners.

In a sense, the teams have no choice but bend the contracts into pretzel shapes to work around the cap...which only makes life more complicated for the players as well.

Hockey stars would like to get money in line with their brethren in basketball and baseball, don't you think?

If it takes a 'luxury tax' to make that possible, the NHLPA will find a way to table it again in the next round of CBA discussions.