NHL Off-Season Thread 2010

[Ben Kenobi]

You have no leverage if you aren't contributing. Obviously he did contribute as you say he has leverage.

[Asher]

Once again, you fabricate the opinions of others. Your mental retardation progresses every single day.

[Asher]

Rumour has it the NHL has asked the Canucks to remove the last two years of Luongo's contract, which would raise his annual cap hit.

[-Jrabbit]

Hawks have been told that Hossa's contract passes whatever legitimacy test they NHL has devised.

[Ben Kenobi]

Rumour has it the NHL has asked the Canucks to remove the last two years of Luongo's contract, which would raise his annual cap hit.

Rumour I heard is they aren't changing a thing, and this is a tempest in a teapot.

[notyoueither]

Trivia answer to file away for use in coming years.

http://sports.yahoo.com/nhl/blog/puck_daddy/post/No-hoax-Capitals-mistakenly-engraved-on-Prince-?urn=nhl-261871

No hoax: Capitals mistakenly engraved on Prince of Wales Trophy
By Greg Wyshynski


For the last 10 days, Brendan Millhouser has been questioning his sanity.

The Chicago Blackhawks fan attended the team's annual fan convention on July 31 at the Hilton Chicago, which featured a display of trophies courtesy of the Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto. Among the hardware was the Prince of Wales Trophy, given to the winner of the NHL's Eastern Conference each season.

Last season, that champion was the Philadelphia Flyers; so Millhouser was stunned and baffled to see the Washington Capitals' name etched on the trophy -- taking a photo with his Verizon Droid camera and Tweeting his reaction to his followers:

He posted several images to his online gallery and sent them around to Chicago media. But it failed to garner any reaction; perhaps an alleged mistake that egregious, in this electronic media age, felt as if it could have been a hoax or a practical joke created by Photoshop. Professional journalists, bloggers, fans ... none were willing to accept the images' validity, especially with one random fan in Chicago as the only person writing about it.

"I was getting frustrated as a fan, but I'm a cynical guy myself. I had my family look at the pictures for me, [saying] 'Can you guys tell me I'm not crazy?'" said Millhouser. "But it's not like I thought someone put the Capitals on there on purpose."

RockTheRed.net, a Capitals blog, finally gave a spotlight to the engraving faux pas last week. But it didn't make headlines until Comcast SportsNet Philadelphia became suspicious of the photos. It contacted the Hockey Hall of Fame, and a spokesperson "confirmed" that they were a fabrication. CSN Philly labeled them a hoax, and closed the case.

One problem: The images were completely accurate.

Hockey Hall of Fame spokesperson Kelly Masse told Puck Daddy on Wednesday that for a brief moment this summer, and at the Blackhawks Convention, the Washington Capitals were listed as 2009-10 Eastern Conference champions on the actual Prince of Wales Trophy.

"It was not Photoshopped. It was a real picture," she said. "What happened was that it was incorrectly engraved, and the Hall of Fame people with the trophy realized it in Chicago. When they got back from Chicago, they got it properly engraved."

When his photos were labeled a hoax, and a probable Photoshop manipulation, Millhauser went on the offensive, starting and writing a blog that offered evidence and justification for their validity. From the blog:

It took the word of the Hockey Hall of Fame, who couldn't just take a current photo to end all of the speculation right there and then. It went on to say decisively that it wasn't real and the photos were somehow altered. Despite the fact, that I reported it right away, took shots from many angles, and then immediately uploaded them from my phone, they had to be altered, right? Not to mention that I don't own a computer, and rely on my droid for all my internet connections. (I had to go to my parents' house 30 miles away to finally reach a computer and write this.)

Why did the Hockey Hall of Fame label the images a hoax, only to reverse its position?

"The person that was speaking with the media thought they meant the trophy at the Hall of Fame at that day," said Masse. "When the Prince of Wales Trophy is traveling, there's a secondary trophy here for the fans to see at the Hall. That one has not been engraved yet. The one that was in Chicago was engraved."

Engraved, it turns out, incorrectly. So how did that happen? How did the Washington Capitals, eliminated in the first round of the 2009-10 playoffs, end up where the Stanley Cup runners-up Flyers were supposed to be?

"My guess is that not all trophies were engraved at one time. I think that they wanted to engrave the trophies that were going to Chicago as fast as they could," she said.

"The Washington Capitals won the President's Trophy [for the league's top regular-season point total]. I think the engraver made a mistake and [mixed up] Prince of Wales and President's Trophy."

Alphabetically close ... a hurried process ... a wandering eye ... it's not all that outlandish to believe that's the source of the error.

Millhouser said Wednesday night that he's glad to finally have vindication.

"It feels good, man. I can feel like I'm sane again. It was a surreal experience."

[-Jrabbit]

Great story, NYE; totally loltastic. Thanks for posting.

[Asher]

http://www.nypost.com/p/sports/devils/nhl_gives_players_assn_ultimatum_UEbYgwfB6I4E4y7xGbE1OP

NHL gives Players Assn. ultimatum on Kovalchuk, Luongo, Hossa

By LARRY BROOKS

Last Updated: 10:08 PM, September 1, 2010

Posted: 10:01 PM, September 1, 2010

The NHL has given the NHLPA an ultimatum regarding the contested front-loaded contract of not only the Devils' Ilya Kovalchuk, but Vanocuver's Roberto Luongo and Chicago's Marian Hossa, as well, The Post has learned.

A well placed source reports that the league has informed the Players' Assn. that the league will grandfather the recently submitted Kovalchuk 15-year, $100M contract, Luongo's 12-year, $64M deal that is entering its second season and Hossa's 12-year, $63.3M deal that also is entering its second season into the CBA under the following conditions:

1. That the cap hit on future multi-year contracts will not count any seasons that end with the player over 40 years of age. The cap hit would be calculated on the average of the salary up through age 40 only.

2. That the cap hit on future contracts longer than five years will be calculated under a formula granting additional weight to the five years with the highest salary.

The league has given the PA, which is being directed by Donald Fehr, until Friday at 5 pm to accept these conditions. If the PA refuses, or if negotiations fail to yeild a common ground, the league has informed the PA that:

1. It will reject the Kovalchuk contract.

2. It will move to immediately devoid the Luongo contract.

3. It will move to immediately open proceedings for a formal investigation into the Hossa contract.

The NHL owns sweeping punitive powers against teams and players judged guilty of circumvention under Article 26 of the CBA.

[notyoueither]

Sounds serious, but I note that Brooks is not the best source.

[Asher]

Nor typist.

[snoopy369]

Umm, how about just agreeing to not allow salaries to decrease year to year? Like any sane salary cap?

[Garth Vader]

I still don't understand why the cap hit isn't just what you pay the player that year.

[Asher]

Sounds serious, but I note that Brooks is not the best source.

Darren Dreger reports that NHL sources say the NHLPA was not provided an ultimatum.

[Flubber]

I still don't understand why the cap hit isn't just what you pay the player that year.

They wanted to avoid people fooling around for a single year with a contract like 12, 1, 12 -- Its 25 million over 3 years and they would prefer to see them be hit with 8.3 per year which should be a realistic value for the star player involved. Otherwise you get teams playing games with the cap for a single year and for a given year a team could effectively have an extra 10-15 million to play with, if they did this type of thing with just one or two stars.


Personally I think the "average" idea isn't broken that much -- you just need to fix the problem of uber long contracts where no one thinks the later years will be played at the really low salaries. Conceptually all you need to do is make the cap hit the higher of 1. the average of the entire contract or 2. a rolling 3,4 or 5 year average salary . Add in a provision so teams don't take a cap hit more than the actual total salary over time (say last 3 years would reflect only the amount of salary not yet accounted for under the cap)

End result? Enter into any contract you want-- Front load it or back loead it or make it uneven in anyway . None of it will matter as the cap hit would always be reflective of the actual value of the contract

[snoopy369]

I still don't understand why the cap hit isn't just what you pay the player that year.

Because that opens you up to all sorts of other abuses, like:

$40MM/5 years:
$13MM, $2MM, $8MM, $15MM, $2MM

or whatnot... you're not supposed to be able to play with the numbers QUITE that much (ie you could have a guaranteed cup winning team the second year by having a bunch of people that you pay that way all be $2MM for the second year - so Toews, Kane, Crosby, Ovechkin, Gonchar, etc. all be on the team and all be making good average salaries but that one year have a crazy low hit; some of them end their contract that year, and some are beginning it, so you are never over the cap). And further you could still have:

$2MM, $2MM, $2MM, $2MM, $2MM, $2MM, (...), $15MM, $18MM

or something goofy like that to extend it out even further (especially if you assume the CBA will change between now and the future, and make your hit irrelevant).

The ONLY way to have a cap that is consistent and not easily abusable, is to require salaries to not decrease from year to year, to have a limited increase from year to year, and to have a limited overall length that is reasonable for that sport (so baseball 10 years is probably reasonable, football 7 years is plenty; not sure about hockey, but 7 might well be fine there too).