Icewind Dale said:
Oh, I beg to differ. Where the money the fans invest goes matters quite a bit. If the money doesn't go to the players, it goes to the owners. I don't care much to see an old man get richer. I don't, however, mind seeing my favourite players get richer. It is their trade, afterall, that drives the industry.
I'd say most people who side with the owners appear to resent the players for being richer than them, more than anything. "They're paid millions to play a boys game. They should be grateful, not greedy" is a pretty accurate paraphrase of quite a few comments I've read around here.
Why is it fair that the owners take a loss? Mostly because they're the ones owning running a business. I'm not expert on business, but I do know this. In the business world, you risk losses. Especially if you're a buyer. The players, on the other hand, are the ones applying their trade.
You're right about one thing. Both sides are, in the overall picture, to blame. However, relatively speaking the players not nearly as much to blame as the owners are. The owners screwed up. They're trying to save their skins by taking back what the players worked hard to earn. So yes, the players are certainly more victims in this whole mess than the owners are.
So what you're saying is that by the owners taking risks to own a business, that its ok if they lose money and eventually have to sell or move the team. By having a league where more than half the teams lose money, is just not healthy for the league overall. If we want to truely make this league even more successful, we need big corporations to back teams with loads of cash. Very few companies or people would buy into a franchise as of right now. We need stability to grow this game, and we all know that there is major potential to do that. I'm not a fan of Goodenow or Bettman, especially Bettman and the way he has handled the state of the game, but this is a step in the right direction.
We need competitive balance to get a tv contract. Otherwise ABC can continue paying money to show 3 Avalanche/Detroit games a season. If at the start of each season, it is possible for any team to be successful, its get more people excited about their teams, especially in the states where the game needs a much help as it can get. In most of these states, the teams are also struggling. It has to be pretty hard to get new fans to the game, when their team has had many losing seasons. And as the demand grows for the game especially in the troubled states, the tv stations will have no choice but to follow suit and try to make some advertising revenue.
Right now, I don't care who's giving up more. As far as I see it, the players aren't really going to take that much of a hit. For most of them it won't change their lifestyle one bit. Jagr might have to stay out of the casinos a little more. I just want this league to be successful like I have said many times. The players keep getting fed propoganda from Goodenow, alot of what they state in their private comments show actually how uneducated they truely are when it comes to this. That might be a little unfair to say, whether or not they are just saying that to show their firm stance, but alot have stated things that about a cap that shows they have not done the research and just throwing out their own opinion without the proper knowledge. And what Bettman has said in the media, has been fairly honest. He has stated when he thinks things will work and what won't and I tend to agree with him in every aspect. A luxury tax will not work unless its paired with a cap, unless of course their is a different model of luxury tax with certain stipulations that will provide some sort of cost certainty.
I do think some players are greedy when it comes to this, but thats not why my view is what it is. I also think some are very misinformed. By Goodenow and the rest of NHLPA head honchos just writing off the Levitt Report or even the Forbes one, it makes it easy to just bypass that in the media. By not really looking at the problems facing the league, they can just go on their merry way and not actually take into consideration that the league is in serious trouble.
All this positioning from both sides is getting sickening. Its not about arguments who is taking the bigger cut, who caused all of this, the players/owners shouldn't give this up because its the others fault. Screw all of that, it means nothing. The bottomline is the league needs stability and few years of so-called "hardship" for the players to get this league back on its feet and moving in a new direction. Am I the only one that sees a major chance for growth if this deal is done. With the cost-certainty, all it takes is the league to garner more interest from fans and tv, and all of a sudden revenues are up and once again the players are loving life.