Jump to content
The Official Site of the Vancouver Canucks
Enter Search Term. Use arrows to navigate between autocomplete results. If no results appear, use Enter to do a full site search.
Forum Closure ×
Canucks Community
Forum Closure

*Official* CBA Negotiations and Lockout Thread

-Vintage Canuck-

Recommended Posts

elvis15 Canucks Hall-of-Famer

elvis15

Posted
Posted

I see how it works defeating the back diving contracts, but the variance alone isn't enough. The variance, contract term and UFA term limit are all tied together.

From players view:

...

From owners view:

...

As an aside, this lockout is owners fighting owners. Its partly about money, but second about winning. They all want to win and are jockeying for position. Perhaps this is a good thing...jockeying towards parity. As a fan, Id like to see how this won't happen again. I hope the players give a little more in exchange for no lockout in XXX years.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
elvis15 Canucks Hall-of-Famer

elvis15

Posted
Posted

Former Canucks owner: League’s recent stance “disregards the growth in the game”

Arthur Griffiths used to own the Vancouver Canucks, but he seems to be mostly siding with the players these days, based on a recent interview with CBC.

That’s especially true now that the players have agreed to a 50-50 split of hockey-related revenues, plus Make Whole back before it was taken off the table. However, the owners balked at the NHLPA’s latest proposal, in part because they firmly want player contracts to be capped at five years.

Griffiths expressed his disappointment in the meltdown of negotiations last week.

“The owners have suddenly come back to the table and found this solidarity that disregards the growth in the game,” Griffiths said. He also feels that the league’s actions ignore that some markets were beginning to show the progress they want.

Griffiths thinks that the NHL season has to start by about the second week of January at the latest, which means that a new CBA would have to be agreed to within the next two weeks. That contrasts Dan Cleary‘sprediction that the two sides still have about a month to work something out.

Griffiths said that losing the season would be a “horrible, horrible, horrible black mark on the sport” and would make it hard for the NHL to get fans back, particularly in the markets where they’re not as passionate about hockey.

The good news is Griffiths is still optimistic about the chances of the NHL and union saving the season despite the rapidly approaching deadline.

The NHL and NHLPA are set to meet again tomorrow and mediators will be present.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Boudrias Canucks All-Star

Boudrias

Posted
Posted

Here is another really good article from Puck daddy.

http://sports.yahoo....dGlvbnM-;_ylv=3

Cover your ears, and open your eyes. Don't listen to the hope or the gloom or the he-said, she-said sniping. Look at what is on the table – or at least was on the table, before the NHL pulled its latest offer in a fit of anger and theater last week. Ignore the spin, and look at the facts.

f12d7a29669af922220f6a706700b536_original.jpgThe NHL needs to put its last CBA proposal back on the table. (AP)What do you see?

I see a deal, or at least a path to one. I see a negotiation that should be in its final stages when the NHL and the NHL Players' Association resume talks Wednesday, with federal mediators rejoining the process. I see no excuse – none, nada, zero, zilch – for the season to be canceled. I see no hills on which to die here, not anymore, only the point of diminishing returns.

Is there any battle left to be won that is worth the sacrifice of the season? Of course not.

Which is why some teams are quietly telling staffers to get ready. Which is why more players are popping up at practice rinks. They say it means nothing, and technically that's true: Only the tight inner circles on each side really know the next moves. No one wants to seem too eager and project weakness, either. But whether it's optimism or just-in-case preparation or educated guessing, this is not just wishful thinking. It better not be wishful thinking.

The sides aren't as close as NHLPA executive director Don Fehr made them seem last week. But they aren't as far apart as NHL commissioner Gary Bettman and deputy commissioner Bill Daly made them seem. At this point, if the deal doesn't get done, if the lockout doesn't end by mid-January at the latest, it won't be because of principles or economics. It will be because the leadership (bleeped) it up.

There has been too much time spent – no, time wasted – on the personalities and politics. You know what? Both sides shift their priorities. Both move their targets. Both pocket one thing and ask for more. Both try to discredit the other. Both use slick tricks. They just do it at different times, in different degrees, in different ways. This is bare-knuckles stuff with big-money stakes.

And yeah, that has led to a lot of disrespect and downright hatred, and that has had a tangible effect. It will continue to have a tangible effect if the NHL doesn't put its last offer back on the table – or if it puts only some of it back on the table, driving the sides farther apart.

But that's why it makes sense to bring back the mediators now. Even though mediation failed two weeks ago, even though everything blew up last week, the sides are closer now than they were before. They are close enough to finish this.

Maybe with the help of a third-party perspective, they can put pride aside, keep things quiet and focus on the issues themselves. Maybe with a smaller group, there will be less miscommunication. Maybe they can admit what should be obvious:

– They aren't as close as Fehr made them seem: Many owners think the players shouldn't receive 50 percent of hockey-related revenue, even though the players made 57 percent before. More owners think the players shouldn't receive 50 percent plus $300 million in "make-whole" or transition payments. Suggest adding additional money outside the system via compliance buyouts or a cap on escrow, and there is going to be pushback.

owners-players-meet-discuss-nhl-20121205-223616-912.jpgThe NHLPA can't risk pushing the league too far as the two sides close in on an agreement. (Getty)Bettman and Daly have bluffed before. They have made their best offers, only to make them better, multiple times. But at some point, they might not be bluffing anymore and their offers really might get worse. "Close" is subjective. "Close" takes two. If the owners pull back, then what?

There is also a ton of fine print to write. Just two examples: As far as the NHL knows, the NHLPA is still proposing a minimum salary cap of $67.25 million. The NHLPA is still proposing the cap and floor be plus and minus 20 percent of the midpoint, widening the salary range. The league wants the cap to be set at $60 million for two years, then to reflect what it feels is a true 50-50 split. It wants the cap and floor set at a smaller percentage of the midpoint, so the salary range stays tight – so the rich cannot outspend the poor too much while the poor don't have to keep up with the rich.

In short, there is still a lot of haggling to be done.

– They aren't as far apart as Bettman and Daly made them seem: The owners have already won the biggest prize. Not only have they gotten the players to stay within the salary-cap system, they have gotten them to drop their demand for guaranteed shares and accept 50 percent of HRR. They got them to agree to a make-whole/transition amount. So if the owners put that $300 million back on the table, the major money issue is solved.

Now we're down to how the money is allocated among the players. The dynamics are complicated, not simple, and no one can predict exactly how the system will work and evolve. But no matter what the GMs and agents do in the future, the owners are protected. They will never pay the players more than 50 percent of HRR after a transition period. And no matter how this negotiation ends up, the system will be more restrictive anyway.

The owners have gotten the players to accept maximum contract lengths and flatter structures, and there isn't much difference between proposals, especially relative to where they were before. The owners want contracts limited to five years but will go as long as seven for teams to re-sign their own players; the players are at eight years. The owners want salaries to vary by no more than five percent year to year; the players want the lowest year to be within 25 percent of the highest year.

If the point is to keep long-term liabilities off the books and stop back-diving, cap-circumventing contracts, mission accomplished, either way or anywhere in between. If the point is to stop giving too much to the wrong guys … well, that's mission impossible. There will be human error in any system. But at worst, mistakes will be able to haunt only so long. There won't be another Rick DiPietro deal.

As for the length of the CBA, the owners have gotten the players to go long. While the league proposed 10 years with an opt-out after eight last week, the players proposed eight years with an opt-out after six – when the league had been at six or seven years and the players five.

In short, what are they fighting about again?

– Enough is enough: Look at the big picture. Under the old collective bargaining agreement, there was financial imbalance – with the top teams thriving and others struggling – amid perhaps the best competitive balance in sports.

Now look at the situation. Under this CBA – no matter whose proposal you choose as is, if the NHL's last one is still valid – the owners and players will split HRR 50-50 after transition, as the owners targeted from the start, and the system will be more restrictive.

Shouldn't the league be healthy financially? Shouldn't the competitive balance be as good or better? Wasn't that the goal?

It's time to iron out the details and get it done. There is little left to gain for anyone but a lot left to lose for everyone. Close your ears, open your eyes and keep your eye on the ball – or the puck, if you can still find it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
gizmo2337 Canucks Second-Line

gizmo2337

Posted
Posted

It might help then to make a clarification of your statement about owners fighting owners. I agree, but not only are they fighting each other, but they're also fighting themselves. They need to put it all in black and white to prevent not only the other guy from offering more than they should to get or keep players, but also make it impossible for them to do it to themselves.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
elvis15 Canucks Hall-of-Famer

elvis15

Posted
Posted

I agree, and in the case of the Weber offer sheet, Philly could afford it but it certainly isn't good for the game or the NHL in contract structure alone, nevermind the impact on Nashville being forced to accept or lose their marquee player (and probably a good portion of their fan base/revenue with it). So, the owners need rules to protect Philly from Philly as well as protecting Nashville from Philly.

To put it another way, maybe it's the NHL that needs protection from the owners. Will a variance cover that, or will they have to limit term significantly to prevent the owners from destroying themselves? It certainly won't stop them from offering significant salary to the top players on the first day of free agency, but as we've both alluded to, the shorter term will only increase cap hits and reduce cap space for everyone else.

Do the owners then have to look at reducing how the max salary is calculated off of the upper limit of the cap the next time the CBA is up for negotiating? Does that become the next hill they die on when they find out this hill wasn't the biggest one around?

Link to comment
Share on other sites
goalie13 Canucks Star

goalie13

Posted
Posted

The worst of the worst back diving contracts I might argue is Shea Weber. Not only is it long, terribly back diving, but it was a blatant attempt to poach a RFA by means of heavily loaded front bonuses that a low revenue team can't afford to match. This is a perfect example of owners going after owners, and using the system to do it. Sure, it was within the rules, but there is something about bankrupting the matching team in the process that doesn't feel right. Heck, I'm willing to bet Nashville is one of the hold-outs in this, and may have even been promised something by the Bettman before that deal was matched.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
The Bookie Canucks Second-Line

The Bookie

Posted
Posted

NHL 'partnership' gives players the business

When the inevitable happens and Gary Bettman steps on the podium in the next week or two (or three) to announce the end of his latest lockout, there’s one word the NHL commissioner-for-the-owners must strike from his lexicon lest he insult the ever-dwindling number of people who still care about his league.

"Partnership."

Or, as used in a sentence: "We stand here at a point where we can now together look forward in partnership to take our great game to spectacular heights."

That was Bettman on July 21, 2005 as he announced the end to the 309-day lockout that wiped out the 2004-05 season.

And while the league certainly did make spectacular gains during the last collective bargaining agreement – the Winter Classic, a decent national television contract, a record $3.3 billion in revenues during 2011-12 – there’s no way the NHL-players’ association relationship can be considered a partnership.

Rather, it seems the NHL owners prefer a feudal system as they take on the role of lords while viewing the players as serfs, incredibly well-paid serfs, but serfs nonetheless.

Because a true partner would not go out of their way to bust their partner’s union, as the league is once again attempting after essentially doing it in the last lockout.

Monday marked the 86th day of the third lockout of Bettman’s tenure as the NHL announced it was canceling games through Dec. 30, two more weeks off the schedule. But Monday also brought the hope that the league and the NHLPA would resume labor talks this week.

Last week, direct player-owner talks without league or union leadership in the room led to cautious optimism Tuesday, a loss of optimism Wednesday and an epic blowup of talks Thursday.

Still, the basic elements of a new CBA are now on the table and, most likely, it will see the NHLPA agreeing to drop its share of hockey-related revenue to 50 percent (from 57 percent) while being forced to accept some limitations on the contracts the players can sign.

But all trust between the sides has evaporated, not that the players had much love for Bettman before this lockout. So has any pretense of a partnership.

The owners have shown that unless the players abide by their rules, they’ll take the pucks and go home.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
elvis15 Canucks Hall-of-Famer

elvis15

Posted
Posted

This is where I keep going back to the idea of not averaging the contract to come up with the cap hit. If the cap hit was simply the amount the player is paid during that season then there would be no advantage to these long term, back diving contracts.

If a team like Philly wants to make an offer with a huge up front cost they would need the huge up front cap space to make it happen.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

Go to topic listing

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...