WordsOfWisdom

I've always understood that the Norris trophy is supposed to be given to the best defenceman..... but then they always seem to give it to the highest scoring defenceman anyway. Oh well.

Nicely done. 

Different era in terms of scoring. None of those scoring milestones will ever be beaten without massive changes made to the current game. 

And your point is...?

My point is that the owners fought for the current system because it potentially gives them more money and less to the players.

They didn't do it to make everyone richer. They did it to make themselves richer.

Didn't they reduce the percentage that goes to the players?

That really depends on how many McNuggets I'm getting. 

A 6-pack of McNuggets that have been sitting on the rack for two hours and are only slightly warm.

Stupid thread is stupid. The NHL salary cap is not going away. Deal with it.

You never know what can happen. (Other than NHL lockouts, which we know are guaranteed to happen lol.) 

AIDS and cancer aren't going away either. Let's all stop talking about those topics. Whaaaat? That's not a reason to avoid discussing something. 

This is a thread specifically created to discuss the salary cap! 

That's just great. Bully for you.

 

Now get on the phone to Bettman and alert him. Then get a voting majority of the owners to agree with you.

 

Because, see, I didn't lose a season and a half of hockey specifically to impose a salary cap on the players.

 

The NHL and its owners did.

 

I'm sure once you tell them their argument is completely invalid, they'll turn around and realize the obvious error of their ways.

 

Be sure you let us know how that goes, eh?

That's because in a cap system player salaries are limited while owner salaries are unlimited.  That's why the owners fought for it.   

(Granted, they shot themselves in the foot by having such a high floor, but that's just the owners being dumb.)

No, it doesn't. Bad management hurts the highest spending teams. Period.

 

Case in point: The Flyers spent more money than anyone else last season and they didn't even make the playoffs. Why? Because they had a terrible GM who hamstrung the team with stupid moves and bad signings.

 

Sound familiar?

 

...

 

The Yankees are spending three times what the Rays are spending and they are half a game in front of Tampa Bay. And they're built upon steroid abusing cheaters.

 

Any "competitive sports" league that allows teams to outspend other teams by factors of 3, 4, 5 times isn't a "competitive sports" league. It's a joke.

 

The following statements simply cannot be disputed:

• Bad management hurts all teams. (We've seen countless examples of this at both ends.)
• A salary cap, luxury tax, and revenue sharing work to eliminate the advantage that the most free-spending teams would otherwise have. (You already admitted that you don't watch baseball because of the discrepancy between rich and poor team payrolls.)
• A salary floor hurts the poorest of teams by forcing them to overspend on payroll.

Also, I'm not sure who said it (about the NHL being more popular and more profitable than ever before) but the exact same thing can be said of Major League Baseball. Overall profits for MLB are higher than they have ever been, and MLB does not have a salary cap. That means the "NHL profit argument" is no longer valid. I just disproved it by counterexample. Who knew I would ever use a mathematical proof technique in a hockey forum. Awesome!

To clarify, you (or someone) made the argument that:

P1. The NHL has a salary cap.

P2. The salary cap creates competitive balance.

P3. Only a league with competitive balance can be profitable (implied, unstated premise)

C. The NHL is profitable because it has a salary cap.

Disproved by the fact that MLB does not have a salary cap and has achieved the same positive financial results (even more so than the NHL), thereby removing the salary cap as the causal factor in the NHL's current financial situation.

The idea that because one team simply has more money than another they should be able to paper over their mistakes and miscues is anathema to competitive sport.

 

Again, why I don't watch baseball anymore. It's not a level playing field. It's a joke.

 

But you have to admit, baseball is fun to watch for the fans living in the cities that can afford to spend anything on payroll.  (New York, Boston, LA, etc.) The fact that all the other stadiums are empty doesn't seem to matter to MLB. It's a joke, but that's MLB.

I just think it would be fun to be "the evil empire" for a change, and to crush everyone else like ants. That would be very fulfilling. 

Being more like Star Wars instead of Space Balls would be a welcome change. (Shameless old movie analogy.)

@WordsOfWisdom

 

It's not the salary cap that hurts Toronto...it's bad trades, terrible management and arguably the worst drafting of any NHL team that hurts the Leafs.

I agree the cap isn't the only reason, but you can't say a salary cap wouldn't hurt the Yankees. Any system that prevents the highest spending teams from spending will hurt the highest spending teams.

And why? They retooled on the fly after their first Cup.  Won another and are in line for a 3rd.  Go ahead and point to Kane and Toews.  I'll raise you a Saad (2nd round), Duncan Keith (2nd Round), Seabrook (14th overall - kinda where the Leafs usually draft), Shaw (5th round) and Crawford (2nd Round).  What exactly did the NHL do to help them?  

 

But I think the point is..... fans root for Chicago. Even non-Blackhawks fans are rooting for Chicago right now. They like the dynasty as much as anyone else. I'm not sure the same can be said of Toronto. I don't think people ever root for Toronto (outside of Leafs fans). I don't think anyone wants to see the Leafs in the playoffs ever again... outside of Leafs fans.

It's a very different dichotomy and it's puzzling.

I remember people cheering for New York when they ended their Cup drought in 1994. Most of the time, fans want to see streaks like that end. 

Yes, because "financial leverage" has nothing at all to do with success on the ice.

 

The Leafs had 27 YEARS to "use their financial leverage" to win a Cup in a league with more than six teams.

 

They failed.

 

Stop whining about it.

The Yankees disagree with you.

Spending lots on payroll doesn't guarantee success, but it's the exception (not the rule) when teams with money don't win in non-salary capped leagues. Can you name a team other than Toronto with lots of money that didn't win prior to the salary cap? 

I'm not whining about it. Toronto has been badly managed, no doubt about it. I'm just trying to point out that the salary cap hurts teams like Toronto more than anyone else in the NHL, because high payroll teams could atone for their mistakes by spending their way out of trouble. The Yankees are famous for having TWO starting lineups in the late 1990's: their 1-9 and their bench -- players that were in a starting lineup on any other team. That made the Yankees slump-proof and injury-proof. They had all-stars at every position and former all-stars backing them up. Not surprisingly, they used to win the AL East by 20 games.

Only a handful of teams actually spend right up to the cap. I'm guessing your idea of "right" is high enough for the Toronto Maple Leafs to add a few $10,000,000 superstars to their roster when no one else really can.

 

That gets right back to the insane notion of teams whose fans who spend the most on tickets having the "right" to sign the best players.

 

Don't disagree. That's what you want.

 

 

 

 

Take issue with 48 years of player mismanagement then.  17 different teams have won the Cup since the Leafs last did in 1967.  Another 6 have made at least 1 appearance in the Finals. I'm betting not all had the highest payroll in the league at the time.

...because it would be so awful that long suffering Toronto fans were able use their financial leverage to actually win something for a change?

Ten years ago the Blackhawks were on the verge of bankruptcy because their owner had alienated every fan in Chicago. The team was invisible in its own marketplace. People in the NHL wanted to see that organization get back on its feet because it's not good for business to have an original six team on its deathbed. They went from being in the abyss (literally a dead franchise) to being a modern day dynasty in just one decade.

All Toronto fans want is their turn. We can't win with financial might in baseball because of the Yankees, but you don't see Major League Baseball putting in a salary cap to help Jays fans. Hockey is the only sport where Toronto is #1 in revenue. It's the only sport where a Toronto franchise could (in theory) be like the Yankees if they wanted to be... but the salary cap prevents it.

Speaking as a Leafs fan, how many Cups did the Leafs win prior to the salary cap (in my lifetime)? 0.  The only difference was, the team was more interesting. At least they could make the playoffs 50% of the time. It's not like the Leafs were preventing anyone else from winning with their big spending. All they did was buy aging veterans at the end of their career. But that's still better than the no-name, no-talent crap we've had to put up with for the past decade. 

Chicago: Window of opportunity closes after this year.

Boston: Rebuilding.

Detroit: Moving backward.

New York: Unknown.

Montreal: Peaked. Due for a drop off.

The best thing that could happen to the NHL right now would be Toronto winning 3 of the next 5 Stanley Cups. 

That's too much to quote! 

I'm all for having a cap and revenue sharing (if they're set right), but when fans in some NHL cities are paying 10x more than others and not getting to watch a better on-ice product as a result, then I take issue with it.

If you want to use the Yankees as an example, I guarantee you fans in New York wouldn't accept a salary cap in baseball.

There is nothing about "having more money" or "having higher ticket prices" that should inherently give a franchise a competitive advantage. Nothing. At. All.

So you're okay with all of that extra ticket revenue going into the pockets of owners and not players?

When fans pay higher ticket prices, it either goes to the players or to the owners. If the team can't sign any more good players then ownership is pocketing all of that extra money.

(Steps on soapbox...)

I guess I'm the only person in this thread that thinks I should get what I pay for. 

Would you pay $100,000 for a Hyundai Accent when everyone else is paying $15,000?

Would you pay $25 for a cab ride if the bus arrived sooner and got you to your destination faster?

Would you pay $100 for a meal if they served you McDonalds fries and McNuggets? (And made you fill your own drinks.)

Would you pay $350 to watch Phil Kessel?

(Has tantrum, falls off soapbox, takes ball, goes home.)  

How about this, for every game the richer team starts with a one goal advantage?

LOL. 

Sure. All they have to do is actually do it.

 

Until then, the league is more valuable and more popular than it has ever been.

 

----

 

The entire league is set up so that each team has a reasonable chance of competing.

If the NHL did nothing, that initial statement would hold true through inflation alone. You have to be careful with statements that compare financial figures to the past. Case in point:

"Kids today earn more money than they ever have in history!"   (Inflation)

"There are more car crashes today than ever before in human history!"   (How many people are driving?)

How about setting the salary floor to 30 million and putting the ceiling at 100 million?

Remember, the floor is what teams are forced to spend. That's the very bottom. Just because the floor is 30 mil doesn't mean teams will try to hit it. This would help cash strapped teams avoid bankruptcy by not having to spend tons of money when they go through a down period. They can shed payroll and rebuild. Meanwhile, good teams could load up for a Cup run. I miss those days. 

the NFL can franchise tag players... there are ways in the NFL to keep your star players. they are allowed to restructure their contracts and cut players when needed.  the NHL cannot.

That's well said. These long term guaranteed contracts are killing the NHL. The thought of signing a player for 12 years was insane previously. The average NHL contract length was maybe 2 years, and this was in the 90's. Now you can't sign anyone unless you give them 5+ years. It's crazy. 

But then what is the point of the cap?

It's if only in theory to create a level playing field.

Its like in monopoly when at the start of the game everyone starts out with the same amount of cash.

And he way you spend it combined with your strategy and utilization of resources effect the outcome.

Only one wins evryone else loses.

The point of the cap is to put a limit on how stacked a team can be.

If a reasonable limit is set, I'm okay with that. If a limit is set that prevents wealthy teams from acquiring or keeping their good players, then I'm against a cap. I think the current cap is too low. 

Honest question: What's wrong with raising the cap?

The cap in the NHL today is like a speed limit of 80 km/h on a major highway. Is it a limit or an average? Is a speed limit supposed to be the fastest speed you should ever travel on a road or the average speed that the average driver drives on the road in bad weather while eating a donut and having a coffee?

The NHL salary cap should be something HIGH..... like say 100 million dollars, but without being ridiculous. That's a cap. 

Allow wealthy teams to spend more money. That's all I'm saying. 

Which is really working very well for the league. Tronno is now worth upwards of $1B. So are the Rangers.

http://www.cbssports.com/nhl/eye-on-hockey/24839869/average-nhl-team-values-at-record-high-forbes-says

 

What's the Big Problem? Tronno and New Yorkers paying "too much"? Here's the "capitalist" solution - don't pay for it.

 

 

 

The league's revenues have never been higher. The league's ratings have never been higher. Interest in the sport has really never been higher.

 

We simply must put a stop to that!

If fans in Toronto and New York suddenly stopped paying for it, the league's tune would change very quickly about how great things were going. And it may very well happen in Toronto for the first time ever. The "good faith" of Leafs fans has just about been exhausted. There is a very real risk that the Leafs lose their business advantage in the coming years and start having unsold tickets. If the Toronto market weakens / loses its appetite for NHL hockey, that would be a serious blow to league revenues. To me, it's a house of cards right now. 

By all accounts, it was owners like Snider (Philadelphia), Jacobs (Boston) and Wirtz (Chicago) that were masterminds behind the drive for "cost certainty" and a "hard cap" - why would these guys change their tunes? Those are three of the "richest markets" in hockey.

 

Well I can tell you fans in Chicago won't pay to see a hockey team that is stripped down next year.

Toronto appears to be the only exception to the common sense rule of fans not showing up to see a losing team.

WoW to the rescue!  (I was thinking of starting a thread on this ages ago but never got around to it.) 

Fixing this problem (without blowing everything up and starting over) is easy:

• Raise the cap
• Lower the floor
• Allow teams to designate some players on their roster that are CAP EXEMPT.

What this does is allow great teams to pay whatever is necessary to retain their franchise players without having to compromise too much on the rest of their roster. You still can't have an "all-star" team, but you can potentially build a really strong team.

Also, this rewards big market teams with high paying fans (yes, Toronto) because these teams will be able to leverage some of that financial might to acquire good players in free agency. On the surface it may seem unfair to teams like the Panthers but it's not fair (from a fan perspective) to make fans in Toronto pay 10x more for tickets to see the same quality of product that fans watching the Panthers see almost for free. Fans are customers. Toronto fans are premium customers. Premium customers get premium service and products. When you pay $100,000 for a car, you aren't paying for a Hyundai. You don't pay $3,000,000 for a 900 sq. ft. house. You aren't paying $15 a bottle to drink deer piss for beer.

Sooner or later fans (and ownership) in hockey's richest markets are going to get sick of the current system and demand changes.  My two cents.