A question for the NHLPA supporters

[Cawz]

And personally I'm getting damn disgusted with how fans are turning on each other in this forum....

I totally agree. Its sad really. But we're watching our sport get turned into a bickering contest. I guess we are all just joining in.

 

[ceber]

I think in the NFL, when two good teams are playing, the football is good. Other than that, it can get really, really ugly. Millions of penalties, dumb plays, punts, etc.

Medicority is measured in realitive terms, so yeah, if you have a bunch of teams with lots of good players, .500 is mediocre. To turn the argument around, if all the teams are bad, but finish .500, they're still mediocre within the context of the time period. There still has to be a best and worst bad or good team, so those in the middle are mediocre.

The word "average" would fit better here then. Mediocre, while a synonym of average, carries an extra connotation of poor or inferior quality. It doesn't sound like that's what you're saying.

 

[hockeytown9321]

Just so everyone knows, the Wings did buy a cup.

Moving on.

It all depends on how you look at the situation, I don't see what's wrong with an NFL system. It provides a lot of money to the owners, which seems to be a bad thing, and it's the most popular sport in North America, the Super Bowl is watched by MILLIONS. I don't see how the NHL becoming popular is a bad thing. Maybe it is, but I don't see how.

You cannot get the NHL popular with the way it is now, losing 9 NHL teams also won't help the NHL become the most popular sport either.

I have less of a problem with an owner asking to gain some money in something he's put forward, then I do seeing 3rd and 4th line NHLers asking for 1 Million Dollar contracts, and that's where it ends for me. I have no problem with players (who are greedy in their own way) asking to be paid top dollar, but the question is what is top dollar? I say 7 Million.....spoiled brats, who needs more then 7 Million?

But when I see players of decent talent getting 5 Million, 4 Million, 2 Million, heck even ONE million, that's where MY personal problem is.

And you can't blame the "rich" teams, they have millions of people in their cities, they have the ability to raise prices to the demand that people will pay. The problem is that they then go and pay 1.65 Million to a 4th line player. Well then every 4th line player should be getting 1.65 Million (in the eyes of the player).

That's the problem, I don't BLAME Edmonton, or Carolina, I blame the owners for moving Carolina, but thats a different issue. You can't BLAME small market teams for not spending, and you can't blame large market teams for over spending.

I don't THINK a cap would hurt, but I don't think a cap is NEEDED.

There are tons of other things that can be done to curb spending of the lucky/rich teams. The Red Wings, Leafs, Rangers and such.

Please, I implore you to tell me which Cups the Red Wings bought. I can assure you that you have no idea what you're talking about.

And comparing the revenue the NFL generates is such a ridiculous argument. It has nothing to do with a cap. The NFL's current deal pays each team $68 million per year. Bettman managed $2 million a year for his teams in the last deal with ABC, and $0.00 in the new deal with NBC.

 

[hockeytown9321]

The word "average" would fit better here then. Mediocre, while a synonym of average, carries an extra connotation of poor or inferior quality. It doesn't sound like that's what you're saying.

I tihnk in general the play in the NFL is medicore, but I'm not going to get into a semantic debate about it. I think if everyone's average, thats bad too.

 

[OpinionatedMike]

And comparing the revenue the NFL generates is such a ridiculous argument. It has nothing to do with a cap. The NFL's current deal pays each team $68 million per year. Bettman managed $2 million a year for his teams in the last deal with ABC, and $0.00 in the new deal with NBC.

Bettman managed $2 Million a year with ABC, and nothing with the NBC.

Yep, Gary's fault. Not the fault of the Hundreds of Million os fans who weren't watching, right?
Oh wait, the NHL isn't that popular? Oh....ok...let's get rid of 5-6 teams in the US, that'll make it more popular....Right?

 

[hockeytown9321]

Did some more NFL research.

Looked at the same 5 teams, only in the 10 years before the Cap was instutited(1983-92)

I'm not going to break everything down, because its not really important.

Out of 50 seasons, there were 15 at or within a game of .500, three less than under the cap. I don't consider that a significant difference. 11 seasons were under seven wins vs. 14 since the cap. So things are looking pretty good for the cap people, or so you'd think.

There were 24 seasons over 9 wins.

that means a 50% chance of one of those teams having 10 or more wins over a 10 year period vs. 38% under the cap. Its painfully obvious that the top of the league was dragged to the middle by the cap, while a few near the bottom got brought up.

Under the cap these teams have had back to back 10+ win seasons 8 times. Before the cap, they did it 12 times.

this should end the discussion of whether or not a cap creates mediocrity\average-ocrity.

But if it doesn't, tomorrow's lesson will be on NFL teams at the bottom before the cap that have stayed there since, and time permitting, a look at NFL dynasties. Don't miss it.

 

[garry1221]

Just so everyone knows, the Wings did buy a cup.

Moving on.

It all depends on how you look at the situation, I don't see what's wrong with an NFL system. It provides a lot of money to the owners, which seems to be a bad thing, and it's the most popular sport in North America, the Super Bowl is watched by MILLIONS. I don't see how the NHL becoming popular is a bad thing. Maybe it is, but I don't see how.

You cannot get the NHL popular with the way it is now, losing 9 NHL teams also won't help the NHL become the most popular sport either.

I have less of a problem with an owner asking to gain some money in something he's put forward, then I do seeing 3rd and 4th line NHLers asking for 1 Million Dollar contracts, and that's where it ends for me. I have no problem with players (who are greedy in their own way) asking to be paid top dollar, but the question is what is top dollar? I say 7 Million.....spoiled brats, who needs more then 7 Million?

But when I see players of decent talent getting 5 Million, 4 Million, 2 Million, heck even ONE million, that's where MY personal problem is.

And you can't blame the "rich" teams, they have millions of people in their cities, they have the ability to raise prices to the demand that people will pay. The problem is that they then go and pay 1.65 Million to a 4th line player. Well then every 4th line player should be getting 1.65 Million (in the eyes of the player).

That's the problem, I don't BLAME Edmonton, or Carolina, I blame the owners for moving Carolina, but thats a different issue. You can't BLAME small market teams for not spending, and you can't blame large market teams for over spending.

I don't THINK a cap would hurt, but I don't think a cap is NEEDED.

There are tons of other things that can be done to curb spending of the lucky/rich teams. The Red Wings, Leafs, Rangers and such.

please tell me, what does the cup cost?.... if the wings bought a cup they must have had the money to pay for it right?... and unless they bought it from 7-11 or another party store there most likely was a receipt.... please find that information, i'd really like to know

oh sorry, there's no such thing as 'buying the cup', hell, if the cup could be bought then the rangers would have won how many times in the past decade???

other than that point i pretty much agree w/ everything you had to say

 

[hockeytown9321]

Bettman managed $2 Million a year with ABC, and nothing with the NBC.

Yep, Gary's fault. Not the fault of the Hundreds of Million os fans who weren't watching, right?
Oh wait, the NHL isn't that popular? Oh....ok...let's get rid of 5-6 teams in the US, that'll make it more popular....Right?

I don't think it'd make it any less popular.

Its really a strech to blame people who have no interest in the game for its problems. Is Bettman supposed to call them up and say "you should watch hockey",a nd then they do? I can see the response: "hey, I never thought of that, thanks."

Maybe they should have realized there were hundreds of millions of people not watching before expanding to the places those people live. And I highly doubt those hundreds of millions are going to decide after a 2 year lockout that they want to watch. Thats just me though, all I care about is the Red Wings.

 

[OpinionatedMike]

Its really a strech to blame people who have no interest in the game for its problems. Is Bettman supposed to call them up and say "you should watch hockey",a nd then they do? I can see the response: "hey, I never thought of that, thanks."

Maybe they should have realized there were hundreds of millions of people not watching before expanding to the places those people live. And I highly doubt those hundreds of millions are going to decide after a 2 year lockout that they want to watch. Thats just me though, all I care about is the Red Wings.

You made mention that the NFL gets a HUGE TV Deal. I said it wasn't Gary's fault for not having people watch.
You do know that for him to get the 60 Million he GOT in the first place he promised to get teams into MORE American markets. That was a huge selling point. May have been a partial down fall to the league but it's a totally different issue.

You can't tell whose NOT going to watch. It was a chain reaction.
In 1993 the NHL was looking good, the CBA seemed to be nice and fine (obviously loopholes and things that were over looked are now clear to almost everyone).

So you have owners wanting teams, but it takes a few years to get TV deals, arenas, and such. If that wasn't the case I bet we'd of had 37 teams. What ended up happening is that you move into Florida, and Tampa and it starts off decent. It starts to look good!
Then you have more teams move into other cities and it looks good. Then, with only 16 of 30 teams making the post season, you have to show the *new markets* that you want to win, you also can't lockout and risk losing those markets (hence the resigning of the CBA twice)

So now you have too many markets because too many owners saw a GOOD league at one time and invested the expansion fees. Now owners are telling the fans to stick through a few years because any team takes time to grow. So Florida makes it to the Cup Finals, and when they get there (using a system that other teams lacking talent could use and tweak and make the game boring, and using the system due to the lack of talent to support 30 teams) they rolled over and died. Then they never recovered, the new fans they had wanted a winner every year, other new teams to the league wanted to do what Florida did and stay on top, they wanted to keep the fans, and be competitive, so they offered one or two major names (major names to those markets) some larger then "normal" contracts.....then salary increases a little more, then you see first round picks start to get better, you see Carolina needing a "superstar" and offer Federov a TON of money. Salaries continue to climb because Scott Mellanby makes 2.3 Million a season then Shanny wants 4 a season, then Forsberg is twice the player Shanny is (in his mind, and the mind of his agent) so he demands 10 Million, and Kayria wants 10 Million.

All the while the teams that REALLY can afford this are happy, they don't care, where as teams like Edmonton, and Washington are either forced to make a move that they hope pans out (Jagr) or go belly up.

IF all was perfect then there would of been 30 strong teams with amazing talent, but the pool was very very thin, so players that didn't deserve 1.2, 2.6, 3.3 Million GOT 3.3 Million. The talent was spread thin, because at one point in the early 90's the NHL was a STRONG league, it was exciting and there where Millionaires who wanted a peice of the pie, and the idea that the more markets you go to, the more people you get to watch (assuming the talent level was there) and the TV contract would then follow suit and then BAM everyone would be like an NFL team.

But that didn't happen, there is really no way of knowing that it was going to happen this.

I'm sorry it did. The NHLPA these days seem to be fine with 200 players losing jobs and 5 teams folding. The NHL seems to think that the talent level is getting there and 30 NHL Teams can survive. Both.....in theroy are TRUE. Both COULD work, but both can also fail.

I could go over how it could fail, or gain. But I won't.

 

[hockeytown9321]

You can't tell whose NOT going to watch.

Yes you can. Its called market research. How come I knew all of the nontraditional markets would struggle? Its common sense.

It might not be Bettman's fault no one watches(though I think he should get some blame), but he, as a supposed marketing genius, should know the limitations of his sport. Look at George Bush. He knows John Kerry has an advantage in domestic issues, so he tries to focus on his advantages, national security and the war on terror. He plays to his strenghs, and tries to avoid exposing his weaknesses. And he's going to win because of it.

So now you have too many markets because too many owners saw a GOOD league at one time and invested the expansion fees. Now owners are telling the fans to stick through a few years because any team takes time to grow. So Florida makes it to the Cup Finals, and when they get there (using a system that other teams lacking talent could use and tweak and make the game boring, and using the system due to the lack of talent to support 30 teams) they rolled over and died. Then they never recovered, the new fans they had wanted a winner every year, other new teams to the league wanted to do what Florida did and stay on top, they wanted to keep the fans, and be competitive, so they offered one or two major names (major names to those markets) some larger then "normal" contracts.....then salary increases a little more, then you see first round picks start to get better, you see Carolina needing a "superstar" and offer Federov a TON of money. Salaries continue to climb because Scott Mellanby makes 2.3 Million a season then Shanny wants 4 a season, then Forsberg is twice the player Shanny is (in his mind, and the mind of his agent) so he demands 10 Million, and Kayria wants 10 Million.

The Fedorov example is terrible. Karmanos and Ilitch don't get along, Karmanos knew Ilitch would match it. The offer was made out of spite. Karmanos even said at the time he knew there was no way Detroit wouldn't match. And if Detroit didn't, and Carolina made the conference finals that year, Karmanos would've been up ****'s creek becuase there's no way he had $28 million to pay Fedorov up front. I don't feel sorry for billionaires who bankrupt themselves out of spite.

 

[hockeytown9321]

How about the Arena Football League? They have a salary cap and according to NBC are about equal in popularity with the NHL in the US. I think its alot more fair to look at the NHL compared to the AFL in terms in business. No one watches it and teams fold all the time. A cap hasn't been the saving grace financially, nor has it attracted any fans.