Bruins owner Jeremey Jacobs: article

[YellHockey*]

We know Ottawa will allow it? Even if it is the new regime... it cannot hurt to see how the Ottawa team is doing? Even if Bryden was moving money around for tax benefits it is a mute point now for him...

But what is the point of wasting time and money on people to look at the books when it was evident that when Bryden was running the show the combined operations of the Senators and Corel Centre were profitable. Melnyk came in and was able to leverage even better deals on things like concessions and parking due to the bankruptcy proceedings. The Senators have not seen their attendance or broadcast ratings drop so there is no reason to believe that they cannot be profitable now. And if they were to discover that the operations are no longer profitable now, it is either due to mismanagement or deceit. Neither of those are reasons for the PA to concede anything when it comes to the CBA.

 

[acr*]

I believe the story with the Lapointe signing was this-

At the Board of Governors' meeting the preceeding offseason, the subject of the discrepancies in payrolls came up, and there was an argument between Jacobs and Illitch over the Wings spending out of control and the Bruins not spending period, and the altercation ended with Illitch calling Jacobs a "cheapskate" to his face.

Next offseason Lapointe's contract comes up, he was well liked by the Detroit organization, so Jacobs uncharacteristically overspends on him just to shove it in Illitch's face. That reaction by Jacobs may as well have been the straw on the camel's back leading into the current financial situation we have now.

My favorite part of the story was when Lapointe's agent went to Ken Holland and showed him the Boston offer to see if he wanted to match it, and Holland said "You're joking...right?"

 

[Icey]

Well I don't know if you read the article, but Jacobs is doing exactly that, looking in a mirror. He did acknowledge the owners were responsible for the financial problems the league is in right now. I can only suppose he's including himself in the lot.

Supposing is what got us into this mess. Jacobs acknowledges owners as group got themselves into this mess, but I never heard him once say he was part of the problem and IMO he is a MAJOR part of the problem, more than the Wings, Avalanche, Rangers, Leafs, Stars etc. are. He started this snowball that is out of control. All I hear him do is say how lazy all the players are.

Sorry, but I can't stand the guy. Everything that is wrong with the NHL today can point directly to Jacobs.

 

[SENSible1*]

Wetcoaster can blather on all he wants about the "$52 M they uncovered", yet fails to mention that this money was almost exclusively based on THEIR ridiculous defintition of "hockey revenues".

They refuse to look at the books or negotiate a definition of hockey revenues because they know it will kill the last tiny bit of leverage they have.

 

[Mess]

Wetcoaster can blather on all he wants about the "$52 M they uncovered", yet fails to mention that this money was almost exclusively based on THEIR ridiculous defintition of "hockey revenues".

They refuse to look at the books or negotiate a definition of hockey revenues because they know it will kill the last tiny bit of leverage they have.

The issue comes back to one of trust.


The NHL wants players to accept the conclusion that the league loses hundreds of millions of dollars a year because of out-of-control salaries. It wants to limit salaries to a fixed share of revenues.

The players don't trust the league's numbers. "Everyone knows a good accountant can turn an $8 million profit into an $8 million loss, especially when owners have more than one business," said Bob Boughner, a players union vice president and Colorado Avalanche defenseman. "It goes in one pocket, out the other."

 

[Jarqui]

Wetcoaster can blather on all he wants about the "$52 M they uncovered", yet fails to mention that this money was almost exclusively based on THEIR ridiculous defintition of "hockey revenues".

They refuse to look at the books or negotiate a definition of hockey revenues because they know it will kill the last tiny bit of leverage they have.

Nor have the NHLPA provided any substantiation of that which I have seen.

Here's an example of Forbes pretending it found these revenues :
Anschutz also bought a stake in the Los Angeles Lakers of the National Basketball Association in 1998 and rents out his building to basketball's Los Angeles Clippers and the Los Angeles Avengers of the Arena Football League. When you add in tennis, gymnastics, concerts and other events, Staples Center is busy almost every day or night during the year. Premium seats for corporate fat cats are cross-marketed for the teams and events. Documents related to a bond offering on the building show that bankers estimated Staples Center would generate operating income of $50 million last year, only a fraction of which shows up on the Kings' P&L statement.

Why only a fraction ? The answer is quite simple (some examples):

a) A hockey team isn't in the stadium/arena business. They tend to be tenants in a stadium/arena. A stadium/arena may be "related" to the hockey business but it is a completely different business decision, a completely different business investment, a completely different business risk and therefore a completely different business. As well, a stadium/arena in the NHL tends to be a separate company for a variety of very good business reasons. Further, 27% of NHL team owners don't own a stadium but they must all own a team.

b) Hockey is played about 50 nights a year. As Forbes above points out in their own example above, the Staples Center is busy nearly every night. Why would hockey teams be entitled to any more than a fraction of the revenues ? They're only using the facility 14% of the days of the year. Even then, on those hockey nights, the stadium arena is entitled to their cut of the hockey revenues. So you wind up with a fraction of the stadium revenues and justifiable so. Business 101

c) If a company owner owns a shopping mall that has tenants who have union employees, can anyone point to where those union employees laid claim to the revenues of the mall owner ? It's utter nonsense to consider it just as it is for the unionized hockey players.

d) A hockey team can be yanked out of an arena for arena football or some other sport. The hockey team can go off an rent a facility elsewhere. Both can continue to exist as non essential parts to each other. They are separable.
e) If one hold this to be so, maybe all rock bands who play in NHL arenas should get a cut of the hockey players revenue pie.

Forbes may have sold some magazines claiming "found revenue" but most business people would quickly see through this crap - particularly when they haven't looked at the books.

Here's Levitt's response on the subject of related revenues from his news conference :
Before we finish I want to make another point because nobody has asked me this question about related revenues, which I think is so important and that being an owner who has another business that's profiting somehow or other from the results of the fact that he owns or she owns a hockey team.

I really think that's a non-accounting issue, it's not -- Gap would not consider it. We wouldn't consider it if -- the SEC ... as a valid source of revenue, and I think you would deal with that in the same way as if you said that the owner of the club should receive a higher price for his house because he owns that club or his daughter may be a more marriageable entity because her father owns a hockey team, that just is a specious argument that we certainly did not factor into the numbers.

And most rational and knowledgeable business people would agree with Mr. Levitt.

By avoiding getting to the bottom of the revenue issues by declining joint audits with the NHL, the NHLPA maintains their solidarity with mistrust. That was more important to them than addressing the issue head on.

 

[Jarqui]

Hilarious

I loved his comment about opening the books - the NHL has yet to offer to open all the books of the teams and their related entities. The URO's do not cut it.
…
The Bruins were one of the teams (along with Montreal, LA and Buffalo) the NHLPA reviewed in 1999 and 2000 when they discovered $52 million in undeclared revenues.

No one can put together the UROs opening one set of books on all the teams. Much of the public knows this. It is obvious to anyone who read the Levitt report. The NHL has not declined access to the books used to develop it's UROs. You make the point by contradicting yourself with the NHLPA claim of $52 million dollars. How could they find it if they weren’t allow to see the books ?

The real issue is the philosophy of the Pied Piper of the Nitwits Having Loser's Philosophy Association :

"We continue to believe that a market system, not a team of hired-gun accountants, provides the best measure of the value of the hockey business," NHLPA executive director Bob Goodenow said in a written statement. "In a market system, the owner decides how much to pay the players." a statement made by Bob Goodenow on the day the Levitt report was released.

Auditing is superfluous to Goodenow's doomed philosophy. He admits it. He really isn't interested in it because it kills his ability to continue to bind his players solidarity with unproven distrust of the teams' numbers. Once joint auditing becomes part of the CBA agreement or once the NHLPA audits the books, the concern largely evaporates. You're left with "we agree on $2.1 billion in revenues and don't agree on another $100 mil" in revenues. The rational business person negotiates the delta from there. But Goodenow can’t do that or he’ll lose the support of his players due to the exposure of his ill founded mantra. It would burst his hold on the players because it would reveal that they have not been blessed with a complete set of accurate facts from Goodenow - an abdication of a fundamental responsibility.

 

[Wetcoaster]

No one can put together the UROs opening one set of books on all the teams. Much of the public knows this. It is obvious to anyone who read the Levitt report. The NHL has not declined access to the books used to develop it's UROs. You make the point by contradicting yourself with the NHLPA claim of $52 million dollars. How could they find it if they weren’t allow to see the books ?

The real issue is the philosophy of the Pied Piper of the Nitwits Having Loser's Philosophy Association :

"We continue to believe that a market system, not a team of hired-gun accountants, provides the best measure of the value of the hockey business," NHLPA executive director Bob Goodenow said in a written statement. "In a market system, the owner decides how much to pay the players." a statement made by Bob Goodenow on the day the Levitt report was released.

Auditing is superfluous to Goodenow's doomed philosophy. He admits it. He really isn't interested in it because it kills his ability to continue to bind his players solidarity with unproven distrust of the teams' numbers. Once joint auditing becomes part of the CBA agreement or once the NHLPA audits the books, the concern largely evaporates. You're left with "we agree on $2.1 billion in revenues and don't agree on another $100 mil" in revenues. The rational business person negotiates the delta from there. But Goodenow can’t do that or he’ll lose the support of his players due to the exposure of his ill founded mantra. It would burst his hold on the players because it would reveal that they have not been blessed with a complete set of accurate facts from Goodenow - an abdication of a fundamental responsibility.

As the NHLPA said they were given limited access to do a review (they did not do an audit nor did they have access to all the books) and then using that they compared what they were given with what they could get through such things as SEC filings, etc. They identified $52 million in revenue not disclosed on the URO's.

The NHL owners will not allow the NHLPA unfettered access (as do the other three sports) - plain and simple.

Goodenow noted that in his response to the Levitt Report.

 

[Jarqui]

As the NHLPA said they were given limited access to do a review (they did not do an audit nor did they have access to all the books) and then using that they compared what they were given with what they could get through such things as SEC filings, etc. They identified $52 million in revenue not disclosed on the URO's.

The NHL owners will not allow the NHLPA unfettered access (as do the other three sports) - plain and simple.

Goodenow noted that in his response to the Levitt Report.

Again, that is bluntly incorrect. Here is the text from Goodenow's statement in response to the Levitt report:
http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/news_story.asp?id=71954
We were given access to the UROs for 30 clubs, but were only able to conduct a thorough review of four NHL clubs. On those four clubs alone we found just over $52 million in hockey related revenues and benefits not reported in the League's voluntary and unaudited URO process. If we are given similar access to all of the other individual teams' financial information, presumably used in the Levitt report, we will be in a position to provide further comment.

There is no Goodenow complaint about access to the books of those four clubs. No reference to having to pull from SEC filings for them. No suggestion of incompleteness with those four teams. Goodenow even states "were only able to conduct a thorough review of four NHL clubs..... If we are given similar access to all of the other individual teams' financial information, presumably used in the Levitt report, we will be in a position to provide further comment".

The NHL has challenged the NHLPA in the media since 1992-2000 a number of times to review ALL their books. The NHLPA didn't do it and effectively didn't want to do it per Goodenow's philosophy. Not getting to the bottom of it made for good NHLPA press if the public was gullible and made for a gullible solidarity constructed of fabricated mistrust by avoiding rolling up one’s sleeves to get the bottom of the dispute. Significant financial returns, PR gains or improvement in negotiating position were never there to be had for the NHLPA if the NHLPA performed a complete audit. A majority of the public wasn't gullible. The players obviously were or have been misled.

Goodenow and Saskin have acknowledged that the NHL is losing money. Forbes has acknowledged that the NHL is losing money. If it was a tiny amount of money lost, they wouldn't acknowledge it as a loss - it would be "close to break even". The difference between Forbes and Levitt over the past two years averages $130 million bottom line beyond the $2.1 billion in revenues.

A hunk of that Forbes claim is BS smoke in my opinion and in the opinion of many other as I have outlined in this thread. The NHL has a very good and audited case. The NHLPA don't. The NHLPA case is based on unsubstantiated rhetoric, their largely unsubstantiated opinion and guesses. Where’s the "NHLPA report" ?

If the two parties were to split the raw "difference of opinion" on those numbers and give the players 55% of that action, it works out to $49,000 per player per season. The average salary goes from $1.3 mil to $1.349 mil. Is it worth giving up $1.3 mil per player to get $49,000 more when it merely could have been negotiated ? The NHLPA position is largely negotiating smoke.

The 24% rollback proposed by the NHLPA on Dec 9th comes extremely close to Levitt's numbers and was what was required to solve the NHL financial problem at CBA start up - effectively ratifying the above and Levitt's report. The NHLPA wasted half a season getting there. They were at an absurd 5% in September - not the stuff good faith bargaining is made of.

Going forward, the NHL will likely see at least a 20% drop in revenues due to the cancellation which will have to be taken out of player's salaries. So the players are looking at a further drop of $260,000 per year, after giving up $1.3 million on average this year, while trying to get their mitts on another $49,000/yr and while the game has been damaged for the young players coming along behind them. The lambs have been led to financial slaughter by their Pied Piper.

 

[dakota]

The NHLPA had to sign a non-disclosure agreement so they are very limited in what they can say.

For the NHLPA to give out any details would result in financial penalty clauses being invoked against them - that is what a non-disclosure agreement is all about.

As far as I know Melnyk was the only one to offer to open the books but he does not say if it is just the Senators' books and is he prepared to allow the NHLPA total unfettered access.

As we learned from the Flyers there are two reports - the one the Flyers make to the league (the URO) and the one they use internally which President Ron Ryan has described as "more accurate". The league report upon which Levitt based his report showed a loss according to Ed Snider Chairman of the Board of the Flyers while the internal reports showed a profit according to Flyer president Ron Ryan, who by the way has not been heard from since sharing that insight with a newspaper reporter in Philadelphia.

The NHLPA tested the URO system of reporting when they did the four team review (not even an audit) - that gave them a figure of $52 million in hockey related revenues which were not on the league URO reports which are voluntary unaudited reports which have no compliance mechanisms.

Would they have found more revenue if they were allowed to review the URO's of all the teams? Do you think the NHL let the NHLPA look at the teams hiding the most revenues? The NHLPA thinks there is a serious problem with the URO system based on their experience with the four teams. Forbes Magazine would lend credence to that belief.

The NHLPA continued to pursue the financial information right up to the lockout. Do you notrecall Bill Daly's statement that he found it frustrating that the NHLPA kept asking for the same financial information thay had been seeking "for the past five years". I am sure it is Bill - how about giving to to the NHLPA?

What is the problem? If the figures did bear out the claimed losses why would you not simply comply with the NHLPA's requests?

do you know what exactly was $52 million in undeclared hockey revenues? parking? was it one team not declaring money or all of them? what was the breakdown of each team?

 

[rulin]

There is a gag order and owners may be fined at the discretion of the commissioner. The gag order doesn't mean they can't comment. Only that if they do so, they risk being fined. The fines are used suppress public dissention by owners who disagree with the NHL's official position which weakens the NHL's leverage in negotiations, and those which can be used to show the NHL is bargaining in bad faith. Jacobs couched all his statements carefully. It's extremely unlikely he'd be fined.

I thought the gag order had been lifted? Or was that temporary? Or did this even happen...?

 

[vanlady]

I thought the gag order had been lifted? Or was that temporary? Or did this even happen...?

The gag order was reimposed a few days after it was lifted.

 

[wazee]

The curious thing here is not the 52M that the NHLPA says was undeclared hockey-related revenue. Since ‘hockey-related revenue’ has not been defined, I would expect to see differences in how the two sides would come up with that number.

What seems really odd to me is the NHLPA is operating off numbers that are 5 years old and is refusing any and all attempts by the NHL to get them to look at more recent numbers. IMO, Goodenow’s refusal to do so undermines the PA’s position.

 

[Jarqui]

do you know what exactly was $52 million in undeclared hockey revenues? parking? was it one team not declaring money or all of them? what was the breakdown of each team?

I don't. I've heard the rhetoric but little to back it up or detail it.

As many are probably aware, an LA Kings fan, a CFA, had "unfettered access" to the King's books. He was looking at the discrepancy between Forbes and the Kings books. He signed a non-disclosure agreement and was able to legally produce a 23 page report of his analysis and conclusions.

The link for that report is on the front page of the LetsGoKings site on the LHS "Piston's Financial Report"
http://www.letsgokings.com/

Here is how he addrssed the issue of a non-disclosure agreement:
Finally, there is the matter of the NDA that I was asked to sign as a condition of this analysis. What this accomplishes from the Kings’ point of view is assurance on their part that I do not inadvertently release a number that they wish to withhold to avoid violating agreements with or by-laws of the League. While it is the organization’ s intent to get the maximum amount of information to the fans through this report, the numbers are the property of the Los Angeles Kings, and they wish to protect their interests. On the other hand, the analysis and conclusions derived from this report are solely the property of the author, and the Kings possess no veto power over these findings.

If you review the thousands of media quotations from the NHLPA over the course of this disagreement, they also reveal the NHLPA's analysis and conclusions of the league's numbers. Goodenow did say "If we are given similar access to all of the other individual teams' financial information, presumably used in the Levitt report, we will be in a position to provide further comment." The NHL offered that access. Hiding behind a non-disclosure agreement (which I have found no specific evidence of existence confimed in the media) strikes me more as a matter of convenience to perpetuate the vague and unsubstantiated accusations.

And when you think about it, this is all largely smoke from the NHLPA as well. The numbers going forward are the key. So when the NHL attaches penalities of a $1 million fine & 1 rounder draft picks (3?) for failing to disclose finances accurately and when the NHL adds the offer for a mutually agreed upon 3rd party to audit the books in the future, it really becomes a non issue in the scrap for the 6% of revenues that is in dispute and could be negotiated around today.

 

[Jag68Sid87]

Lapointe was a UFA at that time. One could argue the Bruins were dumb to overpay that much for him, but that can't be used as an example of inflationary contract. If there is a place where I think the league is fine as it is, it's with UFAs. They have earned the right to be overpaid. By definition, a UFA will always be overpaid, unless of course no more than one team wants to sign him, because his salary results from a bidding war. In any system, no matter what, UFAs will always be paid significantly higher than a similarly talented RFA. That's just a right they earned to offer their services to every team and have the one willing to overpay the most win his services.

If we should look at problematic contracts that threw the league out of wack, we should look only at RFAs and rookie contracts with ridiculous bonus clauses. Because unless the RFAs base their salary demands on previous UFA contracts, a thing they shouldn't be allowed to do, UFA contracts have no inflationary influence on the league whatsoever. If nobody is interested in x player's services, he'll have to sign a bellow value contract. If everybody's highly interested, he'll hit the jackpot. Nothing wrong with that. A UFA bases his value on similar RFAs and then ups the price depending on how many teams are interested. But A RFA cannot use a UFA's contract to increase his salary demands. Therefore, only the RFAs' contracts are inflationary in this scenario.

I could not disagree more with everything you say. UFA's should NOT be assumed overpaid, not in a well-run, competitive league. And rookie bonuses are not a problem. A kid only reaches his bonuses because he actually PERFORMED. What's wrong with that? In my opinion, under no circumstance should a Martin Lapointe be earning more than an Ilya Kovalchuk in 2003-04. That's just wrong. You wanna throw salary structures out of whack in a hurry? Start spending more money on third-line talent than all-star talent. That's the easiest and fastest way towards the Abyss, not by spending based on talent level.

The current UFA system does not work, because people who know hockey will not merely accept the fact that grizzled vet A is making twice as much as young stud B because he's earned that right. That's a load of krap, as far as I'm concerned. Your stars should be well paid, your support players should fall accordingly on your payroll. That's the way it should work. Just cuz John LeClair was a star player last decade does NOT mean he should be paid like one this decade.

Look at Marshall Faulk and Jerome Bettis, as just 2 examples of what I'm talking about. Faulk restructured his latest contract because he's accepted the fact he's going to be a backup in 2005. And Bettis took less money even though he had a very big year because he knows he's on his last legs in the NFL. Do you think Bob Goodenow would approve these moves?

Therein lies one of the major problems with the NHL. Obviously, this also occurs in MLB and it's killing the sport.

Martin Lapointe should NOT be making money based on the fact he has service time and was once on the open market, whereas other players will never ever see that open market. Players should be paid based on what their value would be if ALL players were to eventually be placed on the open market.

To that end, I believe the NHL would be better off without RFA and UFA categories and everybody could become a free agent after their first contracts are up. At the very least, you know that the right players would be making the big money. Unfortunately, if you don't put in a hard salary cap, all those players end up on a select few teams (hello, Major League Baseball).

end of rant.

 

[Jarqui]

Further to this claim by Forbes :

Here's an example of Forbes pretending it found these revenues :
Anschutz also bought a stake in the Los Angeles Lakers of the National Basketball Association in 1998 and rents out his building to basketball's Los Angeles Clippers and the Los Angeles Avengers of the Arena Football League. When you add in tennis, gymnastics, concerts and other events, Staples Center is busy almost every day or night during the year. Premium seats for corporate fat cats are cross-marketed for the teams and events. Documents related to a bond offering on the building show that bankers estimated Staples Center would generate operating income of $50 million last year, only a fraction of which shows up on the Kings' P&L statement.

Here's what a LA Kings fan saw when he actually looked at the books:

Looking at other portions of the AEG business empire, Staples Center is profitable, but only marginally so after making a significant debt service payment on the $315 million in debt held against the facility. Given that AEG ownership percentage of Staples Center is lower than that of the Kings, these profits are insufficient to cover the cash losses of the hockey team. Anschutz Entertainment Group does not earn any income from the Kings.
...
As to transfer payments between the entities, the Kings pay 8% of gross ticket receipts or $1.9 million to Staples Center for rent. This is the same rent paid by the Lakers and puts the Kings squarely in the middle of the league in terms of its lease payment. In return, Staples contributes 25% of the premier seat and luxury suite license and ticket revenues to the Kings. Again, this is the same amount of money that the Lakers re ceive. In addition, Staples Center and all its facilities are made available to the Kings that use them to sell their merchandise and place their sponsorships.

That 25% box revenue given to the Kings is much higher than the 14% of the days of the year that the Kings occupy a building that is busy nearly every day of the year.

Some remarks from Levitt on this general subject :
We requested that the NHL perform a calculation to determine what the allocated revenues and expenses included in the 2002-2003 NHL combined URO would be if each of the teams with a building affiliation had allocated revenues and expenses using a consistent methodology based on paid attendance at NHL hockey events in relation to total Paid Attendance in the arena. We reviewed the calculations in detail and compared the results to the amounts included by each team in the UROs submitted.

Conclusion : Affiliated Arenas:

Based on this benchmarking analysis, I conclude that, when allocated between hockey and non-hockey events using Paid Attendance as a standard basis of allocation, aggregate League-wide revenues and expenses would not materially differ from the amounts reported in the combined League-wide URO. The
combined URO reports an aggregate League-wide operating loss of $273 million for the 2002-2003 NHL season. The results of the benchmarking study would increase the NHL's operating loss for that same season by $2 million.

In other words, Levitt did look into this and cross checked the various methods used across the league. Further, one might look at the Kings and try to argue there should have been more revenue from them. But when you take that approach with all the teams, you can't ignore the teams who would receive less revenue using that sort of an approach.

I lean heavily towards the word of the two independent parties who actually looked at the books and arrived at a similar conclusion over the one party who did not.

 

[dakota]

Further to this claim by Forbes :


Here's what a LA Kings fan saw when he actually looked at the books:

Looking at other portions of the AEG business empire, Staples Center is profitable, but only marginally so after making a significant debt service payment on the $315 million in debt held against the facility. Given that AEG ownership percentage of Staples Center is lower than that of the Kings, these profits are insufficient to cover the cash losses of the hockey team. Anschutz Entertainment Group does not earn any income from the Kings.
...
As to transfer payments between the entities, the Kings pay 8% of gross ticket receipts or $1.9 million to Staples Center for rent. This is the same rent paid by the Lakers and puts the Kings squarely in the middle of the league in terms of its lease payment. In return, Staples contributes 25% of the premier seat and luxury suite license and ticket revenues to the Kings. Again, this is the same amount of money that the Lakers re ceive. In addition, Staples Center and all its facilities are made available to the Kings that use them to sell their merchandise and place their sponsorships.

That 25% box revenue given to the Kings is much higher than the 14% of the days of the year that the Kings occupy a building that is busy nearly every day of the year.

Some remarks from Levitt on this general subject :
We requested that the NHL perform a calculation to determine what the allocated revenues and expenses included in the 2002-2003 NHL combined URO would be if each of the teams with a building affiliation had allocated revenues and expenses using a consistent methodology based on paid attendance at NHL hockey events in relation to total Paid Attendance in the arena. We reviewed the calculations in detail and compared the results to the amounts included by each team in the UROs submitted.

Conclusion : Affiliated Arenas:

Based on this benchmarking analysis, I conclude that, when allocated between hockey and non-hockey events using Paid Attendance as a standard basis of allocation, aggregate League-wide revenues and expenses would not materially differ from the amounts reported in the combined League-wide URO. The
combined URO reports an aggregate League-wide operating loss of $273 million for the 2002-2003 NHL season. The results of the benchmarking study would increase the NHL's operating loss for that same season by $2 million.

In other words, Levitt did look into this and cross checked the various methods used across the league. Further, one might look at the Kings and try to argue there should have been more revenue from them. But when you take that approach with all the teams, you can't ignore the teams who would receive less revenue using that sort of an approach.

I lean heavily towards the word of the two independent parties who actually looked at the books and arrived at a similar conclusion over the one party who did not.

I thought the NHLPA looked at the books for the Kings... they were one of the 4 teams that they looked at... is there a public report about what they found? Ie. similar to what the authors above stated publicly without breaching nondisclosure agreement.

 

[guinness]

I believe the story with the Lapointe signing was this-

At the Board of Governors' meeting the preceeding offseason, the subject of the discrepancies in payrolls came up, and there was an argument between Jacobs and Illitch over the Wings spending out of control and the Bruins not spending period, and the altercation ended with Illitch calling Jacobs a "cheapskate" to his face.

Next offseason Lapointe's contract comes up, he was well liked by the Detroit organization, so Jacobs uncharacteristically overspends on him just to shove it in Illitch's face. That reaction by Jacobs may as well have been the straw on the camel's back leading into the current financial situation we have now.

My favorite part of the story was when Lapointe's agent went to Ken Holland and showed him the Boston offer to see if he wanted to match it, and Holland said "You're joking...right?"

I always thought that Detroit's and Montreal's offer to Lapointe weren't that far off from Boston's, maybe a few hundred thousand. Lapointe's contract is bad, but I still think Holik 's in worse. Hatcher and Cujo have to have the worst contracts in the other positions.

 

[Jarqui]

I thought the NHLPA looked at the books for the Kings... they were one of the 4 teams that they looked at... is there a public report about what they found? Ie. similar to what the authors above stated publicly without breaching nondisclosure agreement.

None that I have ever seen and I've followed it pretty closely. And yes, the Kings were one of the four teams that the NHLPA looked at. Further and again, the NHLPA were satisfied with their access to the records of these teams according to the remarks made by Goodenow during his response to the Levitt report.

 

[Wetcoaster]

I thought the NHLPA looked at the books for the Kings... they were one of the 4 teams that they looked at... is there a public report about what they found? Ie. similar to what the authors above stated publicly without breaching nondisclosure agreement.

The NHLPA was given limited access to certain material to conduct a review (of four teams (Boston, LA Montreal, Buffalo). They were not given access to the team's books.

The NHL and owners has NEVER offered full disclosure and free access to team books and those of their related corporate entities as is the norm in the NFL, NBA and MLB. Even Levitt was not given this access as he states in the notes to his report. The owners do not even share this information with one another.

 

[Wetcoaster]

None that I have ever seen and I've followed it pretty closely. And yes, the Kings were one of the four teams that the NHLPA looked at. Further and again, the NHLPA were satisfied with their access to the records of these teams according to the remarks made by Goodenow during his response to the Levitt report.

Not so. You better re-read Goodenow's response.

 

[mooseOAK*]

The NHLPA was given limited access to certain material to conduct a review (of four teams (Boston, LA Montreal, Buffalo). They were not given access to the team's books.

The NHL and owners has NEVER offered full disclosure and free access to team books and those of their related corporate entities as is the norm in the NFL, NBA and MLB. Even Levitt was not given this access as he states in the notes to his report. The owners do not even share this information with one another.

I have never seen it written anywhere that the NHL revenue disclosure rules were going to be any different than the other leagues. Where did you find this?

 

[Jarqui]

Not so. You better re-read Goodenow's response.

Here it is for all to read:

http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/news_story.asp?id=71954
We were given access to the UROs for 30 clubs, but were only able to conduct a thorough review of four NHL clubs. On those four clubs alone we found just over $52 million in hockey related revenues and benefits not reported in the League's voluntary and unaudited URO process. If we are given similar access to all of the other individual teams' financial information, presumably used in the Levitt report, we will be in a position to provide further comment.

The information provided by the NHL to the NHLPA allowed them to conduct a "thorough review" of those four clubs - with no complaints from Goodenow about a lack of information that prevented them from doing a "thorough" review.

 

[NYFAN]

Jacobs talks alot of smack for someone who routinely rips off other owners with his concession empire!

 

[Jarqui]

The NHL and owners has NEVER offered full disclosure and free access to team books and those of their related corporate entities as is the norm in the NFL, NBA and MLB. Even Levitt was not given this access as he states in the notes to his report. The owners do not even share this information with one another.

Here's what Levitt said in his "summary"
"He (Bettman) was emphatic in his instructions that the review procedures should be designed in a manner I deemed appropriate, and that I (Levitt) would have access to any and all the data I needed to perform the assignment. Moreover, Commissioner Bettman made it clear that my review of the League's finances and my report thereon should be independent, even if my findings were dramatically different from those reported in the combined URO. "

Can you provide a quote and a link to that statement you claim was made by Levitt in his report where he was denied access to existing information ?