Wow! As soon as Eichel was gone and Sabres had a floor gap Lou moved in quicker than a senior citizen with a coupon at an early bird special. This Cap space is going to help a lot at Trade deadline time
It's extremely likely Adams approached LouLam well in advance of any Eichel trade. Agree with the rest of your comment.
TBH I have nothing against tanking, but I think using "ghost" players shouldn't be allowed. There's a reason why there's a salary floor and I think players who don't play shouldn't be able to help teams reach the floor. To me it's a way to go around the rules and it should be considered as excessive tanking. Doesn't make me mad by any means, it's just my .02 on the subject and I believe it's a fair point, whether you agree or not.
You can of course believe that, but it's absolutely not the principal reason there is a salary floor. The salary floor has absolutely nothing to do with tanking. And if preventing tanking is a partial reason for the floor, it is at best a very distant second, if not much lower reason. The upper and lower cap values are set at 15% above and below, respectively, 50% of projected Hockey Related Revenue (HRR) (minus the cost of player's benefits). The lower cap value exists to ensure there is a minimum contribution by all teams to the 50% payment of total HRR to the players. If all teams generated the same 1/32 of HRR (they don't) and all teams spent to the midpoint (they don't), the players would divide their 50% share proportionate to their individual contracts (not the face value of their contracts), and each owner would receive 1/32 of league-wide HRR. I believe it is still the case that individual teams whose HRR falls substantially below 1/32 of league-wide HRR are eligible for a transfer "booster" payment from the owner's 50% share. That clause enables poorer (typically smaller-market) teams to remain viable, or if they are in a local business cycle downturn.
Teams which spend to the cap are in effect choosing to subsidize >1/32 of the 50% of HRR to the players.
Without a lower floor, some teams would qualify for a larger subsidy of the revenue sharing. Jacobs, Dolan, MLSE, etc., would object to that.
My comments above ignore the nuance of what an individual team actually pays it's individual players (because it's separate from the cap). A team with a $75M cap number may be paying more or less than that in salary in any given year depending how the individual contracts are structured, both in terms of annual cost for each player and how that annual cost is split between signing bonus (not subject to escrow) and salary (which is subject to escrow), and what the division of escrow is for that year between the players and owners.
Are they supposed to sign some free agent leftover huge dollars to get back over the floor?
The point of the floor is to keep player spending high. It's a concession to the players. The money that Buffalo doesnt spend goes back to all players through esgrow. I doubt they'd mind that
Strictly speaking, the floor alone doesn't keep total player spending high. The player's 50% share of HRR is irrespective of the sum of the cost of the league-wide contracts. If all teams spent less than the cap midpoint (1/32nd of 50% of HRR), then actual player salary received would be proportionally higher than the sum of the face value of the contracts, and pro-rated accordingly.
Yet, both the NHL and NHLPA - the signers to the CBA that covers the cap (and re-upped it w/o revision to this situation) - do not see it that way. They have already established situations that are considered circumvention. This situation is not one of them, no matter whether a fan affirmatively thinks it is.
Agreed.
No, not really. Boychuk agreed to terms with the Islanders on a reasonable deal (it wasn't like what was attempted with the Kovalchuk situation). He was expected to play for all of those years and there was little reason to think he wouldn't. Boychuk then suffered a serious injury to his eye that sidelined him and effectively ended his career. He shouldn't lose out on his contract because he was injured on the job. LTIR is a good solution to this scenario.
What could be viewed as cap circumvention is the trading for a player like Boychuk because all parties know he'll never play again and the team acquiring him has no intention of ever playing him, unlike the team that signed him to the deal originally.
I haven't done enough reading about it because I don't care that much but the Hossa situation could also be viewed as cap circumvention, when a player acquires a mysterious (fake) injury to allow them to go on LTIR. Very difficult to prove though.
If you don't allow players with career ending injuries to go on LTIR, what's the solution? They get paid out and the cap comes off completely? Teams would likely prefer that I'd think. Teams getting stuck with that cap hit as if the player was playing doesn't seem right either and would really limit the amount of years teams would be willing to sign players to.
How exactly does the bolded circumvent the cap? Agree with your other points.
Adams is a bad GM. Feel bad for Sabres fans. This won’t be the guy to lead you out of the dumps.
Essay grade:
+1 for stating Main Point / Premise.
+1 for including personal view.
+1 for conclusion/summary which repeats Main Point.
Major deduction for examples / reasons substantiating Main Point.
Not really if the contract is fully insured.
Agreed. It's either 60% or 80% insured. (I think 80%) Elsewhere it's been posted it's only costing BUF $225 or $250k in actual cash to Boychuk (without escrow adjustment factored in). His signing bonus has been paid already, and I think the remaining salary would be reduced by 1 paycheck. It's actually an excellent cash-value of LTIR cap space.
Lou needed this as well. So..
I think it's fairer to say BUF needed it, and NYI wanted it. Lou certainly didn't need it "today".
Need is a strong word here. I think the isles were fine but Lou saw an opportunity so he took it. He wasn’t desperate
Agreed.
