DAMMIT EK, make that stupid ad muted by default! I can't stand jumping outta my seat everytime I come here forgetting to turn my speakers off.

Seriously: the players can go to hell. They laugh at us is the bottomline. Only a few truely deserve our respect, and most of them are captains of each teams.

The NHL said that existing contract money would be paid out in deferred payments. In other words, the contracts are... H-O-N-O-U-R-E-D!
- As_I_See_It

The NHL said it would payout 211M in deferred money in Make Whole. According to the players it would take over 500M in Make Whole payments to honor existing contracts.

They would be honoring them according to the agreed upon CBA contract. If the players agree to something, then they live with the results.
- MJL

So can we agree that you need to quit belly-aching about the players needing that 57% in order to honour all existing contracts, because you yourself have admitted that any deal that has a hard (not soft) landing at 50% would still be honouring contracts?

Jesus, I'm making more progress with these labour negotiations than Guy Serota ever could.

Toews, Hossa, Seabrooke and Keith, all olympians, Sure no stars.

St.L Blues are struggling to sell tickets, bad example again.
- moondawg

only one of those "stars" made more than 4 million dollars at the time

the st.louis example was about competing, not selling tickets

The NHL said it would payout 211M in deferred money in Make Whole. According to the players it would take over 500M in Make Whole payments to honor existing contracts.
- MJL

League offered 211M over 2 years
Players want 400M over 4 years

Players don't trust the 7% annual growth they are using since day 1

Missed the general point. Yes the players could make more than they have in the past but it would be less than their current deal. Either way its worse for them at the end of the day.

I'll paint a different picture. Say your in sales and you make 5% commision. You have an amazing year make the company tons of money. They don't like how much ur commision check is so say next deal we only gonna give you 4% commission. You honestly going to be like that's cool I'll sell more and can make even more than last year. That may be what u do, but admit it you wouldn't be happy about it. And if it happened repeatedly you would try some form of protest.

Why should the playerrs be any different?

Yes the players can play elsewhere, close to 200 already have. But that point is not as valid when ur discussing up rooting families thousands of miles. So ur example of working elsewhere isn't really comparable either with averaage joe commuting extra 30 min lol
- sfarrell

Your very naive, if you think it's funny about Average Joe commuting an extra hour a day, making less money then he did 4 years ago, to look after his family. Your very ignorant or self righteous.

Most of the NHLPA are also self righteous and ignorant, because they take the people for-granted that pay their salaries. The players haven't lost one cent, since the last CBA, that cost the NHL a season. Instead their wages went up almost 90% in those seven years. Meanwhile, half of the teams in the league are losing money. You can't expect the top 8 teams to keep dolling out money for Revenue Sharing forever. One of two things will happen, the league will implode and a number of franchises will cease to exist, or secondly, the top 8 teams will start a rebellion and refuse to give into the PA and will go all out to have it capitulate. The PA better figure it out soon, because either way, many of the players will be out of a job.

We've been over this a dozen times, MJL.

The players and agents were aware of a possible roll-back.

If you don't believe me, please refer to the Weber, Suter and Parise contracts.

Hint: look at the signing bonuses.
- Atomic Wedgie

And we can go over it a dozen times and it will still be a weak argument. How many players that signed this past off season? And how many got huge signing bonuses? And in Weber's case, the way the contract was front loaded in the Offer Sheet was clearly designed to make it difficult for Nashville to match. And let's look at the year before, and the year before, and see how many players received big signing bonuses?

Hint: This past off season was no different then any other off season. Only the top Free Agents command big front loaded deals with signing bonuses. And that had zero to do with a possible rollback.

Hey Jamal, if things are so bad for you why don't the players quit en-masse (sp?) and form their own league and assume all of the financial responsibilities. My wife and 4 other employees did just this when their boss at the time said they couldn't afford to pay them any more.
If this is not an option then STFU!!!! You play like sh!t for weeks at a time and still collect a check yet when attendance drops because of your sh!tty play who takes the hit? Not you and your guaranteed contract.
- duxcup07

what you said!!!!

first of all, mike fisher sells a ton of jerseys. consider the city, his wife, and just look at the guy. Secondly, who says I have to trade for prospects? there's a ton of teams who would want Suter/Weber who would offer a good player with a good contract in return aka a "hockey-trade"

and whats wrong with undevelopped talent? kane and toews were 20 when they lead their team to a cup. are you saying that some team would offer 100 million to these guys, but nobody would be willing to part with an elite prospect?
- conor_smythe

Anyone trading for Suter or Weber would offer them decent pieces, picks and prospects, but you will never get back that same elite talent, otherwise why would the other team be doing the tarde at all. Its not like teams are trading Weber for Chara, or Crosby for Ovi. Generally the trade of prospect, picks and decent 1st line or 2nd line players.

Yes, but that team also had Hossa and Campbell, and they eventually did lose half there roster after they won to players they could not afford to keep, such as Buff, Versteeg, etc.

League offered 211M over 2 years
Players want 400M over 4 years

Players don't trust the 7% annual growth they are using since day 1
- Symba007

Players wanted 383M. Players have used 5% growth rate previously.

So can we agree that you need to quit belly-aching about the players needing that 57% in order to honour all existing contracts, because you yourself have admitted that any deal that has a hard (not soft) landing at 50% would still be honouring contracts?

Jesus, I'm making more progress with these labour negotiations than Guy Serota ever could.
- Atomic Wedgie

Your talking two different things. Your talking about a hypothetical situation after a CBA is signed. I'm talking about what the players want in negotiations, now. Right now, would the players consider taking an immediate rollback having contracts honored?

I know you know better then this.

The NHL said it would payout 211M in deferred money in Make Whole. According to the players it would take over 500M in Make Whole payments to honor existing contracts.
- MJL

And how many years are attached to each figure?

Um, it's their own fault that they're crappy businessmen.
- Scoob

Yea. Crappy businessmen. Who are billionaires.

And we can go over it a dozen times and it will still be a weak argument. How many players that signed this past off season? And how many got huge signing bonuses? And in Weber's case, the way the contract was front loaded in the Offer Sheet was clearly designed to make it difficult for Nashville to match. And let's look at the year before, and the year before, and see how many players received big signing bonuses?

Hint: This past off season was no different then any other off season. Only the top Free Agents command big front loaded deals with signing bonuses. And that had zero to do with a possible rollback.
- MJL

Thanks for playing.

Two angles I have to offer:

1) If I'm the players, take the best deal the owners have, and just put a rider on it detailing that "we will sign this offer right now, if Gary Bettman will no longer be employed or cosulted by the NHL, forever and ever and ever."

2) Cancel NHL Hockey until Gary Bettman expires, natural causes or otherwise.

Here's the part of the players offer that everyone seems to be missing:

There are no guarantees or fixed targets, other than a requirement that, beginning with the second year of the Agreement, players’ share, expressed in dollars, may not fall below its value for the prior season.

So, they'll take 50% of HRR next year, with a make whole provision that actually makes it ~55%, and then they'll never take anything less than that - no matter how far revenues fall. Jamal Myers and the rest of the PA must think the leagues lawyers and the fans are idiots to think that's an offer to go to 50/50.

"there are no guarantees, other than the players share is guaranteed to never fall below a certain dollar amount"

Your talking two different things. Your talking about a hypothetical situation after a CBA is signed. I'm talking about what the players want in negotiations, now. Right now, would the players consider taking an immediate rollback having contracts honored?

I know you know better then this.
- MJL

It's the exact same thing.

Players want contracts honoured.

An immediate roll-back to 50%, agreed to in a CBA, would "honour all contracts."

If you want to say that the players want all the money they agreed to in the first place, go ahead Skippy, say that.

But drop the notion of "honour" - you've already admitted you aren't using the term correctly.

To Jamal Mayers, Paul Bissonnette, Eric Cole, Sidney Crosby and any of the other spoiled brats that have diarrhea of the mouth:

Try supporting a family of five on $52,000/year.

Try waking up a 5AM, Tuesday-Saturday to drive 30 minutes each way to stand on a trucking dock in either the freezing cold or sweltering hot, with no escape from those elements in my 10 hour shift save for the 30 minute lunch break I have each day.

Try being able to afford only 1 vehicle: a 1996 Nissan Pathfinder that has 140,000 miles on it, that I just had to sink another $500 into just so I could have heat in my vehicle this winter.

Try swallowing your pride as you stand in line for 3 hours because your family falls under the state guidelines for heat and electrical assistance.

Try taking a 15% pay cut (three years ago), and not seeing a dime of that back yet. And I probably never will.

Try imagining how the hell to even think about paying for your 18 year-old's college tuition...only to have 2 more of your boys following closely behind, and wondering how to pay for TWO more college tuitions, SO YOUR BOYS DON'T HAVE TO DO WHAT YOU DO FOR A LIVING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Try to buy Christmas presents for those kids, while wondering what bill(s) you may have to put off until next month.

And, try feeling like a real man, when you have to look your wife in the eye Christmas morning when handing her a couple pair of socks!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!



None of you have ever, EVER known what it's like to live in the real world, and none of you ever will. I would give my left nut to be able to do what you guys do for a living. And I would never take it for granted, knowing what I know now.

Perhaps some of you guys need a dose of reality.

You will NEVER have any of my sympathy, so save your breath.


- Powerslave

Sucks to be you, maybe you should have got a better education so you wouldn't have to be doing such a brainless job?

Dont compare yourself to a NHL player bud, your pathetic job can be done by ANYONE in the world, guys like you are a dime a dozen and are easily replaceable.

Why the heck would you have 3 kids when you cant properly support them in the first place? Its not like that job was ever better than it is now. Guy like you are pathetic, spitting out kinds without even thinking about how you will support them. Stop feeling sorry for yourself, you did this to yourself my friend.

All this whining about how the players/owners make so much more than you needs to stop. If you hate capitalism so much why the hell are you living in North America? These guys worked their asses off to be where they are and if they want to ruin it all by arguing with each other who gives a (frank)? Maybe they'll lose it all and start crying about poverty with you guys.

As for me, I've moved on to watching other hockey leagues. It's not the same but it's better than sitting around crying about this season all the time
- FinAddict

Why does it need to stop? It goes without saying that the average man with meager earnings is and will always be envious of the man with more earnings than he knows what to do with.
Think about it for a second. $2.4 million. That means an average NHL'ers disposable income is right around $1.5 million per year. That's the AVERAGE player. The top players are bringing home 4 times that, seven of which will be grossing over $10 million this season. Hell even the lowest paid guys are bringing home over a half million, not bad for some of the guys only getting 5 - 10 minutes of ice time per game.

Personally, I think they're ALL greedy money grubbing fools, but that's mostly because I'm on the outside looking in. I'll never have a say involving millions of dollars a year salaries, but I can watch and pay attention to disputes like the one NHL and NHLPA are having and give my opinion.

I think neither the owners or players realize how good they actually have it and can't seem to tolerate eachothers success in spite of eachothers own good fortune. So with that said, I think they all deserve what ever they get.

If this wasn't about greed, they'd have already settled.

I have plans to turn in my season ticket package on 29 Nov., in person, to the Preds.

Once the strike happened, I had to fill the schedule I keep. There were lots of empty dates available with no games. Now there is no way to accommodate the games without much ado.

just watch what is free. I'm not purchasing NHL Centre ICE and definately not buying any hockey jersey's and stuff for my 5 kids for x-mas.

Basically, whatever is free I'll watch.

Two angles I have to offer:

1) If I'm the players, take the best deal the owners have, and just put a rider on it detailing that "we will sign this offer right now, if Gary Bettman will no longer be employed or cosulted by the NHL, forever and ever and ever."

2) Cancel NHL Hockey until Gary Bettman expires, natural causes or otherwise.
- El Capitano

Rather than take the time to explain to you why your two angles aren't worth a bucket of spit, perhaps I'll just let child molester Pete Townshend explain it to you:

"Meet the new boss,
Just the same as the old boss."

Sucks to be you, maybe you should have got a better education so you wouldn't have to be doing such a brainless job?

Dont compare yourself to a NHL player bud, your pathetic job can be done by ANYONE in the world, guys like you are a dime a dozen and are easily replaceable.


- C.J

My thoughts as well. Just thought it might be too cruel to say.

just watch what is free. I'm not purchasing NHL Centre ICE and definately not buying any hockey jersey's and stuff for my 5 kids for x-mas.

Basically, whatever is free I'll watch.
- chelios_24

Five kids?

Good god man, buy some NHL rubbers for Christmas.