nyr7andcounting said:
I don't think it's the same provisions as the $42.5M. In fact it was reported that arbirtation and QO's are going to be what was offered by the PA in Dec. rather than what was offered by NHL in Feb. I believe that's a 10-15% difference in QO depending on the player. We also know that there is going to be a decent amount of revenue sharing which is good for everyone. That can only strengthen the weak markets and that helps the players as well as the league.
WTF? Nice spin. So it was better to leave $10 million on the table in hopes of getting qualifying offers for players UNDER $1M bumped 10-15%? Okay Sparky, do the math. How many players does it take to equal $10 million when you are getting a 10% bump on your sub-$1M salary? I'll give you a hint. More than is on ANY NHL roster at one time. Its actually better than FOUR complete rosters. Wow! Big win! Leave the $10 million on the table for that 10% on something under a million! Brilliant!!!
Revenue sharing has always been in the mix. The NHL has been talking in the neighborhood of $60-90 million, so the deal being proposed now is going to have to equal that or better. Since payroll taxes are projected to be 1-for-1 on anything over $29 million, and a cap set at $36 million, that means that a maximum of $7 million will be generated for teams that hit the cap. Based on that figure the NHLPA has to see 9 teams hit the $36 million tax to hit the low number and 13 teams to hit the high. I just don't see many teams coming close to that cap number, so I think this is a loss as well. Color me crazy, but I think the NHLPA wanted to see a lot more money in the system than that, and have it distributed to greater audience as well.
It has not removed $180M from payroll. Potential means nothing, that's like saying an $x cap is too high because if everyone spends to it the league will go broke. You have to judge it on what will happen, not best/worst case scenarios that are unrealistic. Only a few teams would be spending that extra couple of million, especially with a luxury tax and especially this year. And since there is a floor, some teams are pulled up and the overall market isn't as depressed as it would be if you dropped the cap and didn't add a floor. Players don't lose a lot of money next year eventhough the cap is lower.
NEWS FLASH! The league has always has a ground floor level for teams to spend to. That's how banding works and that's how guaranteed revenues works. Try and spin it into a brilliant victory if you like, but when it was always in the proposal its not much of a give. Its not like they got something they didn't already have. And the players don't lose much money? Hmmmm, the players are going to get 54% of revenues versus 76% of revenues from the last deal. Again, spin all you want, but that is a 22% hit in BASE revenues. Include the likely decrease in revenues and you see a huge hit. From $1.5 billion (76% of $2.1 billion) down to $810M (54% of a projected $1.5 billion). That's a substantial hit.
I haven't seen anyone on here suggest linkage is an overall win for the PA so I don't know what you are talking about. It's inclusion could/probably will make the deal better than the hard caps they have been offered though. You have to realize that if at any point a proposed hard cap is lower than what linkage could place a cap at since revenues will most likely rise, then linkage is better. $42.5 and the last NHL offer I believe was $37.5M...those are hard caps that won't move over this CBA. If linkage is going to increase the cap over 6 years, and if you believe that it will increase to a point past the hard caps that were offered, than it makes more sense to take the linkage. The PA was against linkage a year ago because they didn't want a cap at all, and plan B was probably to get a hard cap high enough that it would be beyond a linkage cap. Didn't work out, and now that the hard cap offers are low enough, it makes sense to take linkage. Not an overall win, but linkage is probably better than $42.5M hard cap.
More spin! Man, cut it out. You gota be getting dizzy by now! All along the NHLPA repeated the mantra, "NO CAP! NO LINKAGE!". They were not going to take ANY deal with those conditions in any shape or form. Ooooops, looks like they're getting that rammed right down their throats after all. To add to that, the NHL had offered the NHLPA profit sharing of 50% of anything over $115 million. That profit sharing opportunity is lost. That is money right out of the NHLPA's pockets that they could have had.
[/QUOTE]Again, no one is suggesting that, at least not me. Also they only lost 1/3rd of a season and some playoff money, not a whole year of salaries. Neither side was going to agree to anything until February, so by not taking $42.5M and waiting for a possibly better deal, they lost 3 months of salary and playoff money.[/QUOTE]
You spin me right round, baby right round, like a record, right round round round round!!!
Yup, the NHLPA only lost 3 months salary. Keep telling that to yourself. Forget the $1.5 billion they pissed away with the whole lost NHL season. Hell, they'll lose 1/3 of what they could have made last season just in the drop in revenues from not taking the deal earlier. Its been a cluster foul-up from go for the NHLPA. All the spining you want to do is not going to change how badly they are getting boned.