Lanny MacDonald*
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impudent_lowlife said:The owners say: "We want to tie player salaries to revenues" - such as the revenues accounted for in the Levitt report, which was shown to be nothing but lies by Forbes. And, "we want to limit the profits of players while not limiting our own profits and call it a 'partnership'".
The Levitt report was proven to be nothing but lies by Forbes? That's a laugh. Forbes "guesses" at their figures and is regularly out to lunch on the values they place on teams and the revenues they generate. Leavitt followed the same formula that the NFL uses for revenues to define the numbers in his report. What really drove home the fact that the Leavitt report was factual was that the number the players offered as a salary roll back almost perfectly matched the number that the Leavitt report said the league was bleeding. Using Forbes as a source for revenue numbers is like using the National Enquirer as a souce for your discertation. It makes for interesting reading but doesn't hold up when it comes to defense.
The players say: "we want the market to decide salaries but we acknowkedge that some serious issues do need toi be addressed but a salary cap is not sacrosanct to any negotiated agreement."
What that really says is yes, the market is broken and we admit that. But we still expect to get all the traffic will bear and not have to deal with iron clad rules. If we cannot use collusion to our advantage, and have the threat of suing the league and the teams for collusion to ensure that salaries continue to escalate, then the deal just doesn't work for us. Collusion is the best thing that ever happened to the players and hate the fact that this is the only time the owners get to legally collude and that the players are going to get hit hard, the exact same way the players have hit the owners for the past decade.
It's obvious that the owners, under the incompetant leadership of Bettman, want to get back to the days of a compliant Eagleson-type NHLPA.
I love how the morons in the NHLPA take shots at Bettman. Do they really think before they engage their mouths? Really? They experienced more growth in their salaries under Bettman, and saw more union jobs created under Bettman, than at any time in NHL history. Do the players have anything to be mad at Bettman about for the last decade? Not a thing. If anything they should have him at the top of their Christmas card list. Bettman and many of the moves he made were the best thing that ever happened to the NHLPA.
Do the owners want to get back to a comliant NHLPA? You bet your bottom they do. Will Bettman lead the owners there? He better, or he'll be looking for a new job. Fortunately, Bettman is getting the job done and has the players by the nads. Its over and the league has won. All he has to do is wait this one out.