NHL 2011/2012 Season

[tim_m]

The owners initial offer to the players is looking more and more ridiculous with these signings.

[CheapJon]

Rick Nash to the Rangers!


CBJ gets:
Dubinsky
Erixon
Anisimov
1st round pick

[tim_m]

Rick Nash to the Rangers!


CBJ gets:
Dubinsky
Erixon
Anisimov
1st round pick

Wow and the only guy there i remotely care about is Dubi and he had an off season last year. Erixson didn't play much, Anismov was ok.

[CheapJon]

Duby had his worst season. Not good enough for a 4.2 million cap hit. Especially when demoted to the third line behind Hagelin and Kreider. Erixon will get a better shot at making the team in CBJ, he developed a great deal in the Whale. The Rangers however got the same type of player when they drafted Brady Skjei this year + Skjei is 3 years younger than Erixon. Anisimov was a third line center who can maybe become a second liner, wouldn't get that chance in the Rangers I think with Stepan and Richards in front of him + he's a restricted free agent next season and would be looking for a raise. Nash got a cap hit of 7.8 million. Anisimov, Erixon and Duby has a combined cap hit of 7.825.


Great deal for the Rangers IMO. Hope it works out for everybody as I care for the players sent away.

[tim_m]

Duby had his worst season. Not good enough for a 4.2 million cap hit. Especially when demoted to the third line behind Hagelin and Kreider. Erixon will get a better shot at making the team in CBJ, he developed a great deal in the Whale. The Rangers however got the same type of player when they drafted Brady Skjei this year + Skjei is 3 years younger than Erixon. Anisimov was a third line center who can maybe become a second liner, wouldn't get that chance in the Rangers I think with Stepan and Richards in front of him + he's a restricted free agent next season and would be looking for a raise. Nash got a cap hit of 7.8 million. Anisimov, Erixon and Duby has a combined cap hit of 7.825.


Great deal for the Rangers IMO. Hope it works out for everybody as I care for the players sent away.

Same here, i loved Dubinsky and Ansimimov. Wish them well with their new team. Hope Nash works out with the rangers and can hopefully help put us over the top. He will help soften the blow of not having Gaborik the first few months. I hear we are also still in the running for Shane Doan.

[tim_m]

Preds match the offer for Weber, which i really think they had no choice but to do that. They couldn't lose him and Suter. It will be interesting to see if they can still compete in the long term having to swallow that kind of contract being a mall market team.

[tim_m]

No new CBA will mean lockout
By Katie Strang
ESPNNewYork.com

NEW YORK -- Commissioner Gary Bettman made the NHL's intent very clear Thursday, saying the league plans to lock the players out if a new collective bargaining agreement cannot be reached by Sept. 15, the date the current CBA is set to expire.

Bettman said this stance was reiterated to the NHL Players' Association during the day's bargaining session.

"I reconfirmed something that the union has been told multiple times over the last nine to 12 months, namely that the time is getting short and the owners are not prepared to operate under this collective bargaining agreement for another season, so we need to get to making a deal and doing it soon," Bettman said outside of the league's offices in midtown Manhattan. "And we believe there's ample time for the parties to get together and make a deal, and that's what we're going to be working toward."

The two sides, which have been engaged in labor talks for six weeks, have five weeks to broker a new deal and a significant divide on a number of issues.

"Our efforts are going to be devoted to making a deal, but as I said the owners are not going to operate under the economics of this collective bargaining agreement," Bettman said.

NHLPA executive director Donald Fehr has previously addressed the possibility of playing even while a deal is in negotiation, although that does not appear to be an option the league is willing to entertain.

"Under the law, if an agreement expires, that may give someone the legal ability to strike, or in this case to impose a lockout," Fehr said. "There's no requirement that they do so and if nobody does anything, you can continue to work under the old conditions."

Fehr returned to the negotiating table Thursday after spending the past week in Europe, briefing players overseas on the proceedings. With his return, the two sides dove back into the core economic issues.

The NHLPA made a presentation on the league's proposed new revenue-sharing system, voicing concerns that the players would bear the brunt of concessions with salary givebacks.

Although the PA did not present its alternative solution -- a counterproposal that will address this and other core economic issues is expected to be submitted Tuesday -- Fehr said the sides have a significant gap in their desired solutions.

"There is a meaningful gulf there," he said.

The alternative proposal that will be offered next week when the sides reconvene in Toronto will likely show a large divide in other areas as well, such as salary rollbacks, hockey-related revenue and the entry-level contract system.

With such polarizing topics and little common ground in meaningful areas, a lockout appears likely. The last NHL lockout was in 2004, when the league canceled the entire season.

Fehr talked about the PA's objection to NHL's proposed revenue-sharing system.

"The biggest reason was, it seems to us that both overall and on a club-by-club basis, all of the revenue-sharing payments -- both the new ones and the existing ones -- would be paid for by player salary reductions," he said.

Bettman offered a response.

"We start from the premise that the fundamental proposal, our initial proposal, relates to the fact that we need to be paying out less in player costs," he said. "That's something that while revenue sharing has been an important part of the existing collective bargaining agreement, we intend to have it going forward in an enhanced way. Revenue sharing isn't the key element. It's an element that has to be dealt with, but the fundamental economics need to be dealt with first."

This time i am completely on the side of the players. How can the owners with a straight face cry poor with the insane contracts handed out this off season. They are causing the problem not the players and they expect the players to agree to these insane concessions? I hope the players strike before the league locks them out. Fuck the greedy owners.

[Malcolm]

Theres no way they can afford to go through another lockout

[Alan]

they need a new CBA, can't play under the current one, Fehr will pull the same strike before the playoff stunt he did with MLB.

I'd expect a January start realisticly

[AxlsMainMan]

Negotiations are going nowhere.

[tim_m]

I'm on the players side this time. The NHL are asking way too much. They are essentially asking the players to save them from their own stupidity. How they can cry poor with the insane contracts they've given out this offseason is laughable.

[Alan]

I'm on the players side this time. The NHL are asking way too much. They are essentially asking the players to save them from their own stupidity. How they can cry poor with the insane contracts they've given out this offseason is laughable.

They have to offer those contracts, otherwise the players could sue them for collusion.  The teams cannot get together and say right we won't offer any contracts over x years or x amount of $. It would be illegal and cost the owners a fortune.

The owners have offered increased revenue sharing, and have tabled 2 offers now, the second one has larger revenue sharing than the first and shifted 3% more of the HRR split towards the players.

The players on the other hand have offered to unlink the cap from HRR for 3 seasons before reverting back to the current CBA share of 57% HRR in the 4th. Growth on salaries would be 2% 4% then 6% under the players proposal for the unlinked years.

I was with the players after the 1st offer the NHL put on the table, the players 1st offer was just as stupid though. So at that point I just wanted the season to start, the 2nd NHL proposal seemed to offer hope the season might actually start on time as it shows willingness to compromise. Then the players basically gave the fans the finger by not presenting a counter to it.

[tim_m]

I'm not saying get together and just decide not to offer those deals. Just don't offer that much. Say you can't afford it. The players will either sign for less or not play if they demand more then a team can afford.

[Alan]

bidding wars don't work like that.

Suter and Parise both got huge contract offers from multiple teams, each one trying to outdo the other to get the star free agents for this year.

And some teams can afford it. NYR, Leafs, Habs all making huge profits right now. Other teams like the Sabres have a billionaire owner who is willing to lose money to bring the cup to Buffalo.

But a league cannot opperate with teams constantly losing money.

[tim_m]

I still don't think buttfucking the players as bad as they want is the solution though.

[CheapJon]

Landeskog is announced as the new captain for Colorado Avalance.

Youngest in history. Cool news in these times.



(I'm too frustrated and tired of the upcoming lock-out so I won't even comment on it, just makes me fucking sad)

[AxlsMainMan]

EDMONTON - It seems rather odd that NHL owners are hurrying to sign as many players as possible under the current CBA before locking those same players out because the current CBA just isn't working.

But that actually sums up hockey's latest labour strife perfectly: it makes absolutely no sense, millionaires squabbling with billionaires over who gets the bigger slice of an obscenely big pie.

If the players were a little more understanding and the owners were a little less stupid, they could solve this thing in a week.

But they aren't, and they probably won't.

Why should owners worry about making smart business decisions, like not putting hockey teams in places where 12-year-olds knew they couldn't survive and not trying to cheat their way around their own salary cap, when all it takes to get about $350 million in taxpayer money for a new arena is stamping their feet and threatening to leave town?

And why should players settle for $4 million a season when they can get $4.5 million? Think it's easy scoring 12 goals a year?

http://www.torontosun.com/2012/09/02/nhl-lockout-makes-absolutely-no-sense

[Alan]

I still don't think buttfucking the players as bad as they want is the solution though.

You never open negotiation with your best offer. You always open with your perfect view.

If the owners had opened with 50/50 split in HRR which will come into effect when that 50% surpasses the current cap limit then they have no room to give up percentage points.

The fact they gave up 3% in their second offer shows they're not expecting it to be close to 46% to the players 54% to them.

The players essentialy still have not budged from saying we want the old CBA and thats it, we're not negotiating. 57% of HRR is unrealistic when you see the other major sports are around 50-50.

Both sides started out with proposals that would 'buttfuck' each other. One side has moved theirs.

[tim_m]

I still don't think buttfucking the players as bad as they want is the solution though.

You never open negotiation with your best offer. You always open with your perfect view.

If the owners had opened with 50/50 split in HRR which will come into effect when that 50% surpasses the current cap limit then they have no room to give up percentage points.

The fact they gave up 3% in their second offer shows they're not expecting it to be close to 46% to the players 54% to them.

The players essentialy still have not budged from saying we want the old CBA and thats it, we're not negotiating. 57% of HRR is unrealistic when you see the other major sports are around 50-50.

Both sides started out with proposals that would 'buttfuck' each other. One side has moved theirs.

Depends on which side you believe. Both are accusing the other of stalling the talks. I assume the truth lies somewhere in the middle. The sad fact is likely no real movement will come until revenue begins to be lost.

[Alan]

The NHL offered to open up CBA talks during the All-Star break Feb 2011. The NHLPA agreed to talks July 2012. The PA stalled for 17 months before allowing talks to even begin.

I agree nothing will be done untill sept 15th when the league announces it is locking the players out.

Also there is no 'which side you believe' with this, the contents of the proposals are out there to see if you want them, you can choose which side to support but facts are facts.

What I hope to happen is the CBA gets done quickly after that date, and it would hopefully look something like this:

Revenues & Sharing:
HRR definition:
 Tickets, concessions, parking, and merchandise sales, all revenues from TV and radio broadcasts, all merchandise sales, luxury box income (pro rata, per game), sponsorships.
Revenue sharing:
100% National TV & Radio contracts, 50% Local TV & Radio contracts, shop.nhl.com purchases

Travel & Accommodation costs for road teams tallied and split equally amongst all teams. (Accommodation is counted as 2 players per room)

Contracts:
8 Year contract limit
3 year ELC
UFA at 27
Arbitration rights for RFA stay the same


Cap:
70.2M until such time that 50% of HRR surpasses 70.2M from that point cap is based on 50% HRR
Contracts which extend past a player?s 35th birthday have those years counted against the cap regardless of retirement.
Luxury tax charged at $1-$1 rate up to $5m over the cap in 1st season over, $1-$2 second season and so on. Luxury tax money goes into revenue sharing.


edit:

CBC just added an article on the owners proposed changes to HRR

http://www.cbc.ca/sports/hockey/opinion/2012/08/nhl-proposals-to-change-revenue-formula-would-be-significant.html