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Flubber
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With a view of the Rockies
Aug 2000
time: 22:24
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To follow up from Dejon
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It's Over: Bettman cancels NHL season
TSN.ca Staff with CP files
2/16/2005
From this moment on, the 2004-2005 NHL season will be marked with an asterisk and caption that reads "Season Cancelled."
A last-minute effort to put together a framework for a new collective bargaining agreement proved to be too little, too late on Wednesday as commissioner Gary Bettman officially called off the remainder of the 2004-2005 season.
Bettman had given the Players' Association until 11am et to accept the league's final offer, which featured a $42.5-million US salary cap. The union's counter-offer called for a $49-million salary cap. A publicized letter-writing campaign outlining $6.5 million the gap between both sides broke down late Tuesday night, prompting the league to send memos to its 30 teams saying the season would be cancelled.
The only other letter that came on Wednesday morning was a press release from the NHLPA saying it had scheduled its own news conference for 4pm et/1pm pt in Toronto.
Related Info
Bettman-Goodenow correspondence
"It's too bad...but at least we have an answer," Vancouver Canucks captain Markus Naslund told TSN. "It's too bad for us players that we can't be out there to perform but there's a bigger picture, too."
It's the first time a major professional league in North America has cancelled an entire season due to a work stoppage. A Stanley Cup champion has been crowned every year since 1893 with the exception of 1919, when the Finals were canceled after five games due to a flu epidemic.
The union was willing to play with a salary cap at $49 million, but that was rejected by Bettman.
"If every team spent to the $49 million level you have proposed, total player compensation would exceed what we spent last season and, assuming for discussion purposes, there was no damage to the game, our player compensation costs would exceed 75 percent of revenues," the commissioner wrote. "We cannot afford your proposal."
Goodenow fired back with a spirited letter, stating the union would not present any future offers.
"Your claim that the clubs 'cannot afford' our proposal is based on your hypothetical fear of what would happen 'if every team spent to the $49 million level the players have proposed,'" he wrote. "I am at a loss to understand how you suggest your offer earlier (Tuesday) represents a $75 million increase when it only impacts the spending of nine teams!"
Early Tuesday evening, Bettman made what he termed the NHL's "last effort" to resolve the lengthy labor dispute, raising the amount of the previous salary cap offer of $40 million in an attempt to reach a new CBA with the players.
In a letter to Goodenow, Bettman put forth a "take it or leave it" offer and requested a response prior to his news conference Wednesday afternoon.
"We are increasing our offer of (Monday) by increasing the maximum individual team cap to $44.7 million ($42.5 million in salary and $2.2 million in benefits)," Bettman wrote. "This offer is not an invitation to begin negotiations - it's too late for that. This is our last effort to make a deal that's fair to the players and one that the clubs (hopefully) can afford. We have no more flexibility and there is no time for further negotiation."
Goodenow responded with his own letter to Bettman in which he presented a deal that would institute a $49 million cap - $3 million lower than the union's previous offer - plus $2.2 million in benefits.
Goodenow's six-year proposal also called for a $25 million floor that each team could fall below twice during the term, a minimum player salary of $300,000, a scale of payroll taxes and a 55 percent player share of 2005 playoff revenue.
While Bettman's proposal called for a hard salary cap, Goodenow's plan allowed teams the opportunity to exceed the threshold by 10 percent - up to $53.9 million - twice during its duration, with a 150 percent tax as a penalty.
After months of haggling over the issue of a salary cap, both the NHL and union made unprecedented concessions late Monday night. The NHL removed the linkage of salaries to league revenues while presenting a proposal that included a $40 million cap to the union.
Doing something it vowed never to consider, the NHLPA in turn backed away from its hardline stance against a cap and made a counterproposal that featured a $52 million limit on team payrolls. The union's latest offering also included the 24 percent rollback on existing contracts it presented in December and more aggressive tax thresholds and tax rates on team payrolls.
Under Bettman's proposal, NHL teams would have to divide less than $45 million among 24 players and would not be able to exceed the threshold. By comparison, NBA teams have nearly $44 million to divide among 12-15 players and also enjoy exceptions which allow them to exceed the cap without penalty.
Bettman locked out NHL players at the start of the 1994-95 season, when the league's average salary was $572,000. It has more than tripled to $1.8 million.
The lockout reached its 154th day Wednesday.
If an agreement was reached, Bettman said the league had in place a 28-game regular season followed by a playoff with 16 participants.
The work stoppage has been in effect since Sept. 15, when Bettman announced that the league would lock out its players following the expiration of the most recent agreement. He indicated that teams had lost $1.8 billion over the last 10 years, including $224 million in 2003-04. Bettman added that the owners needed "an enforceable, defined relationship between revenues and expenses," so that a team's ability to compete was not dependent upon its ability to pay.
Two-and-a-half months passed before the two sides agreed to meet in their first formal bargaining session since the lockout began. It was at that point that the players offered a 24-percent rollback in salaries as part of their proposal. Though Bettman said the union finally acknowledged the league's financial troubles, the offer was rejected by the league.
The two sides met again in January, this time in a much smaller setting without Bettman or Goodenow at the bargaining table. But after almost 10 hours of talks over two days, both sides continued to cite "philosophical differences."
On Jan. 27, the league put forth a framework for a proposal that included a team-by-team salary cap between $32-$42 million with no luxury tax and team payrolls linked to revenues at a rate of 54-percent. The NHLPA did not look favourably on the proposal.
With the deadline of the season being cancelled hanging over their heads, Bettman and Goodenow finally met again for two days in early February. Both sides reported no progress.
On Feb. 9, Bettman set a weekend deadline for getting a new deal in place or else the season would be cancelled, acknowledging for the first time that a formal announcement would take place rather than let the season fade away without recognition.
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Kontiki
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Canada
Aug 2001
time: 00:24
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I'm wondering how they hope to get out of this mess in time for next season.
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Flubber
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With a view of the Rockies
Aug 2000
time: 22:24
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quote:
Originally posted by Kontiki
I'm wondering how they hope to get out of this mess in time for next season. |
It will be tough but I think a lot of people just figured this would get solved at the last moment and are now going WTF !!??
In any labour negotiation the question is always who loses and the answer here is unequivocally "the players" for the following reasons
1. owners have other sources of income and in many cases were operating franchises at a loss
2. There is nowhere that the players can go to obtain anything close to NHL-style salaries and conditions
3. I'm betting that the NHL will go back to REQUIRING that a cap be linked to revenues-- after a full year off, no one knows what the revenues will be so I'm doubting that the last minute offers will remain available
What gets me is that this fight is mainly about the top players . . .. I'm betting that cap or no cap the guy that makes around a million now would still make around a million--- So the fight seems to be about protecting the chances of an elite player to make 10 million a season rather than 6 or 8.
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Flubber
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With a view of the Rockies
Aug 2000
time: 22:24
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quote:
Originally posted by pchang
Every player coming into the league thinks they are a TOP player or will become one in the near future. |
Nope-- The grinder who scored 15 goals in junior knows they are not destined for stardom. I've met quite a few major junior players and for the most part they are realists. They know that they are not ALL potential superstars but if they can make a million as a third line grinder, thats pretty good.
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ixnay
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ACS Staff: 'RoN' Content Editor
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I <3 etna, omg disgaea fag
Jan 1970
time: 22:24
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OH MY
http://sports.espn.go.com/nhl/news/story?id=1994750
quote:
Season could be un-canceled Saturday
There might be an NHL season, after all.
The NHL and the players' association will meet in New York on Saturday after the league requested the sides get together again. The Hockey News reported Friday night that the sides had already agreed in principle to a deal that includes a $45 million salary cap and could un-cancel the season Saturday.
Asked if there was any way a deal won't get done, a player close to the talks who asked to remain anonymous told The Hockey News, "Not that I can see. I couldn't possibly imagine the idea that somebody is going to try to make a name for themselves in the last minute here."
Wayne Gretzky and Mario Lemieux are still believed to be major players in the process. Both are reported to be in New York taking part in the talks.
"I believe all (that) stuff is pretty accurate," said the player close to the talks.
A second source confirmed to The Hockey News that Lemieux traveled to New York on Friday.
On Wednesday, commissioner Gary Bettman canceled the season, saying it was too late to play any semblance of a schedule. The cancellation made the NHL the first major North American sports league to lose a full season to a labor dispute.
Or did it?
In a statement released Friday night, the players' association said the NHL made the offer late Thursday night to get back together. NHL spokesman Frank Brown told ESPN that the league had no comment on the reports.
There was no immediate word on who would take part in the meeting, although Canada's TSN reported earlier Friday that NHL vice president Bill Daly and NHLPA senior director Ted Saskin -- who ESPN The Magazine's E.J. Hradek reported was traveling to New York on Friday night -- will be in attendance. TSN said Bettman and Goodenow may not be directly involved in the meeting.
One general manager told The Hockey News that Bettman used the cancellation to force NHLPA executive director Bob Goodenow's hand -- i.e., if Goodenow thought he could maintain his reputation of being a successful deadline hunter, he was wrong.
"I think the timing has always been to get an agreement so that we can play," said New Jersey Devils president Lou Lamoriello, who has taken part in previous negotiations. "Right now, it's still get an agreement, and then if we get an agreement, then can we play?
"I think it's a little different than it was before," he said.
Hradek reported that even if an agreement is reached, there is no guarantee a season will be played this year.
"The way everything has transpired, nothing surprises me," said Lamoriello, who declined to say whether he would be in attendance.
Daly was involved in a closed-door meeting Friday evening and declined to comment.
There hadn't been any official contact between the NHL and the players' association since Tuesday night -- when the sides traded what they said were final offers.
All proposals were rejected, and Bettman went ahead and canceled the season Wednesday at a news conference that was scheduled two days earlier.
"I don't think anything was premature. It was a necessity," Lamoriello said. "It didn't appear to be going anywhere and there was too much jockeying going on.
"Right now, there's a chance of people getting down to possibly getting this done," he said.
Bettman said in a letter to Goodenow on Tuesday that the league's salary cap proposal of $42.5 million was as far as he could go and that there was no time or flexibility for negotiation.
Goodenow sent a letter back, proposing a soft cap at $49 million that could be exceeded by as much as 10 percent by teams twice during the course of the six-year deal.
It appeared there was momentum toward reaching a deal and that the season had a chance to be saved, since the sides were only $6.5 million apart on their cap numbers. But talking ceased after each side sent two letters to the other on Tuesday night.
There were big breakthroughs Monday in Niagara Falls, N.Y., when the NHL agreed to drop its demand that player costs be linked to league revenues and the union, in turn, came off its steadfast opposition to a salary cap.
"We got through the philosophical end of it, so there's a better chance, but I think there is still a lot of work that has to be done and it still takes some time," Lamoriello said.
Bettman said the NHL couldn't afford the union's final proposal and said if all 30 teams spent $49 million on player costs, then more money would be paid out to players than last season.
Rumors began to swirl on Thursday, once the realization set in that the season had indeed been canceled.
"A lot of players, owners, managers saw how close the two negotiating teams got to a deal and I think people are just exploring if that can be explored any more," agent Pat Morris said Friday. "I don't know if it'll have a successful conclusion."
Bettman has said that teams lost more than $1.8 billion over 10 years -- the last time a collective bargaining agreement was reached. The previous lockout cut the 1994-95 season down to 48 games per team.
NHL clubs claim to have lost $273 million in 2002-03 and $224 million last season.
Bettman said that a deal would have to be in the drafting stages by the end of last weekend if there was going to be time to play a 28-game season and a standard 16-team postseason. |
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16-02-2005 23:16
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For instance, the Russian league not only got back the best Russian players, but also got some prominent foreigners. Let the lockout last forever! 
I hope this season stays cancelled, and that the next one starts on time and properly.
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