There will be a strike

[tantalum]

Bettman pretty forthright with his comments today which I think is a good indication of the ownership group sticking together.

from grange's twitter:

"Bettman: 'the sides are far apart and have different views of the world"

Bettman cites #NBA and #NFL as context for #NHL deal

Bettman: players proposal didn't respond to theirs & didn't acknowledge industry trends (paraphrase) #NHL #NHLPA


Shoalts:

Bettman also said he is still waiting for players to file their complete proposal. Implied he was annoyed they have not.


The owners aren't dropping a linked hard cap anytime soon (or ever IMO).

[Fred]

Some reality

However, having to pay Weber $27 million over the next calendar year adds more pressure on the team to generate more revenue.
"We come to work every day and we want to enhance the fan experience," Cogen told the paper. "We want to monetize some of the on-ice successes and re-invest it back into the team.

"We hope to compete and not just survive in the NHL. I would argue we are (competing)."

While ticket sales and season ticket purchases have increased over the last few seasons, the team's ownership group had to drop $60 million of its own money into the team over the past five seasons -- a report confirmed to the Tennessean on Apr. 29 by Preds chairman and alternate governor Tom Cigarran.

[tantalum]

There is another aspect that puts the owners on edge. Much of the growth has to do with owners investing their own money (or re-investing profits) to increase seating capacities etc. MSG is undergoing a billion dollar makeover and while not all of that billion dollars can be said to come from the Rangers the fact is after that billion dollar investment in which the players contributed $0, the players will get somewhere between a 45-55% share of the increased revenue. If the players want to invest in some teams and building improvements etc I'm sure the league would be willing to listen but the players would never do that because right now it's a stupid investment. Hence the reason for the lockout.

Fred. Yep. The reality is even with having to pay some signing bonuses etc some teams will be better off than if they played another season under the current CBA. Some teams it won't matter but a better CBA for owners means something better down the line. A select few ownership groups will be somewhat upset that they aren't bringing home profits in October but this will likely be more than offset by the increase in franchise value under a more favourable CBA. Only the Leafs and Rangers are really making enough profits to be peeved over a lockout and given the Leafs have sent Burke as their representative to these negotiations I'm guessing they are behind Bettman. You know Burke is.

[rats19]

maybe i should start up a "joke/funny" thread....sheesh this might get ugly again...

[tantalum]

maybe i should start up a "joke/funny" thread....sheesh this might get ugly again...

It got ugly the moment the PA decided to bring on Fehr. Fehr has no intention of making any sort of deal until 30 games are lost. It's his only leverage point. It's the same leverage point they thought they had in 2004. They were wrong then and I think they are wrong now.

They are supposedly not getting together for another week during which time the PA may actually decide to give the league their complete and formal proposal (they haven't done so yet instead it appears they gave a nice powerpoint and that was about it). At the next round of meetings I expect the league will present a better offer to the players with a hard linked cap at around 48% of revenues and tell the players we are willing to negotiate anything including the % of revenues (if other concessions are given) but we will not negotiate a system that doesn't have a linked hard cap. When the players reject it, I expect the league to publish/leak every last detail of what they are offering, why they are offering that compared to the current CBA, and let everyone know there is wiggle room within those parameters to strike a deal and most everyone will be left wondering why the PA walked away from the table.

The PA is winning the PR war right now because of a couple of things. (1) people I don't think really grasp what their proposal means or what it would bring the league to (I may be wrong but as more things are written today as people think about it a bit more the shine is certainly wearing off. (2) they are less rich (3) the NHL really hasn't negotiated through the media...yet. The leaks and details are all coming from the PA side and they are of course presented with honeyed words and key points left out (such as the owners proposal actually increasing revenue sharing)

That PR war can be turned on it's head in very short order with a complete disclosure by the NHL when talks break down.

Honestly, as soon as the PA director surrounds himself with the Aaron Volpatti's of the league it is impossible to take the PA seriously. Sure there is a David Steckel here and there but mostly it's the bigger money guys and not the guys that get thrown under the bus at the end of the day.

[Boston Canucker]

Today's responses from both sides seemed entirely predictable. Both sides agree that the cap is not in question, but that they are wide apart on the figures, distribution. Bettman exaggerated the number of missing issues in the PA proposal, but that's no big deal. It'll take a while to figure it out, but watching these two today did not give me a sense that we're in for a season long haul. For a while, I've been predicting a Jan 1 re-start, early Dec deal; maybe it'll be a little earlier, which would be great, but we'll see where they are in a month. Fehr is doing a good job of keeping the players up to date it sounds, and hopefully unified, that'll be key to not allowing another imposed, and evidently flawed (by the NHL's own admission) deal from the NHL to determine the entire new CBA. The owners will end up getting a lot of what they want, but if they demand everything, that's when it will get tough; my sense is they won't.

[tantalum]

Today's responses from both sides seemed entirely predictable. Both sides agree that the cap is not in question, but that they are wide apart on the figures, distribution. Bettman exaggerated the number of missing issues in the PA proposal, but that's no big deal. It'll take a while to figure it out, but watching these two today did not give me a sense that we're in for a season long haul. For a while, I've been predicting a Jan 1 re-start, early Dec deal; maybe it'll be a little earlier, which would be great, but we'll see where they are in a month. Fehr is doing a good job of keeping the players up to date it sounds, and hopefully unified, that'll be key to not allowing another imposed, and evidently flawed (by the NHL's own admission) deal from the NHL to determine the entire new CBA. The owners will end up getting a lot of what they want, but if they demand everything, that's when it will get tough; my sense is they won't.

With removing the linkage the PA is very much saying the cap is in question and by including all the other ways a team can get around what cap is left in makes it very much in question. Once the PA agrees to keep linkage I agree that yes a deal should be "quick" in coming. But until they do nothing will happen.

[Mondi]

I'm saying the combination of neo-con owners and undereduacted meadhead players will result in yet another season lost.

If I was Henrik Sedin, Jason Spezza, Martin Brodeur or others, I would be pissed off that my legacy and stats were being jeopardized by yet another work stoppage in the middle of my career.

Both sides know that at some point a compromise will be reached, missing games does little to put pressure on either side when they all have (literally) millions in the bank.

[Boston Canucker]

Today's responses from both sides seemed entirely predictable. Both sides agree that the cap is not in question, but that they are wide apart on the figures, distribution. Bettman exaggerated the number of missing issues in the PA proposal, but that's no big deal. It'll take a while to figure it out, but watching these two today did not give me a sense that we're in for a season long haul. For a while, I've been predicting a Jan 1 re-start, early Dec deal; maybe it'll be a little earlier, which would be great, but we'll see where they are in a month. Fehr is doing a good job of keeping the players up to date it sounds, and hopefully unified, that'll be key to not allowing another imposed, and evidently flawed (by the NHL's own admission) deal from the NHL to determine the entire new CBA. The owners will end up getting a lot of what they want, but if they demand everything, that's when it will get tough; my sense is they won't.

With removing the linkage the PA is very much saying the cap is in question and by including all the other ways a team can get around what cap is left in makes it very much in question. Once the PA agrees to keep linkage I agree that yes a deal should be "quick" in coming. But until they do nothing will happen.

Not structurally. You've been overplaying the removal of linkage in your critique. It's not the long term fix the players/Fehr has been talking about. I would suspect it will be in there in the final deal, and that is not the sticking point that I see coming out of Bettman's response, or even those commentators who offered a more critical eye on the PA proposal. The two sides now have proposals on the table; the nitty gritty starts now. There will be better and worse days but this does not feel at all like 2004 when the movement from a no cap to a cap system was at the center of things. Winter Classic kick off, still my bet.

[rats19]

spezza has more than work stoppages effecting his leagcy

[tantalum]

Not structurally. You've been overplaying the removal of linkage in your critique. It's not the long term fix the players/Fehr has been talking about. I would suspect it will be in there in the final deal, and that is not the sticking point that I see coming out of Bettman's response, or even those commentators who offered a more critical eye on the PA proposal. The two sides now have proposals on the table; the nitty gritty starts now. There will be better and worse days but this does not feel at all like 2004 when the movement from a no cap to a cap system was at the center of things. Winter Classic kick off, still my bet.

I'm not overplaying the removal of linkage at all. Wanting a hard cap was not why the league was willing to shut down for a season. The PA before Goodenow was turfed even offered up a hard cap. The reason the league lost a season was because of the owners desire, and IMO need, for linkage (i.e. cost certainty). That hasn't changed. That is the major sticking point (though details can be sticky as well of course) as it is that linkage that controls their #1 expense. And it will be in the final deal because until it is the NHL will not negotiate a thing as EVERYTHING stems from that agreement to the fundamental trigger in the deal (not the actual number but the linkage). The number can be negotiated but that can not. Without it I can all but guarantee that within 5 years the league is back to the haves and the have nots on the ice.

I expect the league to come back at best and say we are willing to go up to a max of 50% revenues for our linked cap system but it is dependent on other concessions. The PA would then be best advised to negotiate the hell out of the HRR which is where their negotiation should lie in the first place IMO. Especially with moves or expansion to more lucrative markets in the future (the PA gets no expansion money right now but could provide for a bit of a boon for them if they got a piece of that pie).

And we can go on and on about how "well they did it to themselves so they need to fix it". True but the fact is in order to fix it the #1 expense must be addressed and to address that expense REQUIRES the approval of the players in teh form of a CBA. The league can not unilaterally say no more front loading! No more signing bonuses! They can't all of a sudden put the brakes on things without a collusion charge. It needs to be in the CBA and as such, yeah, the players are going to take a hit and it will likely be a bigger hit than they had planned.

In the end, in my view, there are flaws with the current system and big ones but the fundamental idea is sound and why the owners are going to stick to that rather than an unknown system that is not much different from what they shut down a season for before. At the end of the day had the PA come back to the league with a we'll take 50% of the revenues, negotiate what those revenues are because we don't agree with the reduction in those revenues and limit contracts to 7 years the league may grudingly accept. The leagues major contention is the linkage and what that number is. Everything else is really just a little extra gravy.

[Fred]

In the NFL they have contracts that permitt players to be, simply put fired. So I believe any way ?? Is this some thing the owners have in their new proposal ....any one know

As to Fehr, don't be fooled by his velvet glove approach, he's doing it to garner support from fans. When the going gets tough off comes the gloves IMO

[Strangelove]

Some reality

b] the team's ownership group had to drop $60 million of its own money into the team over the past five seasons -- a report confirmed to the Tennessean on Apr. 29 by Preds chairman and alternate governor Tom Cigarran. [/b]

Ummm not a helluva lot of "reality" there buddy.

I'd like to have a my team of lawyers go over the books of both the Preds and subsidiary Powers Management

(Powers runs the arena including concerts etc, yeah how the fuck are THEY doing?).

I'd like to know how much of that "$60mil" was debt payment from the original franchise purchase

(and how long til that's paid off).

I like to know how much of that "$60mil" was from last season.

Note attendence is on the way up, ticket prices are set to rise for the 2013-14 season.

(point of the last 2 sentences being there's a good chance the Pred future is bright - note Cogen says they're doing more than just surviving)

I'd like to know if that figure takes into account the $12mil per year the city of Nashville pays the Preds each year

(hey, 5 times $12mil = $60mil amirite?).

I'm not pretending to know a lot about big business, just saying I know better than to trust wotever they dish out.

I'm sure the Preds are struggling somewot right now, but how much is the question, and for how long (all things equal).

It's just too fucking cliche to hear a coupla struggling teams whine during CBA talks.

Oh man, I swore I was going to ignore the talks this time and look at me now!

ENOUGH, 50/50 split with more revenue sharing, wake me when it's over....

[Strangelove]

I'm saying the combination of neo-con owners and undereduacted meadhead players will result in yet another season lost.

I'm saying you're wrong.

BTW Mondi are YOU "undereduacted"?

If I was Henrik Sedin, Jason Spezza, Martin Brodeur or others, I would be pissed off that my legacy and stats were being jeopardized by yet another work stoppage in the middle of my career.

So you're saying Martin Brodeur will play until age 59??

[Blob Mckenzie]

BTW Mondi are YOU "undereduacted"?

I think he might be eduacted.......maybe.....

But he's definitely a meadhead .