True...
DementedReality said:
why should the players have non guaranteed contracts and the owners get guaranteed contracts.
i say, if the owners can break the contract because they are paying too much, its only fair if the player can do the same if they are being paid too little.
and dont tell me it happens NOW, because it doesnt. Yashin tried it and it didnt work, Tkachuk tried it and the team caved. There are no other examples of players succesfully reneging on a valid contract.
dr
Which is exactly why the buyout rate for an NHL contract needs to be reduced from the ridiculously high 2/3 of the remainder of a contract for players over 26.
The NHL teams SHOULD have to pay a penalty for cutting a deal short, but there's no way a player should get 66.7% of the rest of the contract. A team would only buy a player out if he is not performing up to the money of his contract. Be it a Leclair, Brind'Amour, Turgeon, etc. Something reasonable in the 25% range should be fair for both sides.
I saw that stupid 2 Minutes for Instigating with Burke and Healy and I found it almost appalling that Healy was complaining about how the players might only get 20 cents on the dollar..... Please.... A player should be happy to get 20 cents on the dollar if he's not performing up to expectations.
As for the opposite way around, hey if Players want to pay the team 25% of the rest of his contract to get out of it, fine by me.
The NFL doesn't have Guaranteed contracts, but they make up for that with Huge Signing Bonuses. So a guy might sign a 5 year 30 million dollar deal, and get 5 million or so of that up front. So, his yearly salary is then 5 million per season. If after 2 years he underperforms, he gets cut and his total earnings from those 2 years is 15 million dollars.
Now, with the NHL had a 25% buyout on contracts, then that same 5 year deal you'd pay the guy 6 million per season. After 2 years of underperformance, he'd earn 12 million and the 18 million @ a 25% buyout rate would be 4.5 million. For a total of 16.5 million over the 2 years that you had that player.
So, a 1.5 million dollar difference, but that might come out even depending on the signing bonus money.
So, I'm all for Guaranteed contracts, with a 25% buyout rate. Because the player still has those years to go and earn a salary, albeit a lower one, but if he can Re-establish himself, he might get a better deal later.