NHL Free Agency Starts Today

[Dominato3r]

Kovalchuk came from an environment where he was the lone guy. Now he has a cast of good players with him, he'll have to learn to play that way.

 

[Blackjack200]

Not to be a dick, but I hope this deal ends up being a disaster for the Devils. These CBA circumventing deals need to stop...

This is me caring

But I agree that the next CBA will have to close this loophole. I'd just point out that we're not doing anything that other teams haven't done as well.

 

[Blackjack200]

Kovalchuk came from an environment where he was the lone guy. Now he has a cast of good players with him, he'll have to learn to play that way.

This is true to a degree, but don't forget that Dany Heatley, Marion Hossa, Slava Kozlov, Max Afinogenov, Nik Antropov, Marc Savard, and other decent scorers all played with Kovalchuk in Atlanta. No doubt they always iced a below average squad, but he wasn't flying solo.

 

[Firsttime]

I don't think it needs to be closed entirely, but they should modify it to where the cap hit can't be below say ~80% of the highest salaried year.

 

[jman19]

This is me caring

But I agree that the next CBA will have to close this loophole. I'd just point out that we're not doing anything that other teams haven't done as well.

Nah I don't think they are doing anything that others haven't been doing, but it isn't good for the league and is a clear hole in the CBA.

 

[sjwaste]

It's breaking now that the NHL has rejected the Kovalchuk contract because neither side actually expected him to be playing toward the end of the deal, especially not at 550k per, and that it was structured that way only to reduce the cap hit.

 

[mugs]

It's breaking now that the NHL has rejected the Kovalchuk contract because neither side actually expected him to be playing toward the end of the deal, especially not at 550k per, and that it was structured that way only to reduce the cap hit.

Article:
http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/story/?id=328025

I was worried that might happen. Bleh.

Apparently it's believable that Roberto Luongo will play for $1 million when he's 43, but it's not believable that Kovalchuk will play for $550k when he's 44. I don't think either is believable.

 

[oogabooga]

Article:
http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/story/?id=328025

I was worried that might happen. Bleh.

I was actually kinda worried it wouldn't happen. Then again, my team didn't just circumvent the salary cap to sign a superstar - not being snide, I'm sure if the Sharks had done it, I might have went "Damn the league, I hope we get to keep him".

There was 0% chance Kovy would play for 550k. Either he'd retire or he'd say "fuck it" and go to the KHL and get paid more if he was still playing (and they're still around).

 

[xSauronx]

Article:
http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/story/?id=328025
Apparently it's believable that Roberto Luongo will play for $1 million when he's 43, but it's not believable that Kovalchuk will play for $550k when he's 44. I don't think either is believable.

agreed. these super long term contracts are insane
/also thinks cam ward for 6 years is going to be crap, meh.

 

[Blackjack200]

Article:
http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/story/?id=328025

I was worried that might happen. Bleh.

Apparently it's believable that Roberto Luongo will play for $1 million when he's 43, but it's not believable that Kovalchuk will play for $550k when he's 44. I don't think either is believable.

And that's why the league is full of it. There are similar contracts all over the place, from Pronger to Hossa to Franzen. If they didn't like front loaded contracts they shouldn't have allowed them in the first place.

 

[mugs]

I was actually kinda worried it wouldn't happen. Then again, my team didn't just circumvent the salary cap to sign a superstar - not being snide, I'm sure if the Sharks had done it, I might have went "Damn the league, I hope we get to keep him".

There was 0% chance Kovy would play for 550k. Either he'd retire or he'd say "fuck it" and go to the KHL and get paid more if he was still playing (and they're still around).

Well, I said I didn't like the structure of the deal - or any of the similar deals that have been signed - and I still don't. I'm mostly just annoyed that this ordeal is not over yet. As exciting as it is to have a guy like Kovalchuk, I've always been worried about what we'll have to give up and what long-term implications the deal might have. I just want this to be over, whether we get him or not. Now... it feels like the 2000 presidential election. It was over... and then it wasn't, and it's going to take forever to work it out.

This kind of holds up everything else the Devils need to do this summer, which sucks. If everyone else makes their moves, that could leave Kovalchuk with the Devils and the KHL as his only options. But the Devils still need to get rid of some salary.

The thing is, this kind of gaming is something that should have been anticipated when they made the cap hit equal to the average salary. The rules should have been written to prevent this sort of thing so it wouldn't have to be a judgment call. Clearly there are several high-priced players who have no intention of finishing their contracts. The Devils just went too far.

 

[oogabooga]

The thing is, this kind of gaming is something that should have been anticipated when they made the cap hit equal to the average salary. The rules should have been written to prevent this sort of thing so it wouldn't have to be a judgment call. Clearly there are several high-priced players who have no intention of finishing their contracts. The Devils just went too far.

I agree this isn't an original idea, and the devils really did go to far.

The over-35 rule I think was supposed to help prevent this kind of thing, I guess they didn't anticipate 27 year old forwards would get signed to 17 year deals - and that teams or players wouldn't want to do something like that.

If you told me decade+ long contracts were going to start getting handed out by people other than the islanders after the lockout - I don't know that I would have believed it.

 

[Aquaman]

Article:
http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/story/?id=328025

I was worried that might happen. Bleh.

Apparently it's believable that Roberto Luongo will play for $1 million when he's 43, but it's not believable that Kovalchuk will play for $550k when he's 44. I don't think either is believable.

Also how can they reject it when DiPietro has the 15 year contract?

The NHLPA is going to grieve this and it's going to go to an arbitraitor.

I think they have to fix it in the CBA.

Cheers,
Aquaman (don't mind the 12 year Luongo Deal)

 

[Blackjack200]

This kind of holds up everything else the Devils need to do this summer, which sucks. If everyone else makes their moves, that could leave Kovalchuk with the Devils and the KHL as his only options. But the Devils still need to get rid of some salary.

I'm not sure it will. We're basically done with our moves, the only thing left to do is get under the cap. The only thing this does is introduce uncertainty w/respect to how much cap space will have to be cleared.

Someone on another board pointed out that the Rangers will almost certainly send Wade Redden down to the AHL this year to get his contract off the books, but that would certainly be a cap circumvention too! If I was Lou I would howl when they tried that.

 

[Firsttime]

It's dumb that they rejected this after the Luongo deal, but it doesn't really compare to the DiPietro contract, while his was for 15 years, it wasn't really structured to reduce cap hit, both sides still expected him to be a top notch goalie at the end of it.

Yay, the Kovy drama continues, just what everyone wanted I think haha.

 

[sao123]

I think the NHL should allow this contract. but then since he is over 35, I think all his years should count against the cap regardless if he plays or not.
Kovalchuk retires at 38? too bad, still counts 6Mil against the cap for the next 6 years.
Lollericeskates.

 

[meltdown75]

yawn

 

[sjwaste]

I'm not sure it will. We're basically done with our moves, the only thing left to do is get under the cap. The only thing this does is introduce uncertainty w/respect to how much cap space will have to be cleared.

Someone on another board pointed out that the Rangers will almost certainly send Wade Redden down to the AHL this year to get his contract off the books, but that would certainly be a cap circumvention too! If I was Lou I would howl when they tried that.

Putting a player on waivers isn't circumventing the cap. It's just that most teams don't want to eat the salary - you basically have an AHLer making millions. That's perfectly within the rules, its just up to the organization to decide if they want to pay the money out. The cap hit's gone, the contract sure isn't.

I do love that Homer thought he was pulling this same shit with the Pronger contract, but that he's too stupid, and didn't know that the 35 year rule kicks in when the contract begins, not when it's signed. So anyone bitching about the Pronger contract should know the Flyers take the cap hit until the end, unless LTIR kicks in. And really, the variance in Pronger's salary is far less than the Kovy contract was. Might be +/- 2M wrt the cap/avg. Anyhow, I just want to make sure that each of my posts in this thread makes some mention of how bad a GM Homer really is. Considering the bag of pucks we got back for Gagne, I'm sure Mike Richards is available straight up for Rolston.

The next CBA really needs a max contract term, or just do what the NFL does and have the cap hit be the actual salary for that year.

 

[BigToque]

I expect that in the end, the devils will just move some of the money from the 11.5 mil seasons into the 550k seasons. The net result is pretty much the same.

I'm pretty sure the only possible thing they could reject the deal on is that 550k might be below the league minimum in 17 years.

 

[Sho'Nuff]

"NHL Free Agency Starts Today"

Soooooo. The playoffs are over then?

Seriously, I love hockey. But hockey playoffs take way too damn long.

 

[SP33Demon]

I expect that in the end, the devils will just move some of the money from the 11.5 mil seasons into the 550k seasons. The net result is pretty much the same.

I'm pretty sure the only possible thing they could reject the deal on is that 550k might be below the league minimum in 17 years.

But then Kovy won't make as much $$ when he agrees behind closed doors to retire in the 10th year.

 

[Firsttime]

So the NHLPA filed a grievance apparently over the Kovalchuk contract. No big surprise there. I still don't see how it doesn't fly if Luongo's contract did.

And the Canucks were able to lock down Raymond for 2 more years for 5.1 mil. Seems like a decent enough deal for them. Apparently Salo tore his ACL so it looks like they may be able to get him on the LTIR or they could still dump Bieksa

 

[mugs]

So the NHLPA filed a grievance apparently over the Kovalchuk contract. No big surprise there. I still don't see how it doesn't fly if Luongo's contract did.

And the Canucks were able to lock down Raymond for 2 more years for 5.1 mil. Seems like a decent enough deal for them. Apparently Salo tore his ACL so it looks like they may be able to get him on the LTIR or they could still dump Bieksa

I think the argument is that goaltenders can play longer than forwards.

The worst case outcome (other than the worst worst case outcome which is that Kovy signs with another team after losing the arbitration) is that the Devils would have to sign him to a 15 year contract and maybe shift some money toward the end so he never makes less than $1 million. That would increase his cap hit by about $750k.

I'm seeing a lot of articles, some quoting legal types, saying that there's no way the NHL will win this because the contract doesn't violate anything in the CBA. To me, this rule against circumvention seems like a smell test - a chance to use common sense when determining if a contract is allowable. I mean, if the only way to be in violation of this rule is to clearly violate one of the provisions of the salary cap, why would there need to be a separate rule for circumvention? Any type of circumvention would already be covered elsewhere. Judges (and in this case arbitrators) often DO use common sense to make judgments. Common sense says Kovalchuk should lose the arbitration.

The other angle is that the NHL can't actually prove that Kovalchuk won't play when he's 44, and they certainly can't say that he can't fulfill the contract. The Devils (or rather, Kovalchuk) would argue that players often make much lower salaries in their later years than when they were in their prime.

I just hope this doesn't get dragged out for a month while they settle on an arbitrator. And I hope we can get Brian Rolston and the Islanders together.

 

[Blackjack200]

I'm seeing a lot of articles, some quoting legal types, saying that there's no way the NHL will win this because the contract doesn't violate anything in the CBA. To me, this rule against circumvention seems like a smell test - a chance to use common sense when determining if a contract is allowable. I mean, if the only way to be in violation of this rule is to clearly violate one of the provisions of the salary cap, why would there need to be a separate rule for circumvention? Any type of circumvention would already be covered elsewhere. Judges (and in this case arbitrators) often DO use common sense to make judgments. Common sense says Kovalchuk should lose the arbitration.

From what I understand the "circumention clause" in the CBA essentially says that's against the rules for any club or player to intentionally circumvent the provisions of the collective bargaining agreement. No specific reference is made to the salary cap (although the cap is part of the CBA).

I think it's a little bit harder to argue that this contract circumvents the CBA than it would be to argue that the contract circumvents the cap. If that makes any sense...

 

[chedrz]

And it's official...the Blackhawks have parted ways with Niemi, choosing instead to sign Turco to a 1-year deal.

I can't remember the last time a goalie won a Stanley Cup and was let go in the same year, especially when he was only looking at a $2.75M cap hit.