mudcrutch79 said:
There's never going to be a TV contract that will equal what an owner can take in in local revenues with an elite team. Period, end of story.
True, but how many teams can achieve elite status at any one time? A handful. And those local revenues include the playoff money. Under the new system, that opportunity disappears. Achieving elite status will not provide nearly the revenues it did under the old CBA.
That Stan Kasten quote is nice, and it's certainly logical from a league point of view. If hockey had the potential in the US for a football or baseball type TV contract, I could maybe understand it, but it just doesn't make sense. The NBA contract is worth $12 million US per team, per season.
Actually according to Fox, it is $25.5 million per team.
If you're a small market owner in the NHL, do you want to encourage your players to walk at 27 for the pie in the sky dream of a $12 million per season annual TV cheque? The revenues from a strong team are worth more than that, and are far more likely to come to pass.
Are far more likely to come to pass? In hockey an elite team gets a ten year run. It is very hard to become elite. Most rebuilding jobs don't carry a team past the middle of the pack.
Conquering the American market may be pie in the sky, but that's where the money is, and 24 of the teams. They could get good teams in the big US markets and still fail, but without good teams in at least one or two big US markets there is no chance to get anywhere in the media or in a TV contract. Suppose they gave a playoff and nobody came. The five top media markets in the US are New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago. How many playoff series have they had in the past seven years?
I think you can make a good argument that hockey should be content to be a regional sport, but Gary Bettman doesn't buy it.
It will be interesting to see if the owners make a final offer to the players this week. If so, I'm betting the cap will get a good boost, entry level salaries fold directly into free agency at age 27 and no revenue sharing for small markets. A big market CBA through and through.
Tom