[Report/Rumour] Elias Pettersson Contract Talks

[rekker]

5 minutes ago, I.Am.Ironman said:

The only thing that would potentially be feasible is to implement a sort of cap relief system based on state/provincial taxes.

Yip. This inequity is an issue for sure. Why bother with a hard salary cap if in reality, take-home pay can vary like it does.

[IBatch]

1 hour ago, rekker said:

Yip. This inequity is an issue for sure. Why bother with a hard salary cap if in reality, take-home pay can vary like it does.

Yep.  36.4%-53% is quite the range.   It's becoming tougher to ignore. 

Edited September 3, 2023 by IBatch

[24K PureCool]

Not sure how legal it is but the best way to address tax issue is to escrow players pay based on hughest tax rate of all teams and proportionally distribute out from the fund post season so everyone's tax rate is effectively the same. 

 

So those in higher tax brackets gets more money back and those with lower tax rate takes a hit. 

[wai_lai416]

3 hours ago, 24K PureCool said:

Not sure how legal it is but the best way to address tax issue is to escrow players pay based on hughest tax rate of all teams and proportionally distribute out from the fund post season so everyone's tax rate is effectively the same. 

 

So those in higher tax brackets gets more money back and those with lower tax rate takes a hit. 

There’s no way that would fly. That literally makes it 0 incentive to play in certain cities.. and effectively taking the money from players to subsidize others.. good luck with that 

[Jack Gordon]

My guess is, he signs for something in the neighborhood of $11.5 x 4.

 

It's a nice neighborhood,..

[Trebreh]

if we have a great season and make it to the 2nd/3rd round then we will find out if he really wants to play on a competitive team. signing a team friendly contract will tell us if he's serious about it or if he just wants out and is/was using the teams competitiveness as an excuse.

 

[dougieL]

8 hours ago, rekker said:

Yip. This inequity is an issue for sure. Why bother with a hard salary cap if in reality, take-home pay can vary like it does.

Does the NHL even acknowledge the advantage that teams in low-tax cities seem to have? It seems like such an absurd thing to overlook when your system involves a hard salary cap. Either the NHL thinks it's not an issue, or they know it's an issue but simply choose to look the other way.

 

If revenue sharing across teams is already a thing in order to equalize across different market sizes, a logical thing would be to do something similar for players to equalize across different tax structures.

 

A system in which every player with a salary of $x million for a particular year will take home the same $y million regardless of in which city they play (so take-home salary doesn't all of a sudden change if the player gets traded) would seem to make logical sense.

[wai_lai416]

2 hours ago, dougieL said:

Does the NHL even acknowledge the advantage that teams in low-tax cities seem to have? It seems like such an absurd thing to overlook when your system involves a hard salary cap. Either the NHL thinks it's not an issue, or they know it's an issue but simply choose to look the other way.

 

If revenue sharing across teams is already a thing in order to equalize across different market sizes, a logical thing would be to do something similar for players to equalize across different tax structures.

 

A system in which every player with a salary of $x million for a particular year will take home the same $y million regardless of in which city they play (so take-home salary doesn't all of a sudden change if the player gets traded) would seem to make logical sense.

So who’s paying the extra taxes to the government when a player gets traded? Literally all the teams that gets some revenue share are the low income tax states with the least revenue and you are basically telling them to go subsidize other teams player income tax. Like that’s going to fly. The only teams that benefit from this is big market teams while small market teams will just become completely irrelevant and will be looking to relocate or fold since there’s no reason to sign in low tax states to make more money since those teams will be paying the big market team to subsidize them instead. 
 

The tax difference is not even the main issue why teams win the cup and others don’t. It’s about being smart with the cap and try to minimize bad contracts buy out etc. those easily covers the difference in cap hit. LA Anaheim etc all won the cup you have rangers Washington Montreal etc all making the finals some winning. 
 

Ok Matthew tkatchuk if not signing in Florida might be looking at 10.5 instead ok that’s great the OEL buyout easily makes up for the difference. It’s whichever team that have the fewest bad contracts/buyout and whichever team have the most player performing at their cap number that wins the cup. Look at Tampa.. look at Colorado.. look at Vegas.. how many “bad” contract or underperforming players do they have? Not many. And then you look at Vancouver how many bad contracts buyout penalties etc do we have? Prolly almost 7-10mil worth of overpaid cap/buyout penalties every season. Garland boeser prolly 1mil too much each.. Myers prolly 2mil, mik prolly 500k then you factor in all the buyout and cap recaptures in previous years etc. between garland boeser beauvillier we don’t need at least 1 if not 2 of them.. and how much would that free up? Elc is the most effective ways for a competitive team to deal with bad contracts. Too bad the Canucks don’t have any elc that are out performing their elc

[dougieL]

2 hours ago, wai_lai416 said:

So who’s paying the extra taxes to the government when a player gets traded? Literally all the teams that gets some revenue share are the low income tax states with the least revenue and you are basically telling them to go subsidize other teams player income tax. Like that’s going to fly. The only teams that benefit from this is big market teams while small market teams will just become completely irrelevant and will be looking to relocate or fold since there’s no reason to sign in low tax states to make more money since those teams will be paying the big market team to subsidize them instead. 
 

The tax difference is not even the main issue why teams win the cup and others don’t. It’s about being smart with the cap and try to minimize bad contracts buy out etc. those easily covers the difference in cap hit. LA Anaheim etc all won the cup you have rangers Washington Montreal etc all making the finals some winning. 
 

Ok Matthew tkatchuk if not signing in Florida might be looking at 10.5 instead ok that’s great the OEL buyout easily makes up for the difference. It’s whichever team that have the fewest bad contracts/buyout and whichever team have the most player performing at their cap number that wins the cup. Look at Tampa.. look at Colorado.. look at Vegas.. how many “bad” contract or underperforming players do they have? Not many. And then you look at Vancouver how many bad contracts buyout penalties etc do we have? Prolly almost 7-10mil worth of overpaid cap/buyout penalties every season. Garland boeser prolly 1mil too much each.. Myers prolly 2mil, mik prolly 500k then you factor in all the buyout and cap recaptures in previous years etc. between garland boeser beauvillier we don’t need at least 1 if not 2 of them.. and how much would that free up? Elc is the most effective ways for a competitive team to deal with bad contracts. Too bad the Canucks don’t have any elc that are out performing their elc

It's not about teams subsidizing other teams. It's about a system that ensures a Canucks player whose salary is $3 million takes home as much as a Panthers player whose salary is $3 million. Canucks and Panthers owners would pay exactly the same amount out of pocket for either player.

 

 

[IBatch]

8 hours ago, wai_lai416 said:

There’s no way that would fly. That literally makes it 0 incentive to play in certain cities.. and effectively taking the money from players to subsidize others.. good luck with that 

Thing is, the "spirit" of the CBA is a level playing field.    Think you'd be surprised, bet the NHLPA would be divided for sure.   One way to do it, is create a cap that's based on net pay instead.   The owners would take a bit of a hit but it would all even out too.   CALI and NY teams also pay huge taxes.    ANA, SJ, LA, Buffalo, NYR, NYI are actually the next tier of taxed teams after TO, MTL, VAN, WNP.     Then EDM and CAL after the jock tax states.   Then a big drop where the rest are around 40-42%.    Then no state tax teams of which Seattle was added.      What could work, is give the first two tiers a break, and even it up to around 44%.   Bring down EDM and CAL tom 47-48%.     Just take the median.   Wouldn't be too hard to do, actuaries/accountants could figure it out easily.    Don't make it an escrow account, call it something else.   Adjust the caps accordingly.    Ours would go up, by 9%. 

[IBatch]

1 hour ago, dougieL said:

It's not about teams subsidizing other teams. It's about a system that ensures a Canucks player whose salary is $3 million takes home as much as a Panthers player whose salary is $3 million. Canucks and Panthers owners would pay exactly the same amount out of pocket for either player.

 

 

See above post.   I agree it can be done.   The other thing the CBA needs to address, is contract length.    And second contracts specifically.    Players hate escrow, yet get it up the proverbial butt when it comes to buyouts.     It's a class system these days.   Good serviceable vets, take peanuts to keep playing, much better options than the AHL call-ups to balance rosters or rushing guys on ELC's.    20% of the players, make 80% of the cap doesn't bother me, however there are simply too many bad contracts handed out.     RFA's should be limited to 4-5 years second deals.   And UFAs should shave a year off that too.   6-7 instead of 7-8.    Used to be like the Sedins and Naslund.   Multiple contracts, limited it length.   That system worked.   The carrot goes away pretty fast these days.   

 

Another way to deal with this maybe, is to add a soft cap.     Give the players a bigger slice of the pie, but have conditions, contract length really should be ELC 4 years,  RFA 4-5 years,  UFAs 5-6 years.    This way a team gets a better chance to get out of their rebuild cycle and a real window with stars on their ELC's.   PIT didn't win a cup with Crosby on his.   LA didn't either, only CHI won one, and that was with only one guy on his ELC.    It's not a "real window".    ANA won a cup, but it wasn't Perry and Getzlaf carrying the mail.   It was Selanne's line and Pronger/Neidermayer etc.   Sure it helped though.    Make that window, a reap window.    Do the same thing with star players, instead of 4 years, if they are good enough, let them play 9 games and reduce their ELC to 3 years.   Instead of the 2 we did with Brock and QHs.  

 

The system is working, but agree with Burke, teams shouldn't be giving out 3rd contract money on second deals.   It's what GMs do now, gambling all the time.   Sometimes it works great, others it simply is terrible.   Brock was bridged.   Hasn't earned his paycheque since his ELC, not even close.   QHs is how it should look.   EP... we are going to pay dearly now.    But at least he earned it last year.  He didn't the year before.   JT Miller, Stamkos and Tavares are examples of how second deals should look, or deals that take different level players to UFA years.  

 

Dubas ruined it for so many teams.  But it was trending that way for a few years already, his deals cemented the trend.   It can be somewhat justified based on taxes.   But the only player that actually earned that sort of cap percentage, was actually Tavares.   Because he put his time in.   It's for sure created a class surf system, and it's the journeymen lunch pail guys whose wallets are getting lighter to pay for it.   The on ice product is also affected.   AHL call-ups etc.   Pretty tough to have 6 defenseman these days.    And 3 scoring lines.   Bobrovsky takes home more money than McDavid.   Like the No CAP come playoffs.   Would like to see the "soft cap" add to that,   Makes for a better playoffs. 

Edited September 4, 2023 by IBatch

[wai_lai416]

52 minutes ago, IBatch said:

Thing is, the "spirit" of the CBA is a level playing field.    Think you'd be surprised, bet the NHLPA would be divided for sure.   One way to do it, is create a cap that's based on net pay instead.   The owners would take a bit of a hit but it would all even out too.   CALI and NY teams also pay huge taxes.    ANA, SJ, LA, Buffalo, NYR, NYI are actually the next tier of taxed teams after TO, MTL, VAN, WNP.     Then EDM and CAL after the jock tax states.   Then a big drop where the rest are around 40-42%.    Then no state tax teams of which Seattle was added.      What could work, is give the first two tiers a break, and even it up to around 44%.   Bring down EDM and CAL tom 47-48%.     Just take the median.   Wouldn't be too hard to do, actuaries/accountants could figure it out easily.    Don't make it an escrow account, call it something else.   Adjust the caps accordingly.    Ours would go up, by 9%. 

There’s way too much work involve for something like this. Each time a player gets traded his cap hit would change. Each time a player is traded the amount of taxable salary would change. It would equate to something like tax evasion. Player A gets paid 10mil if he’s playing on team A but he gets traded to a team with lower income tax. Now all of a sudden his salary drops to say 9mil for argument sake and then traded again and his salary all of a sudden increases to 9.5mil? The amount taxable all of a sudden changes depending on what team he’s playing for. That’s literally tax evasion/manipulation. Flexible salary based on what team you play on.  
if it’s as simple as having a flexible cap based on what city you are in then it probably would have been done. Again this would only benefit the big market team. Now small market teams that doesn’t generate as much revenue or much revenue at all like the Anaheims New Jerseys Ottawa buffalo etc etc where taxes are 48% and up but have trouble selling tickets all of a sudden have to pay anywhere from 8-10mil depending the the cap more than other teams if they want to compete? Where are they getting the extra 8-10mil from? Big market teams that have no issues selling tickets no big deal. Small market teams? That’s a big issue. Revenue sharing probably doesn’t even cover the amount for the small market team with high tax. 

Edited September 4, 2023 by wai_lai416

[rekker]

8 hours ago, dougieL said:

16 hours ago, rekker said:

 

Does the NHL even acknowledge the advantage that teams in low-tax cities seem to have?

I've never heard anyone in the media actaully ask the question to Bettman, but I can only imagine the slimeball answer he'd reply with though. You would think the GM's around the NHL are bringing it up in meetings. I did hear Doug Armstrong bring it up in an interview and he definitely had concerns with the process.

Edited September 4, 2023 by rekker

[IBatch]

2 hours ago, wai_lai416 said:

There’s way too much work involve for something like this. Each time a player gets traded his cap hit would change. Each time a player is traded the amount of taxable salary would change. It would equate to something like tax evasion. Player A gets paid 10mil if he’s playing on team A but he gets traded to a team with lower income tax. Now all of a sudden his salary drops to say 9mil for argument sake and then traded again and his salary all of a sudden increases to 9.5mil? The amount taxable all of a sudden changes depending on what team he’s playing for. That’s literally tax evasion/manipulation. Flexible salary based on what team you play on.  
if it’s as simple as having a flexible cap based on what city you are in then it probably would have been done. Again this would only benefit the big market team. Now small market teams that doesn’t generate as much revenue or much revenue at all like the Anaheims New Jerseys Ottawa buffalo etc etc where taxes are 48% and up but have trouble selling tickets all of a sudden have to pay anywhere from 8-10mil depending the the cap more than other teams if they want to compete? Where are they getting the extra 8-10mil from? Big market teams that have no issues selling tickets no big deal. Small market teams? That’s a big issue. Revenue sharing probably doesn’t even cover the amount for the small market team with high tax. 

Revenue sharing could be written into the CBA to create a median rated.   Start looking at contracts as net pay, based on 44% taxes (about the median).    It's a complicated thing for sure, that said nothing the average accountant could  create a system for fairly quickly.    Heck there already is a calculator on the internet for anyone to use, takes seconds to compare rates.   Have NHL dollars.  And work from there.   Adjust the entire cap based on that.   If agents started to work with one system, it would be a lot easier to negotiate deals as well.    Another option is lower and raise teams caps.   You don't have to be a cap team.   16% plus is too much of a range.   And it takes no time to get to the 53% bracket TO, VAN, OTT, VAN have to work with (players salaries, even the modest or low paid ones).    36.4%-53%.     Yikes.     Look at the mental gymnastics Gillis made to keep that team together (clauses, even Hansen had one, and of course Luongo's deal which allowed us to add a top four D), back then we had the same bracket as CAL and EDM as well.   47-48%.    With what's going on in WNP and CAL right now and recently...and how much Dubas had to shell out ... Well it's no wonder cup teams and most finalists or final four ones, are no or low state tax teams.   It's for sure a real issue. 

Edited September 4, 2023 by IBatch

[wai_lai416]

35 minutes ago, IBatch said:

Revenue sharing could be written into the CBA to create a median rated.   Start looking at contracts as net pay, based on 44% taxes (about the median).    It's a complicated thing for sure, that said nothing the average accountant could  create a system for fairly quickly.    Heck there already is a calculator on the internet for anyone to use, takes seconds to compare rates.   Have NHL dollars.  And work from there.   Adjust the entire cap based on that.   If agents started to work with one system, it would be a lot easier to negotiate deals as well.    Another option is lower and raise teams caps.   You don't have to be a cap team.   16% plus is too much of a range.   And it takes no time to get to the 53% bracket TO, VAN, OTT, VAN have to work with (players salaries, even the modest or low paid ones).    36.4%-53%.     Yikes.     Look at the mental gymnastics Gillis made to keep that team together (clauses, even Hansen had one, and of course Luongo's deal which allowed us to add a top four D), back then we had the same bracket as CAL and EDM as well.   47-48%.    With what's going on in WNP and CAL right now and recently...and how much Dubas had to shell out ... Well it's no wonder cup teams and most finalists or final four ones, are no or low state tax teams.   It's for sure a real issue. 

I disagree with the final four or finalist usually teams with the low tax. The final four is usually the teams with the least amount big overpaid contracts and buyout penalties. Who on Carolina Vegas Florida Dallas is overpaid and not performing to their cap value in the playoff? Maybe Jamie benn? Most of those teams also don’t have 3-4 millions in dead cap every year. Like I said the amount of dead cap we are playing with every single season along with all the overpaid bad contracts would have made up the difference between the different tax states. Bigger cap for high tax states all it does is give them a bigger margin of error for bad contracts since it’ll make up for their buyouts and overpaid contract. 
 

to make it to the final 4 you need depth.. when u have 5-10% of ur cap sitting in buyout penalties retentions or players being overpaid by 1-2mil on their current contract. That’s where the problem is. Is paying ep 12mil 13mil that big of a problem if we never had OEL and never had to deal with the buyout? It’s the constant buyouts cap recapture and bad contract all added together that’s sinking teams. The good teams find ways to dump those contract on bad teams to get around it but the Canucks are not in that position coz they are not good enough to be throwing away asset nor were they bad enough to accumulate asset. 5-10% difference we can prolly overcome. But we are talking about 5-10% difference in bad contracts and buyout and then add in the 10-15% difference in tax. We are looking at like a 20% handicap vs say a Carolina

[Provost]

5 hours ago, wai_lai416 said:

There’s way too much work involve for something like this. Each time a player gets traded his cap hit would change. Each time a player is traded the amount of taxable salary would change. It would equate to something like tax evasion. Player A gets paid 10mil if he’s playing on team A but he gets traded to a team with lower income tax. Now all of a sudden his salary drops to say 9mil for argument sake and then traded again and his salary all of a sudden increases to 9.5mil? The amount taxable all of a sudden changes depending on what team he’s playing for. That’s literally tax evasion/manipulation. Flexible salary based on what team you play on.  
if it’s as simple as having a flexible cap based on what city you are in then it probably would have been done. Again this would only benefit the big market team. Now small market teams that doesn’t generate as much revenue or much revenue at all like the Anaheims New Jerseys Ottawa buffalo etc etc where taxes are 48% and up but have trouble selling tickets all of a sudden have to pay anywhere from 8-10mil depending the the cap more than other teams if they want to compete? Where are they getting the extra 8-10mil from? Big market teams that have no issues selling tickets no big deal. Small market teams? That’s a big issue. Revenue sharing probably doesn’t even cover the amount for the small market team with high tax. 

A team +/- cap ceiling relative to the median tax rate is easy to calculate and accomplish.  

 

There already is revenue sharing.

 

The small market concern is really meaningless.  If they can’t compete to keep their own players now, that affects their competitiveness.  They aren’t forced to spend to the cap, this is just an outlet that allows them extra flexibility to do so if they want.

 

All if this discussion is meaningless though as it is about fairness and parity.  That is not a concern for Bettman though.  Their concern is growing revenue.  The teams in the south are generally the ones that need to grow the game so giving them an advantage  due to taxes is to the league’s bottom line.  Having Tampa or Vegas win the Cup is good from his perspective.  Canadian teams are mostly already maxed out on ticket and revenue so who cares if they lose as long as folks keep spending money supporting them.

 

It will take a huge push from the high revenue teams to make a change.
 

 

[N4ZZY]

14 hours ago, Trebreh said:

if we have a great season and make it to the 2nd/3rd round then we will find out if he really wants to play on a competitive team. signing a team friendly contract will tell us if he's serious about it or if he just wants out and is/was using the teams competitiveness as an excuse.

 

i'm hearing about the Vegas rumors. man, if it's true, we just can't seem to hold on to our best players. If Petey's gone, I'm assuming Hughes will be next to want out. Aquilini not being able to be patient has forced him to be even more f**king patient. Karma's a bitch. He wants to be competitive and took shortcuts, and now probably is forced to have to do a proper rebuild anyways. f**k THAT MAN. 

 

[BlakeQuinnAndEggs]

Having the Sedins in office is huge. Petey isn't going anywhere unless we fall off a cliff.

 

A lot hinges on how we play this year but as of right now, imo these rumors are bogus.

 

Just cause Vegas wants a player doesn't mean the rumor is valid.

[HKSR]

13 hours ago, dougieL said:

Does the NHL even acknowledge the advantage that teams in low-tax cities seem to have? It seems like such an absurd thing to overlook when your system involves a hard salary cap. Either the NHL thinks it's not an issue, or they know it's an issue but simply choose to look the other way.

 

If revenue sharing across teams is already a thing in order to equalize across different market sizes, a logical thing would be to do something similar for players to equalize across different tax structures.

 

A system in which every player with a salary of $x million for a particular year will take home the same $y million regardless of in which city they play (so take-home salary doesn't all of a sudden change if the player gets traded) would seem to make logical sense.

I don't follow the other sports, but I assume the MLB, NBA, etc have caps too.  Do they care at all about tax differences?

[DeNiro]

11 minutes ago, N4ZZY said:

i'm hearing about the Vegas rumors. man, if it's true, we just can't seem to hold on to our best players. If Petey's gone, I'm assuming Hughes will be next to want out. Aquilini not being able to be patient has forced him to be even more f**king patient. Karma's a bitch. He wants to be competitive and took shortcuts, and now probably is forced to have to do a proper rebuild anyways. f**k THAT MAN. 

 

Which Vegas rumour would that be?

 

The one made up by a fan?

 

This market is so paranoid it’s hilarious.