How Some Contracts are Ruining the League

[JKG33]

I don't disagree with anything you just said, but you still insult me.

Thats how I felt about the first two posts. Are Richards and Brown overpaid? Slightly, yes. But not to the degree others are, and certainly not enough to be ruining the league.

 

[BruinsBtn]

Teams deserve to be punished for making bad decisions

Eventually the cap will stop going up by 7 million dollars every year and these contracts will start happening less

This is what has to happen. A rising cap has been hiding massive mistakes by GMs for awhile. Once it flatlines, there will be hell to pay and it will be young players due for raises that pay it. I could see them pushing for change.

 

[The Macho King]

The point I'm trying to make is that the players play well, get a good contract, then start to suck. See the pattern? If players can get bought out easily, then they have to play well or lose the contract.

A buy out would just allow them to get another contract while getting paid for underperforming another contract. Vinny Lecavalier is getting paid twice right now.

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

Funny thread. Lou Lamoriello must be the master at ruining the league with the stupid contracts he gave out to over age and over the hill players like Mogilny and Malakhov and the whole Kovalchuk fiasco.

 

[Tie Domi Esquire]

we need a lockout to fix this

 

[Invictus12]

They'd still get paid, so there is no incentive for a player to play well.

There is an incentive for the GM to be smarter the next time around.

 

[ricky0034]

Funny thread. Lou Lamoriello must be the master at ruining the league with the stupid contracts he gave out to over age and over the hill players like Mogilny and Malakhov and the whole Kovalchuk fiasco.

plus like traps and stuff am I right?

 

[Radek27]

we need a lockout to fix this

Or the league can take a stand and insist on non guaranteed contracts.

 

[Caeldan]

Or the league can take a stand and insist on non guaranteed contracts.

So then we'll have star players holding out every season for a raise? No thanks. Guaranteed contracts are definitely as good for the fans as they are for the players and the owners.

 

[Aceonfire*]

There should be more compliance buyouts allowed.

If teams want to be stupid and waste money on players, they should be able to.

It is better to have compliance buyouts than watch someone like Leino waste away on a team and drag it down.

I am sure the Oilers would love to compliance Nikitin right now..

 

[JKG33]

If people want non-guaranteed contracts fine. But it should work both ways. If a player is playing better than what their paid, they should be able to walk out of contracts too. I can't see people being to thrilled with that.

 

[eyetest is useless]

I love how players getting paid in the years where they decline is ruining the league but artificially low salaries for their first few years in the league are just fine.

 

[ricky0034]

Or the league can take a stand and insist on non guaranteed contracts.

you don't think that would require a lockout?

 

[BLONG7]

Why more compliance buyouts?
Just don't offer horrible contracts.

The GM's are like kids in a candy store on July 1st.......

 

[BeastoftheEast85]

The point I'm trying to make is that the players play well, get a good contract, then start to suck. See the pattern? If players can get bought out easily, then they have to play well or lose the contract.

I do see the point that its human nature to work harder when you are trying to earn a big day than you would after that big pay day has come. Most of these players are in their late 20s potentially with a wife and some kids and if they know they are getting paid, then to some extant they are going to be with their family and less training then they would otherwise.

GMs also know that if they don't offer lucrative long-term contracts to top talent (or even low talent as in many of these cases), then they will get it from another team. Then fans are the one's who end up paying those contracts

So fans actually do end up actually paying more money to watch "lazy" players pay. But by offering more compliance buyouts you will just increase this. Wealthy teams would be able to offer more lucrative deals because if the players don't perform they would be able to wipe them off their cap. This would also force the less-wealthy teams to pay players more in order to compete with them.

The only real solution would be to give teams more opportunities to terminate contracts with lower fees (and those fees would still show up on the cap) like in the NFL. Set a new standard whereby contracts could be terminated say every 3 years with 10% of the remaining value being paid to the player. Removing guarantees and making contracts more performance bonus based would also work. This wouldn't lower the cap as that is set as a % of revenue but it would help better match performance with salary.

 

[tsanuri]

There should be more compliance buyouts allowed.

If teams want to be stupid and waste money on players, they should be able to.

It is better to have compliance buyouts than watch someone like Leino waste away on a team and drag it down.

I am sure the Oilers would love to compliance Nikitin right now..

Compliance buyouts help the GM's be stupid. And they shouldn't be rewarded. They already have a system in place that if a GM thinks the contract is bad enough they can buy it out and suffer the consequence of having less to spend. And that is the way it should be. No free passes.

 

[NeedleInTheHay]

Vinny Lecavalier, RJ Umberger, Andrew MacDonald = 15 million dollars

All signed for multiple years to boot. Yikes.

 

[SladeWilson23]

Thats how I felt about the first two posts. Are Richards and Brown overpaid? Slightly, yes. But not to the degree others are, and certainly not enough to be ruining the league.

I don't agree with the OP saying it's ruining the league. But the players he was describing, are players who sign big deals, and their play falls off. Brown falls into that category. 37 points in his last 106 games. Remember he signed his extension prior to last year. And this year is the first year of his extension.

Richards on the other hand signed his 12 year deal with Philly after the 07-08 season I believe. He did have an 80 point season the first year of the deal, but then fell back to 62, than 66, 44, 32 (48 game season), 41, and 10 so far this year.

I also think GM's should pay whatever they want to the guys they feel are important to their team. Travis Zajac's contract for example often gets made fun of. But to me, he's being paid just right. He's a good 2nd line center who is great defensively, and is good for 45-50 points a year. Under this new CBA, his contract is fine. He's a very valuable guy to the Devils, and Lou paid him accordingly.

 

[SirPaste]

Chris Stewart's 2 year deal is really bringing down the NHL

 

[SladeWilson23]

Funny thread. Lou Lamoriello must be the master at ruining the league with the stupid contracts he gave out to over age and over the hill players like Mogilny and Malakhov and the whole Kovalchuk fiasco.

Except he didn't start the whole frontloading 10-15 year contract craze that ultimately resulted in the lockout.

 

[OzzyFan]

It's the GM/Owner's faults. They don't have to give Clarkson's and Leino's and Stewart's of the world long contracts. Clarkson's and Leino's are more livable when they are more realistic gambles, IE 2-3yr contracts.

Don't quite understand how some GM's making poor decisions amounts to "ruining the league".

And this. It hurts the team's who have those players, doesn't real ruin the league at all. All compliance buyouts would do is give stupid gm's a reason to gamble more with overspending and give them more get out of jail free cards, that's the last thing you'd want to do given your stance.

PS=Since you're a Devils fan, you saying this because you want to buyout Clowe?

 

[SladeWilson23]

PS=Since you're a Devils fan, you saying this because you want to buyout Clowe?

I hate Clowe's contract, but at the same time I have no problems with Lou giving him that deal. I do think Lou should have realized his health history and gave him a proper contract. It was a risky contract, but one that wouldn't hurt to take.

 

[DonskoiDonscored]

Easy fix, remove the Shootout.

 

[tsanuri]

I don't agree with the OP saying it's ruining the league. But the players he was describing, are players who sign big deals, and their play falls off. Brown falls into that category. 37 points in his last 106 games. Remember he signed his extension prior to last year. And this year is the first year of his extension.

Richards on the other hand signed his 12 year deal with Philly after the 07-08 season I believe. He did have an 80 point season the first year of the deal, but then fell back to 62, than 66, 44, 32 (48 game season), 41, and 10 so far this year.

I also think GM's should pay whatever they want to the guys they feel are important to their team. Travis Zajac's contract for example often gets made fun of. But to me, he's being paid just right. He's a good 2nd line center who is great defensively, and is good for 45-50 points a year. Under this new CBA, his contract is fine. He's a very valuable guy to the Devils, and Lou paid him accordingly.

The Richards deal was just too long and that has been taken care of with the new CBA.
As to Brown he was rewarded by the team with this contract. He is the first American born captain to win the cup twice. His last deal was below market value at the time and he has negotiated his own deals.
And where both deals are a bit high they are by no means close to the worst deals out there.
And how valuable do you think both these players are to the Kings? They aren't producing where most fans would like and I don't think they are probably happy themselves with what they are doing. If the Kings fall out of the playoffs then something probably will and should be done.

 

[SladeWilson23]

The Richards deal was just too long and that has been taken care of with the new CBA.
As to Brown he was rewarded by the team with this contract. He is the first American born captain to win the cup twice. His last deal was below market value at the time and he has negotiated his own deals.
And where both deals are a bit high they are by no means close to the worst deals out there.
And how valuable do you think both these players are to the Kings? They aren't producing where most fans would like and I don't think they are probably happy themselves with what they are doing. If the Kings fall out of the playoffs then something probably will and should be done.

I think both of those guys are pretty valuable to the Kings. Of course I'm not a Kings fan, and you would know better than I do.