So he is telling all the players to start searching for jobs in 2019 to expect another season lost.
Following Fehr in baseball, he's a scorched-earth style negotiator. In other words, he's not afraid to come into the negotiating table and say that he is willing to puck things up terribly for all if he does not get his way.
If I was a hockey player, I would definitely look for alternative contracts and have some lined up for 2019.
What Fehr will want is to consider total market value of the clubs for determining salary caps, not just simple revenue streams such as ticket sales and broadcasting contracts. The problem is that the value of clubs appears to be very disparate between teams like NYR and TML compared to clubs like the Canes and Yotes.
It also doesn't help for the owners to charge a half of billion dollars for Las Vegas team, and more for what's being talked about for Seattle. That's about $1.1B revenue that is not factored into the cap.