*Official* CBA Negotiations and Lockout Thread

[oldnews]

A bunch more smoke that generates no revenue, and no real entertainment.

The 'business' of hockey lockouts.

Counterproductive.

[brewdog]

$100M from 30 owners over 10 years is really such a small amount of money in exchange for some pretty significant contracting rights. That's barely more than $300K per owner each year. I'm sure they spend more than that on sticks each season.

I propose a new drinking game. Choose your personality and take a swig each time they say the following phrase:

Gary Bettman - "That was our best offer."

Bill Daly - "We don't have a negotiating partner."

Donald Fehr - "It's unclear why..."

Doug MacLean - "56.5%!"

[WHL rocks]

I thought he had a pensive smile almost as if he was daring the PA to go down that route. He had the look of a bluffer who tries to act as if he wants the person to do it.... when he very clearly does not.

[SamJamIam]

Get out of here you clown. It's not my work, it's yours since you are making the claim.

If you can't back up your claims don't engage me in conversation. You make a claim you back it up with proof.

Give me a link from credible source that says Bettman has pulled off the table every offer he's made.

Other wise quit pulling stuff out of your arse and leave me alone.

[Franz Liszt]

Sheeeeeeeeeeeiiiiiiiiiiit.........

[Ossi Vaananen]

Bettman: " my intent was to start the season on time (30:30)". WOW talk about eating his own rhetoric, ya a 43% proposal in late July is obviously going to get things done by mid September. What a clown, I feel sorry for anyone that believes this clown.

[Ossi Vaananen]

I'm frankly uninterested in digging through months of articles about this process to find something that's agreed upon by everyone in this thread except you. Look at other people's posts here. Bettman's approach that involves taking NHL proposals off the table when they are countered instead of accepted outright is common knowledge. It's referenced multiple times per page.

And you still don't know what revenue or profit are or you'd have said so by now. Demonstrate that you comprehend some fragment of the subject matter. The burden of proof is on the person who contends what is otherwise accepted. That's you here, not me.

[SamJamIam]

I thought he had a pensive smile almost as if he was daring the PA to go down that route. He had the look of a bluffer who tries to act as if he wants the person to do it.... when he very clearly does not.

[brewdog]

Bettman: " my intent was to start the season on time (30:30)". WOW talk about eating his own rhetoric, ya a 43% proposal in late July is obviously going to get things done by mid September. What a clown, I feel sorry for anyone that believes this clown.

[shiznak]

I think everything has gone according to Bettman's playbook up until today. He always planned on giving nothing to the players until Dec 1 and counted on them compromising right up until then. That way he begins negotiating on Dec 1 against a player position that is far closer to their own, allowing them to give less in the end.

They knew when the players started missing paycheques, this would cause them to compromise. They also know that in many markets the NHL doesn't make very much money in October and November as compared to the later months and certainly the playoffs. In short, they lose less than the players by forgoing the first 2 months. The players miss a third of their salary, but the owners only miss a fifth or sixth of their revenue.

They figured once Dec 1 rolled around, the players would be ripe for compromise and would be anxious to deal.

What happened here is that Fehr slowed down the process, knowing that we are entering waters that the owners do not care to be in (missing games deep into December and January). He now has the NHL in a more precarious position, much like the players were in for the last 3 months.

It is now Fehr's turn to grind the NHL and see what HE can get from THEM. This was not a part of Bettman's playbook and now he is extremely unhappy.

IMHO

[DarthMelvin]

Bettman was asked by the Owners to remove the make whole aspect he did not.He wanted to keep the process going. The owners listened to the NHLPA in regard to their "key" to ending the Lock out but that key kept changing or being added to lol. In regards to the decertification Bettman stated disclaimer....they made concessions and the NHLPA said no so why keep these deals on the table only to have the NHLPA take them and ask for more....lol

"NBA

Gabriel Feldman: The disclaimer of interest is a less formal process that is initiated by the union itself, and it is a statement that the union no longer wishes to represent the players as their collective-bargaining representative. So it is, in essence, the union walking away from the players.

Decertification requires a formal petition to the National Labor Relations Board and then a formal vote in front of the NLRB where 50 percent of the players have to choose to no longer be represented by the union. So decertification, in essence, is the players walking away from the union.

So there are formal distinctions between the two processes. Decertification is a more formal process that takes longer. The disclaimer is a less formal process that is much quicker."

which do you think the NHLPA choose lol

Who mentions "the fans" more in thier PR....lol

Don't forget it was the NHLPA that quit the new process that brought so much optimism to everyone including the media....

[SamJamIam]

Your right, Bettman has frequently said we'll take this offer off the table after *this date*. He did it in mid September after the league proposed a 46/54 split in their favour, with the ultimatum later that Friday. He did it before American thanksgiving, saying the 'make whole' provision changes would only be available if the deal was signed before thanksgiving. I'm pretty sure he did another one in late October when he felt they could salvage an 82 game schedule, believing that kind of rhetoric would get the fans on his side. You are completely correct nateb, don't concern yourself with WHL, I've seen him attack posters before on semantics, one can assume it's because he can't formulate a real argument.

[theminister]

I disagree. I didn't see it. I saw very real confidence. He is after all a former Proskauer and Rose lawyer with one of the heads of the firm on the NHL BoG. They've seen what decertification did in the NBA lockout and a man as methodical as Bettman has definitely prepared owners for that possibility. I don't think it's that big of a threat to the owners as it throws guaranteed contracts, pension, benefits and tons of other expenses out the window. They knew it was an option, evaluated it long ago and went "Doesn't sound too bad to us".

[brewdog]

It's hard to separate the truth from the posturing while watching this unfold through TSN and Twitter, but the posted comments from those 4 owners (Burkle, Tanenbaum etc) have me a bit concerned that the PA may have pissed off the owners.

[oldnews]

I disagree. I didn't see it. I saw very real confidence. He is after all a former Proskauer and Rose lawyer with one of the heads of the firm on the NHL BoG. They've seen what decertification did in the NBA lockout and a man as methodical as Bettman has definitely prepared owners for that possibility. I don't think it's that big of a threat to the owners as it throws guaranteed contracts, pension, benefits and tons of other expenses out the window. They knew it was an option, evaluated it long ago and went "Doesn't sound too bad to us".

[Mufasa]

Lp

[The Bookie]

Seething step backward as deal disappears

The two-word expletive that means "go forth and multiply" can be delivered in all sorts of ways.

But in the context of a relationship, probably nothing in the world says it more clearly than being dumped by voicemail. Unless it's by text message.

So when NHL Players' Association executive director Donald Fehr walked off the podium after his press conference Thursday in New York - having told the assembled media that with all the concessions the players' side had offered in a new proposal, there wasn't enough difference left in the two sides' positions to prevent a new Collective Bargaining Agreement - he probably wasn't expecting to be stopped short of the door by a message left on his brother (and deputy) Steve's cellphone.

"Unacceptable," said the message, from Bettman's 2-IC, Bill Daly. "Everything's off the table."

As reporters watched, fascinated, Don Fehr returned to the podium. Maybe it dawned on him that the message had probably been left while he was still on TV answering reporters' questions.

He was not happy, but he does a decent job of hiding the exact width and breadth of his displeasure. He's been through these wars before, in baseball.

Gary Bettman's been through them before, too. Repeatedly. But when he arrived for his moment in front of the microphones, he was one seething heap of New York lawyer. He's a pretty good actor, but I'm not sure, given the colour in his face, that his anger was a put-on.

It's pretty clear what happened: talks, which had begun so well on Tuesday, began to deteriorate late Wednesday night when the owners put nearly an extra $100 million into the "make whole" pool, meeting the players halfway in essence, and in Bettman's words, "the union's response was shockingly silent. It was 'thank you, we'll take the $100M.' "

The owners left behind their counter-offer, which Bettman said required a simple "yes or no, not a negotiation session." Fehr tried to negotiate off it Thursday, and the league hit the roof.

And immediately, the conspiracy theories began.

Was all that sudden bonhomie from the owners' side on Tuesday - the meeting suggested by Bettman between six hand-picked owners on one side and as many players as the union wished to send on the other - an elaborate setup?

Were Bettman's "moderates" - Pittsburgh's Ron Burkle, Winnipeg's Mark Chipman, Toronto's Larry Tanenbaum and Tampa's Jeff Vinik - really the NHL's Trojan horse, sent in to catch the players off-guard and get them stampeding toward a resolution? All the while knowing that as soon as Fehr was back in the room, he'd sniff out the ruse, and throw up a roadblock, and make himself an easy scapegoat for the inevitable recriminations that would follow the next breakdown?

Is it too much to have a horse and a goat in the same paragraph?

On the other side, could the whack-a-mole game Fehr's been playing with the union's ever-moving target be happening because - though he must have known from the start that he was playing a losing hand - he's worried about what his own legacy might be, if he's unable to stem the tide of givebacks to the owners?

Could the players, 18 strong, have been so naive as to think that there wasn't something just a little fishy, a little orchestrated, about the sudden thaw from the owners' side? Were they really surprised when Jeremy Jacobs and Co. revealed the iron fist inside the velvet glove once it got down to specifics?

"The owners are beside themselves," railed Bettman. "Some of them I've never seen so emotional. They told me the process is over."

It does kind of make you wonder what the players are thinking right now.

Maybe Fehr has been telling his guys that a collective bargaining negotiation is like buying a car.

That the rock-bottom price the salesman gives you at the beginning is going to change, perhaps several times, before the haggling is all done, so don't get all shirty about it. Keep battling, and eventually you'll get a better deal.

If you can't get the price you want, maybe he'll throw in some options. You tell him to keep the extended warranty, maybe you'll get air-conditioning and the sun roof.

It sounded good. So Bettman's opening gambit in the summer was a bloody insult? Everyone could see that. But in the end, he'd come around a little bit. You couldn't expect to win the negotiation, exactly, because he's the only dealer in town, unless you had your eye on a Lada, in which case Russia was only about two hard days away by air.

But hang in there, and you could maybe walk away with your dignity.

If that's what the head of NHLPA has been telling his players, Thursday evening's events must have hit them like a stiff boot to the solar plexus and had them wondering if their hired gun was delusional. Surely they're smarter than to think they were - are - going to win this fight.

Surely they knew which way the day was going to end from the moment they found out that the only representatives the league had deigned to send to hear their proposal were Bill Daly and the dreaded Dr. Death, lockout lawyer Bob Batterman.

No Bettman; he was back at NHL headquarters, making Montgomery Burns steeples with his fingers, composing his speech. And no owners; they had begun leaving in shifts during the day, getting out ahead of the storm.

Fehr put on a pretty good song and dance, making it sound as though it would have to be a really cynical league to reject the players' offer of a maximum eight-year contract length, an eight-year CBA term with an optional out after six, a nip here, a tuck there - never exactly what the NHL had asked for, but closer.

But what he really was doing was a bit of sleight-of-hand. The sides weren't close, and he knew it. He kept changing the game, and as soon as the league would try to put one fire out, another would spring up.

His statement that the players were proposing the eight-year maximum on contracts (the NHL wanted five) appears to have touched a nerve.

The five-year limit, Daly said, is "a hill we will die on."

The players - hell, anyone who loves the game - had better hope he doesn't mean that.

The thing about having burned the house down once before, only to build a bigger one in its place at zero cost, is that it makes the arsonist think it's just that simple.

[Ghostsof1915]

Notice how things were fine until Bettman and Fehr got involved again and then it goes completely off the rails.

I think both the NHL and NHLPA need to get rid of both these clowns, and just hammer out a deal.

They're playing chicken, and don't realise they are destroying the fan base because of it.

[WHL rocks]

Your right, Bettman has frequently said we'll take this offer off the table after *this date*. He did it in mid September after the league proposed a 46/54 split in their favour, with the ultimatum later that Friday. He did it before American thanksgiving, saying the 'make whole' provision changes would only be available if the deal was signed before thanksgiving. I'm pretty sure he did another one in late October when he felt they could salvage an 82 game schedule, believing that kind of rhetoric would get the fans on his side. You are completely correct nateb, don't concern yourself with WHL, I've seen him attack posters before on semantics, one can assume it's because he can't formulate a real argument.

[WHL rocks]

Aaaaand now he's gone offline to avoid admitting he's wrong. It must require a spectacular amount of self-assurance to defend his comments and act like what he's saying has some authority when he doesn't have any clue about accounting, finance or negotiations. Thanks for helping me give him a dose of reality.