The Salary Cap is stupid

[mojo1917]

 

I write this not as a disgruntled Flyers fan, but as a fan of great teams.

This current version of the chicago blackhawks is about the best a team can be built under the current NHL salary cap.

Yet, this is it for the 'hawks, they need to win now because their team will look vastly different  next season and not in a good way, Unless some lawyers can find some serious loop holes a team that was built by Tallon and Stan Bowman over the course of the last 10 years  will be dismantled.  The LA Kings are another team in a similar boat , not exactly but they too are in salary cap hell and will have to make major changes to a team largely built through the draft, with the well timed trade.

 

I think this is stupid. 

I wonder if the next go 'round with the CBA if an NBA type salary cap could be instituted ?

teams like Chicago could certainly benefit from the Larry Bird exemption, the 5/30% exemption, a yearly mid-level exemption, and a rookie exemption at the least.

I hate the thought of the 'hawks not having the room to pay for Brandon Saad even though they have the money and all things being equal he'd like to continue to play on this great team. It just seems stupid to me to draft a guy, develop him and then watch him play his prime  years somewhere else because of the salary cap.  

 

Their best players are their draft picks and you want to keep Jesus Towes and Patrick Kane right ?  hell yes. Something is not right about the salary cap when a team plays within the rules and is still penalized. 

Edited June 1, 2015 by hf101
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[Commander Clueless]

Maybe, but what you are describing is sort of the point (well, secondary point, after saving money).

 

The league wants more parity, not Chicago winning it every other year (which is happening regardless).

 

Chicago will still be a great team after their moves this summer.

 

 

 

Death to dynasties.

[yave1964]

I have a hard time with the cap, in 2002 the Wings won the cup with the Best team money could buy, literally outspending folks to add Luc Robitaille, Brett Hull and Dominic Hasek. Nowadays adding one star is about all that a team can hope for. Keeping your own takes an accountant, flexibility from the players as to pay, a GM with the brains to sign a player long term before their contract is up and pray to God they do not turn into Phil Kessel.

 

 I agree one hundred percent with you, the Hawks built right and now will have to dismantle. They are victims of their success.

 

 All that said, I still think we need a cap.

 All you need to look at is baseball, in the non cap time frame teams like the Royals, Pirates, Reds and half a dozen more entered every season as cannon fodder. Hockey, without a cap in todays financial market would be in the same boat.

 

 Look at the Panthers, having not only a cap but a cap floor forces them to spend, it cuts both ways. They are close to being at the least a playoff contender. Without a floor no way in Hell do they add a Luongo at the deadline last year or a Jagr this year. No way.

 

 So again, it is horrible what is happening with the Hawks but I would rather have one team be a victim of their own success than ten teams that due to finances and that being the only reason, having absolutely zero chance to compete.

 

 It could be tweeked. Maybe by adding a rule that homegrown contracts only count this, fuzzy math like the NBA uses could be a way of helping the have's not turn into have nots.

[idahophilly]

Well, I truly don't know about the NBA. I have heard about a draft developed player exemption and like the idea. What I would like is a dollar for dollar penalty for going over the cap.So, if the Hawks want to go over the cap by 5 million to keep their players then they have to also pay 5 million to the 29 other teams with more going to worst team and less to the next worse team and so on. Another variation could be to increase the cap by the same amount for the other 29 teams rather than give them cash that some teams won't spend on players. So, in this case lets say the cap is 70 million and the Flyers go over the cap by 6 million. The Sabre's cap goes up to 70.7 million, Toronto 70.5, Edm 70.2 (i didn't crunch numbers but you get the idea). The Flyers still have to pay 6 million bucks to the league in addition to the players salaries of coarse. So, it wouldn't be chump change and it gives free cap space for other teams to use to "woo" UFA's and re-sign good players. And teams who are willing to pay the penalty and give their opposition the money/or extra cap space get to do it... Just spit balling...

[JackStraw]

Maybe, but what you are describing is sort of the point (well, secondary point, after saving money).

 

The league wants more parity, not Chicago winning it every other year (which is happening regardless).

 

Chicago will still be a great team after their moves this summer.

 

 

 

Death to dynasties.

 

I tend to agree. Chicago will have some trouble after this season, they will lose some players, but hockeysfuture ranks their prospects 7th in the league:

 

http://www.hockeysfuture.com/team-rankings/

 

They went through this to some extent after winning in 2010 and they bounced back. My guess is that as long as they have the big three of Toes, Kane, and Keith they will be contenders.

Edited June 1, 2015 by JackStraw

[radoran]

The owners have made the bed and now they have to lie in it.

 

 I agree one hundred percent with you, the Hawks built right and now will have to dismantle. They are victims of their success.

 

They may have "built right" but they certainly aren't maintaining very well. They gave out 30% of the cap to two players. That's just absurd.

 

Think of the return they could have gotten on a Kane (much less a Toews).

 

The key to winning in this league is to continually have young players coming up through the ranks. Trading either of those guys would likely have given them significant parts for the present and future.

 

(One might also note that, while Hossa is getting $7.8M in cash next season, his contract drops to $4M then $1M, $1M and $750K. Could we see him "walk away" from that?)

[WordsOfWisdom]

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. 

Edited June 1, 2015 by WordsOfWisdom

[radoran]

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

 

The owners don't give a rat's behind about the fans because they've come back time (94-95) and time (04-05) and time again (12-13).

 

Heck, fans in Tronno pay top dollar to watch a team that hasn't even been to the Final in a league with more than six teams. Still. Every year.

 

What sort of things do you foresee them "demanding" and how, exactly, would these "demands" be presented?

 

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.

 

http://www.masslive.com/sports/index.ssf/2013/01/boston_bruins_owner_jeremy_jac.html

 

Jacobs has widely been seen as one of the forces behind the decision to lock the players out and then draw out the dispute. He denied that he was a hard-liner, saying he put the good of the league ahead of his own interest in keeping the players on the ice.

“I’m coming off winning a Stanley Cup (in 2011). I’ve got a sold-out building. I have a financially sound business. No Debt. Ownership for 37 years,” he said. “I’m the last guy that wants to shut this down – absolutely the last one out there.

“Unfortunately, I play in a league with 30 teams. And when I step back and look at what’s going on with the broadest sense of the league, I’ve got to play a role constructively in that way. ... To be vilified, I don’t think is right. But what’s my opinion in something like that?”

 

By virtually every standard - revenue, ratings, team value, etc. - the league is in better shape today than it was before the first lockout. Arguably the best shape it has ever been in.

 

What's the driving force making the owners want to change that?

[OccamsRazor]

Raise the cap

Lower the floor

Allow teams to designate some players on their roster that are CAP EXEMPT.

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.

[TropicalFruitGirl26]

Well, I truly don't know about the NBA. I have heard about a draft developed player exemption and like the idea. What I would like is a dollar for dollar penalty for going over the cap.So, if the Hawks want to go over the cap by 5 million to keep their players then they have to also pay 5 million to the 29 other teams with more going to worst team and less to the next worse team and so on. Another variation could be to increase the cap by the same amount for the other 29 teams rather than give them cash that some teams won't spend on players. So, in this case lets say the cap is 70 million and the Flyers go over the cap by 6 million. The Sabre's cap goes up to 70.7 million, Toronto 70.5, Edm 70.2 (i didn't crunch numbers but you get the idea). The Flyers still have to pay 6 million bucks to the league in addition to the players salaries of coarse. So, it wouldn't be chump change and it gives free cap space for other teams to use to "woo" UFA's and re-sign good players. And teams who are willing to pay the penalty and give their opposition the money/or extra cap space get to do it... Just spit balling...

 

I am not a huge fan of the cap (I know, strange coming from a smaller market supporter), but I understand its necessity so we don't have teams becoming the Yankees or Dodgers of hockey and buying up every available quality player leaving none for the smaller markets.

 

Some really interesting ideas in your post, @idahophilly

[Poulin20]

As someone who believes in free market principles I say get rid of the cap. I hate the idea of "regulating" dynasties and such.  Why indirectly "punish" success?  I hate how the Hawks keep winning but let some other team come and knock them off their perch.     

[JackStraw]

What I would like is a dollar for dollar penalty for going over the cap.So, if the Hawks want to go over the cap by 5 million to keep their players then they have to also pay 5 million to the 29 other teams with more going to worst team and less to the next worse team and so on.

 

This basically sounds like what MLB has with the "luxury tax". For years the Yankees were paying a nice chunk of the payrolls of small market teams like the Marlins and Rays. But it doesn't really level the playing field. The big market teams still have a big advantage in paying the big salaries to the top players.

 

Another variation could be to increase the cap by the same amount for the other 29 teams rather than give them cash that some teams won't spend on players. So, in this case lets say the cap is 70 million and the Flyers go over the cap by 6 million. The Sabre's cap goes up to 70.7 million, Toronto 70.5, Edm 70.2 (i didn't crunch numbers but you get the idea). The Flyers still have to pay 6 million bucks to the league in addition to the players salaries of coarse. So, it wouldn't be chump change and it gives free cap space for other teams to use to "woo" UFA's and re-sign good players. And teams who are willing to pay the penalty and give their opposition the money/or extra cap space get to do it

 

This doesn't really sound like much of a salary cap at all. So the Flyers (who can afford it) go over the cap. The cap increases for the Coyotes, who couldn't afford to spend to the cap in the first place. How is that making things equitable? If the Flyers go over the cap by 6 or 10 million, that's chump change for Comcast. The luxury tax idea makes more sense in that it at least gives the poorer teams more actual money to spend.

[mojo1917]

The owners have made the bed and now they have to lie in it.

 

 

 

They may have "built right" but they certainly aren't maintaining very well. They gave out 30% of the cap to two players. That's just absurd.

 

Think of the return they could have gotten on a Kane (much less a Toews).

 

The key to winning in this league is to continually have young players coming up through the ranks. Trading either of those guys would likely have given them significant parts for the present and future.

 

(One might also note that, while Hossa is getting $7.8M in cash next season, his contract drops to $4M then $1M, $1M and $750K. Could we see him "walk away" from that?)

this is why i mentioned the NBA's 5/30% rule and the Larry Bird exemption.

 

think what you'd get for Kane or whatever you wrote ?

more players that are good, probably a zero sum gain with regard to offsetting Kane's salary, or picks a shrewd GM finds a basement dwelling team and makes the move for higher picks... and rebuilding.

 

woe to the GM that trades Jonathan Toews for money and picks, or picks and pu-pu platter of "young players" .   The Red Sox did that a long time ago and the sports world had 80 years to hear the bitching about it.

 

I think the idea of a salary cap is fine I also think a thing or two borrowed from the NBA would go a long way and making the league better. I think dynasties are good for sports, who doesn't love to hate the NE Patriots or damned Yankees ?  What about the "great " St Louis baseball teams of the 50's and 60's , the Celtics Lakers and Sixers from the 70's and 80's no one outside of the home market will be talking about what a great team the '06 'canes or '07 ducks were...If a GM builds a juggernaut that guy should be able to run over the league with it for a while.

[Bertmega]

I am a little lackadaisical with this post, but going through the numbers since the 2004-05 lockout, the teams that have won the cup were not in the top five in spending. 

 

I would like to look at the numbers in the pre-cap era to see if there was any impact with $$ vs Championships. I'd almost like to say that the two are not correlated and the cap is anti-capitalistic and WoW does bring up a good point. The Toronto and New York fans are paying out the @$$ to support desert hockey. 

[J0e Th0rnton]

Maybe, but what you are describing is sort of the point (well, secondary point, after saving money).

 

The league wants more parity, not Chicago winning it every other year (which is happening regardless).

 

Chicago will still be a great team after their moves this summer.

 

 

 

Death to dynasties.

I dunno man. This is going to be the worst summer the Hawks have seen since the introduction of the cap in terms of losing talent.

 

Toews and Kane got greedy with those contracts and this is pretty much the final run for this team for some time.

 

As per bleacher report Back then, Toews and Kane took up 21% of the contract space. Now they take up 30% as these 10.5 million a year contracts come into play next season. They said "Effff the team, pay us both max contracts". They virtually got together and made a pact that both sign or neither sign to force management's hand. I honestly thought they would be more team friendly hometown discount kinda guys. But they got their cups and now they want personal moolah at the expense of the team.

 

Here is what you have currently signed for 64 million. Cap is either staying at 68 million, or going up to 71 million. So you have 4-6 million in cap space. The Hawks went slightly over the cap by a million or two this year, which gets applied as a penalty to next year's cap.

 

??????/Toews/Kane

Sharp/???????/Hossa

Bickell/Shaw/Teravainen

Versteeg/??????/??????

??????

 

Keith/Hjalmarsson

???????/Seabrook

???????/Van Riemsdyk(rookie)

???????

 

Crawford

Darling

 

Saad is RFA and will command a raise of MINIMUM 4 million. Probably 5. if you don't, an offer sheet will.

Kruger is RFA, and is probably one of the best 4th liners in Hockey. most think he will get minimum 2 million, possibly 2.5.

 

Assuming the cap goes to 71 million, those two alone take up all remaining cap space.

 

Sooooooo, you need a 2nd line center, and a two 4th liners. You also need 2 more defensemen. Versteeg has been so bad he is getting scratched and trading him only gets you 2 million in space anyways.

 

And that is 12 forwards, 6 defensemen, not counting how most teams keep at least 13 forwards or 7 defensemen.

 

Crawford kinda flat out laughed at the idea of waiving his full NMC when Darling briefly replaced him(He ain't waiving). Sharp has a limited No movement clause, so it will affect return, and Bickell(Also limited No trade clause) has been so bad you will need to package him with a 2nd round pick and give him away and even then, most teams would not take him. Not even kidding. Super overpaid and horrid.

 

Chicago can't afford to retain ANY salary in trades. Trading Sharp gets you 5.9 million in space and creates a new 2nd line winger need. Trading Bickell will be like the Flyers trying to trade VLC. Highly unlikely unless you bribe with a pick. Crawford won't waive.

 

The only real way out of this is to trade both Sharp and Seabrook and load up with rookies, which usually take a few years to get NHL effective.

 

Yeah, it is as bad as I think it is.

[radoran]

The Toronto and New York fans are paying out the @$$ to support desert hockey.

 

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.

 

November 25, 2014

The average values for NHL teams rose 18.6 percent over the last year to an all-time high of $490 million according to Forbes.com, which uses its own metric to calculate those figures. According to Forbes' valuation, the Toronto Maple Leafs remain the NHL's most valuable team at $1.3 billion, while the Florida Panthers are the least valuable at an estimated $190 million.

The league's average values have been bolstered by the NHL's Canadian rights deal with Rogers that started this season. The NHL has repeatedly said that business has never been better and these values seem to support that.

 

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!

[WordsOfWisdom]

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.

[radoran]

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.

 

I don't know about next year, but the season after that it wouldn't surprise me (assuming CHI drops in the standings).

 

Three Cup Finals in six years gets a fanbase energized. The Kings, for example, were the top draw in the league this year - yet failed to make the playoffs:

http://www.hockeydb.com/nhl-attendance/att_graph.php?tmi=6664

 

Tampa's average went up the season after their Cup win (despite the lockout):

http://www.hockeydb.com/nhl-attendance/att_graph.php?tmi=8385

And they've actually held onto their 18K average after the 10-11 Conference Final appearance despite missing the playoffs two years in a row.

 

Chicago's been averaging over 21K fans since 08-09.

http://www.hockeydb.com/nhl-attendance/att_graph.php?tmi=5218

 

Wouldn't expect that to drop off a cliff the year after a Cup Final regardless of the off-season moves.

 

I would expect the Kings to drop below 20K next year tho (this is the first year they've ever been above 20K).

[WordsOfWisdom]

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. 

[Bertmega]

@radoran

 

Or put a stop to the hand outs to crap teams that couldn't buy attendance. I fail to see the logic where big market teams supplementing small market teams equals high ratings.

[WordsOfWisdom]

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. 

[WordsOfWisdom]

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. 

[Commander Clueless]

@J0e Th0rnton

 

 

True, hard choices will need to be made. The inevitable loss of a depth will hurt them, no doubt...but that's the point of the Cap, in a way - to even the tables a little.

 

The Blackhawks have good prospects, too. 

 

 

Time will tell, I guess.

[radoran]

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.

 

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.

 

@radoran

 

Or put a stop to the hand outs to crap teams that couldn't buy attendance. I fail to see the logic where big market teams supplementing small market teams equals high ratings.

 

There is no "logic" at work here. It is simply that the ratings are higher now than they have ever been. No "logic" just "facts."

 

It's being a true "national" league represented across the whole of the country. The league as a whole has determined that a few "weaker" parts can make for a stronger whole. I don't own an NHL franchise, but the guys who do seem to believe in that argument. And it seems to be supported by the results.

 

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

 

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

 

The NHL has lost a season and a half of hockey so that the people who actually own the teams could force the salary cap upon the players. They set it up so that the players and the owners are each given a fixed percentage of league revenues, upon which the cap number is based.

 

This isn't something that just happened to happen to an unsuspecting NHL when it wasn't looking. It was deliberately imposed by the people who own the teams and run the league.

 

 

 

If a limit is set that prevents wealthy teams from acquiring or keeping their good players, then I'm against a cap.

 

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

 

If you want to go back to a point at which only the "wealthy" teams existed, then you're talking about a much smaller league that, as a whole, is worth a lot less, can pay a lot less and is even more of a marginal sport.

 

On the other hand, it would be a league in which the Leafs would be more competitive.

[B21]

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. 

 

1967.  If that was going to happen, it would have happened by now.  That's the benefit of such large markets.  If Fan A, loses interest, there is always a Fan B, C or D who will buy that ticket.