1718 replies to this topic

[Triumph]

You guys will find out soon enough, Fehr isn't interested in negotiation, he wants war. Whether that's limited to delinkage or he secretly wants to go after the cap entirely is still up in the air. I love how a letter to the Canadian Parliament whining about the owners gets made public right before the summit meeting, which Fehr is predictably late for.

If the NHL had any interest in actual negotiation this lockout would be over. Can you tell me what they have given to the players in any of their negotiations that was not in the previous CBA?

Edited by Triumph, 21 November 2012 - 10:54 AM.

[Daniel]

You guys will find out soon enough, Fehr isn't interested in negotiation, he wants war. Whether that's limited to delinkage or he secretly wants to go after the cap entirely is still up in the air. I love how a letter to the Canadian Parliament whining about the owners gets made public right before the summit meeting, which Fehr is predictably late for.

Fehr's job is to get the best deal he can for the players, same as Bettman's job is to get the best deal for the owners. Fehr will "negotiate" if he feels the owners will crack. Bettman will do the same if he concludes that the players are willing to go without paychecks for a sustained period of time. Both sides realize that it's in neither of their interests to completely alienate the fans, i.e. customers. So in a way, when either the owners or players put out leaks to make the other side look bad, it actually helps both sides. A fan who blames only one side is more willing to continue to be a customer than a fan that blames both sides.

It's an art, not a science. Being angry about it or whining about greed are besides the point.

[NJDevs4978]

If the NHL had any interest in actual negotiation this lockout would be over. Can you tell me what they have given to the players in any of their negotiations that was not in the previous CBA?

Entry level contracts being reduced to two years is a plus for the players. And I believe they got the ability to get an outside opinion medically on injuries at the team's expense.

How much can the owners possibly offer as an 'improvement'? They're not going to offer 60% HRR, they're not going to reduce the FA age to 25.

[Triumph]

Entry level contracts being reduced to two years is a plus for the players. And I believe they got the ability to get an outside opinion medically on injuries at the team's expense.

lol. that is not a plus for the players; the league is the one offering it and the players rejecting it, what does that tell you? For every Sidney Crosby who gets to RFA earlier (which by the way almost certainly gets most players there without arbitration rights, so their second contract becomes take it or leave it), there are 15 players in the minors who miss out on a 3rd season as NHL property. It's not good for players. Ooh boy, second opinions for terrible team doctors, yippee. Cut my paycheck 15% and I get to get second opinions? Why not just bring up ending double rooms for players on the road?

How much can the owners possibly offer as an 'improvement'? They're not going to offer 60% HRR, they're not going to reduce the FA age to 25.

They could do a lot of things, they simply choose not to. The potential for no-trade clauses on RFA contracts, for instance. Increased payouts for buyouts. Full amnesty buyouts. The ending of re-entry waivers and no one counts on the cap until they make $250,000 US per year in the minors, instead of $105,000 as is being proposed now. An increase in the minimum NHL contract, which was a big thing in the last agreement that no one talks about now. Bump it to $600,000, say. The re-introduction of player options in contracts. There are a billion small things the NHL could give the union if you sat and thought about it.

Edited by Triumph, 21 November 2012 - 12:07 PM.

[NJDevs4978]

Getting to your second contract quicker isn't a plus? Obviously it has no effect on current players, which is probably why the NHLPA could care less about it.

It's hard to say what has been offered as a plus and what hasn't since the ancillary issues don't see the light of day with all the attention to HRR, make whole and contract lengths. But I don't see how any of those main issues can be better than status quo for the players, and they're not all going to be status quo.

Edited by NJDevs4978, 21 November 2012 - 12:11 PM.

[Triumph]

Getting to your second contract quicker isn't a plus? Obviously it has no effect on current players, which is probably why the NHLPA could care less about it.

No, it isn't. If you get there without arbitration rights, you get a big take it or leave it offer, like what happened to Karl Alzner, or more familiarly, Patrik Elias and Petr Sykora. You'll see more holdouts if this comes to pass. And again, at the fringes you will see more players off NHL deals sooner, making less money and having less security.

It's hard to say what has been offered as a plus and what hasn't since the ancillary issues don't see the light of day with all the attention to HRR, make whole and contract lengths. But I don't see how any of those main issues can be better than status quo for the players, and they're not all going to be status quo.

No one should care about contract lengths - that should be a non-issue. I mean, obviously it can't be 3 years, but when it falls beyond 5, that's fine for everyone.

[NJDevs4978]

Both sides realize that it's in neither of their interests to completely alienate the fans, i.e. customers. So in a way, when either the owners or players put out leaks to make the other side look bad, it actually helps both sides. A fan who blames only one side is more willing to continue to be a customer than a fan that blames both sides.

It's an art, not a science. Being angry about it or whining about greed are besides the point.

I do blame both sides, I just don't like when people look at this negotiation solely as the players being 'bullied' or the owners being obstinate. Both sides are equally culpable, especially since there's no reason beyond greed for this lockout. In '04 the system was broken. The system is not broken now, not when you have an #8 seed winning a Cup and then Minnesota throwing around $200 million for two players and Nashville matching the ridiculous Weber offer sheet.

[Triumph]

I do blame both sides, I just don't like when people look at this negotiation solely as the players being 'bullied' or the owners being obstinate. Both sides are equally culpable, especially since there's no reason beyond greed for this lockout. In '04 the system was broken. The system is not broken now, not when you have an #8 seed winning a Cup and then Minnesota throwing around $200 million for two players and Nashville matching the ridiculous Weber offer sheet.

I have no idea how you can write these sentences in the same post and not have the 'aha!' light come on.

Edited by Triumph, 21 November 2012 - 12:27 PM.

[NJDevs4978]

I have no idea how you can write these sentences in the same post and not have the 'aha!' light come on.

Again, it takes two to tango. The PA knew they weren't getting the same CBA and would have to make concessions. They didn't meet with the NHL at all over the summer, didn't make any proposals of their own and waited until today to actually (apparently) offer linkage, something that was never coming out without a nuclear negotiation.

[halfsharkalligatorhalfman]

I'd like to see the NHLPA agree to a percentage based soft fall in their next offer. It doesn't even necessarily have to be to 50/50. I think that would really get negotiations going and seems reasonable to me, trying to guarantee a rising cap that gets to 50/50 under 5% growth scenarios is just not going to play. The NHL fought very hard for linkage last lockout and any offer that doesn't have that is just so clearly a non-starter I think.

If the NHLPA does that tomorrow I'll be very hopeful for a resolution very soon.

From twitter leaks it sounds like the NHLPA did exactly that, supposedly players pushed Fehr and hardliners to come off guarenteed cap idea.

https://twitter.com/...303360605466624
https://twitter.com/...303480117964800

@FriedgeHNIC
Think the biggest changes [to NHLPA's proposal] are 1) agreement on using percentage of HRR 2) agreement on backdiving contracts and 3) what contracts in AHL...Would count against cap -- but not necessarily HRR.

https://twitter.com/...310594441883649

@aaronward_nhl
Source,NHLPA proposal took NHL structure,50/50,no guarantee.Only difference,took $211M (make whole) to $393M over 4 yrs.This $393M works

So it sounds like the NHLPA basically gave in completely on the cap structure. Just want a larger make whole payment to make it happen.

The NHL is looking over the offer now and expected to respond within an hour or two.

Edited by halfsharkalligatorhalfman, 21 November 2012 - 01:30 PM.

[halfsharkalligatorhalfman]

Again, it takes two to tango. The PA knew they weren't getting the same CBA and would have to make concessions. They didn't meet with the NHL at all over the summer, didn't make any proposals of their own and waited until today to actually (apparently) offer linkage, something that was never coming out without a nuclear negotiation.

The NHL had no interest in negotiation until a week and a half ago. If you look at their offers their entire strategy was to wait until players missed 2-3 game checks and felt the pain of the lockout before beginning serious talks. Any concessions by the NHLPA over the summer or a month ago would have just confirmed to the owners that the tactic was working and they could get even more out of the NHLPA once they actually wanted to talk. A concession from the NHLPA over the summer just would have made the NHL hungrier for whatever concessions they would potentially get after the first missed game check.

This was about extortion from the very beginning. You're criticizing the NHLPA for trying to fight instead of giving in because you want to watch hockey so badly and don't care about the actual details of the agreement.

Edited by halfsharkalligatorhalfman, 21 November 2012 - 01:04 PM.

[NJDevs4978]

This was about extortion from the very beginning. You're criticizing the NHLPA for trying to fight instead of giving in because you want to watch hockey so badly and don't care about the actual details of the agreement.

Not true, at least not the last part.

And the NHLPA wasn't merely trying to hold its ground (which was bad enough since everything other than the linked cap itself favored the players), they wanted total delinkage. That wasn't going to fly any more than the owners' first offer was. It's a negotiation, of course the first offer is going to be outrageously off. It was a huge PR blunder to make it that egregious though, cause it only galvanized the players more.

And let's face it, today's concessions did not come from Fehr, they came from the players who know its stupid to risk a whole season for delinkage. If the owners reject this deal out of hand without any real giveback I'll be right with you and Tri screaming about extortion. All I was asking for is someone to start negotiating and offer a real deal. Someone apparently did and we'll see what the response is.

Edited by NJDevs4978, 21 November 2012 - 01:24 PM.

[Devils731]

PA wants elimination of teams right to walk away from salary arbitration rulings, I can't imagine that ends up in the final agreement.

[halfsharkalligatorhalfman]

NHLPA released its memo to its members

http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/story/?id=409992

Outlines the NHLPA proposal and includes the actual proposal at the end

Players' Share: A major move in the owners' direction by removing guarantees or fixed targets for Players' share.

Honouring Players' Contracts/Transition payments: Players' Share will equal 50 percent of HRR plus fixed payments in the first four years to partially honour player contracts and ease the transition to 50/50:

2012-13 - $182M
2013-14 - $128M
2014-15 - $72M
2015-16 - $11M
Total $393M

*The owners had previously proposed $211M

Edited by halfsharkalligatorhalfman, 21 November 2012 - 01:44 PM.

[njd3b1ink]

Contracts over $1m in the minors gets counted against the cap.
Also the cap is set at 67.5 million at its lowest.
So if that happens, the Rangers lose close to 11m in cap space.
PLEASE LET IT HAPPEN!

[NJDevs4978]

Apparently the cap isn't totally linked since there's a limit on what the cap can fall to....guess that's the catch.

[njd3b1ink]

Apparently the cap isn't totally linked since there's a limit on what the cap can fall to....guess that's the catch.

If this ends up going anywhere I'm sure they will work on that. 67.5 is too high in my opinion to be the minimum

[halfsharkalligatorhalfman]

Apparently the cap isn't totally linked since there's a limit on what the cap can fall to....guess that's the catch.

Yeah

from

http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/story/?id=409992

The Upper Limit may not fall below 67.25 M in any year of the agreement. This is half way between the 11/12 Upper Limit (64.3 M) and the 12/13 UL (70.2 M).

Upper Limit = salary cap

Also

There are no guarantees or fixed targets, other than a requirement that, beginning with the second year of the Agreement, players' share, expressed in dollars, may not fall below its value for the prior season. This proposal allows us to determine players' share regardless of the effects of the lockout and its aftermath.

i.e. The players' payments can never get smaller.

Edited by halfsharkalligatorhalfman, 21 November 2012 - 03:11 PM.

[Devils731]

League might not be that concerned about the upper cap as long as the salary floor can keep dropping, it might be something the league can give to the players in return for other player concessions.

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

Both sides realize that it's in neither of their interests to completely alienate the fans, i.e. customers.

But they've done that. I am as into hockey and the Devils as anyone, but they've made me not care for the forseeable future...even if they announced a settlement tomorrow, I'm not going to be in "Thank God, now let's hit the ice!" mode. My hard feelings will dissipate over time, but it's going to take me a while to get past this one...yes, many will forgive and forget immediately, but I've got to think I'm not the only one who's had enough of this, just because.