scaredsensfan said:
Maybe not guaranteed profits, but what business outside sports leagues (at least some of them, now NHL and NFL) have guaranteed profits? Honestly, I can see why the owners wnat this, but the stupidity of fans saying that they deserve it (or 'should' make profits) regardless of incompetence or bad management makes me shake my head in disbelief.
We're talking about labour negociations. The NHL as a whole wants to be profitable, which is good for everyone (the players, the owners, the fans) in the long term. A salary cap will give a chance to every team to make some profit if they're well run.
As well, I'd like to hear what's your definition of a competent management: one that ices a good team or one that makes profits? If you say it's to make profits, then teams like the Minnessota Wild can be example for good management (and I'm sure you'd like all teams to follow their business plan). If you say that ices a good team, then some teams could be set as an example while they're making heavy losses. In a non capped league (or one where the difference in payroll is large), the problem is that there will be teams willing to spend like crazy and making a loss to win, while the teams that want to stay financially responsible will have to use other means to get a chance to win (the trap?) because they can't land similar talent.
In other words, in sports league, if you want every team to make the efforts to be the most competitive possible on the ice, you'll need a setup where the payroll difference between teams can't be too high. Then, management has to focus on ice operations, which is good for the fans. Once that is done, they can take care of the financial issues, but they're able to do so after taking care of the on-ice product.
A last word about "guaranteed profits". The NHL will have to work for it, because they need to pull enough revenues so that their 46% of revenues covers their costs of operation. As the revenues grow and their fixed costs becomes a lower percentage of total revenues, their profit share will rise. In other words, to get profits, the owners still have to work on growing the game. As well, as the revenues grow, the players benefit because it means their 54% is a larger amount (and it means they will be able to grow that % in the future CBA negociations). For the fans, if the game grows, it probably means a better on ice product, which is also a good thing for them. Win-win-win situation. That's why the capitalistic economy is based on profits. If the business in your country are making profits, the economy goes well and you improve your standard of living. If the business in your country are making losses, the economy will not grow like it should, people will be laid off and it won't be such a good time for the workers. It's a circle. What this means for the workers is that their business needs to make profit, but not too much (now look back at the profit sharing offer by the NHL as a way to ensure this happens).
