The Ditch

igloo--been a long suffering ND fan since 1987. I've paid my dues as a suffering ND fan believe you me!

so much for the season and crosby saving it! so the owners are all mad the players didn't respond right away to their offer? what are these guys - 12 yrs old? Jeez talk about a bunch of little girls! Millions of dollars and tickets wasted. Fans hurt. arenas empty. vendors, stadium works and vallets not working etc. just sad.

This explains everything! Hope this helps.


[www.youtube.com/watch?v=IP24tFB2ufs]

so the owners are all mad the players didn't respond right away to their offer? what are these guys - 12 yrs old? Jeez talk about a bunch of little girls!

careful, cat - we don't need another lecture about mindreading here.

oh wait, never mind. that was critical of the owners, not the players.

lulz--we miss your wit on ngs! hope all is well with you and your family.

Cole really getting emotional with his responses.   He does conduct himself professionally even though I disagree with his perspective and many of his opinions.    I appreciate how he handles himself, I still wish Chicago landed him a while back.

On one question he was answering about how the owners are going to rely on the players to market the game but what he doesn't acknowledge is that those players marketing the game are replaceable because almost none of the fans recognize them.   He used the Coyotes as an example standing in malls passing out tickets.  While I understand what he's saying I don't see how he doesn't see that those players are just bodies in uniforms to the people passing out tickets.     I think living in Montreal has caused him to lose perspective.    He could go all day in downtown Chicago, NYR, Boston, etc. and probably never be recognized even though he's a quality player and a likable one.  

Players haven't done much of anything to sell suites or sponsorships for the league, I don't blame them for most of that but they need to start acknowledging that before the owners remind them.     When the owners do remind them, it's only going to get worse. 

Wow, that post read smooth.   Next time I'll type when I'm not having another conversation and the radio on.     I'm actaully sorry about that one.  

Back to the ditch.

I think living in Montreal has caused him to lose perspective.    He could go all day in downtown Chicago, NYR, Boston, etc. and probably never be recognized even though he's a quality player and a likable one.  

I agree 100 percent with what you just said.  But obviously not just him because most NHL athletes can pretty well go wherever they please in the U.S, walk down the street and they don't get a second look. 

Players haven't done much of anything to sell suites or sponsorships for the league, I don't blame them for most of that but they need to start acknowledging that before the owners remind them.     When the owners do remind them, it's only going to get worse. 

Player supporters on here constantly call the players "the product" and I can't disagree with that because they are the product.  But as today's players disappear from the NHL over time the next players become "the product" and the game continues to grow or may even become a little stagnant, but it won't die as some of today's players disappear.  In other sports individual players make a massive difference and contribute to the games health and growth in a massive way.   In my opinion NHL players are just very highly paid employees of a large corporation.  They'll all eventally be replaced and their replacements will be paid even better then they are for doing nothing more then lacing up their skates and entertaining the fans for a while every season.

"the product"

The product is an actual NHL game, the players are only part of that.     Anyway, that's always my argument about "the product".

The impact of the players on the product is much much smaller for an NHL game than most of the other major sports.     I don't like it but that's how it is.   Shea Weber isn't going to bounce Eli Manning off of billboards in Chicago and Martin Brodeur isn't going to bump Shaq from cable commercials in Milwaukee.    Crosby is a long way from selling tickets in Nashville compared to what Woods could sell at Firestone. 

Lulzie, hope all is well.


 

He could go all day in downtown Chicago, NYR, Boston, etc. and probably never be recognized even though he's a quality player and a likable one.   

agreed. i have a buddy that grew up here in the Boston suburbs, local h.s., capt at BU, played for Bruins and was never recognized ever. I went out one night w/ him Jiri Slegr, Doug Doull, and another guy or 2 and I was really surprised that no one in the city even looked twice at them. Not exactly a who's who list of NHL Stars but still, they kinda stuck out i thought. Granted he only had a small cup of coffee w/ the Bruins but he was recognized on the streets of Toronto 1 day after playing in his 1st NHL game up in Buffalo. 

Here is an interview with BJ Crombeen from earlier today. He was in the process over the pat few days. Scroll down and click "listen here" it's about 7 1/2 minutes long and touches on why the PA went in the direction it did. http://www.sportsnet.ca/590/2012/12
/07/crombeen_blair/

Here is an interview with BJ Crombeen from earlier today. He was in the process over the pat few days. Scroll down and click "listen here" it's about 7 1/2 minutes long and touches on why the PA went in the direction it did. http://www.sportsnet.ca/590/2012/12

/07/crombeen_blair/

There was two places in the 7 1/2 minutes where B.J lost me.  When he was told that public perception says if the owners offer was put to a vote the players would be back on the ice B.J said an "overwhelming majority" of the players would vote against the owners latest offer.  Based on his tone and his wording he seemed positive the owners offer would be declined.  So here's my question, if that's true then why is the NHLPA not putting the offer up for an official vote?  The season is about to be completely lost so if they are so sure the union is so united why not prove how united you really are?  Hold the vote, show us this "overwhelming majority" declines the owners offer and we're all set.   But to say what he did but refuse to allow the players to vote shows me the union is deathly afraid the players may actually accept the offer.

The other place he REALLY LOST ME is when he started talking numbers.  B.J and the rest of the players should never be allowed to talk numbers publicly ever again.  He said if the players accept a 5 year cap on contracts when UFA's sign with somebody else and with the cap dropping to 60 million dollars it could mean half of the hard cap or in some cases 2/3's of the cap is taken by as little as 3 players. That's so ridiculous it's not even funny.  First of all how many teams are going to have not 1 or 2 but 3 players making 10 million dollars per season to take up half the cap?  How many players are going to rake in 13 per season to take up 2/3's of the cap?  That's a crazy statement to say the least.   What B.J wants is for players to be able to sign 10 year deals that are heavily front loaded with ZERO intention of playing out the last 3 years of the deal.  The players basically want to be paid in advance for years of service they aren't even going to honor without the team being penalized.  This means there really is no hard cap in hockey.  This means big market teams or anybody who can afford it can do just about anything they please.  Like I said, that's just ridiculous.

Interesting interview Killer, thanks for putting the address up (to bad I can't say, thanks for the link CBS).

This sounds like a comment from 2004, scares me a bit.   The major problem with the cap was exactly what he was talking about, this sounds like posturing to take the cap off of the table or like Fehr's looking for a train that left the station a long time ago.   Tough to say if the players came up with that themselves, if the agents did, or if Fehr did.     "The elimination of the middle class" of players has been well underway as soon as the players agreed to a cap.    The only way I can see to preserve a "middle class" with a cap is to have money slots on a roster ( examples would be along the lines of 1 at 15%, 3 at 10%, 4 at 7% no more than 6 players eating up 50% of the cap, something like that).

It's a very short sighted perspective.   The players need to push to eliminate the cap or get off that line of thought in my opinion.   There was never going to be a strong middle class of players once a cap was agreed upon but overall league payroll would go up.    The variance he mentioned was barely an afterthought last CBA and it should have been a bigger issue before, not now.     Pronger, Savard, Chara, Kronwall, LeCavalier, etc. and many others will be eating summer overage allowances and create a bigger mess as they eat up space (even if it's only temporary space because of injury, it's still space) and contract slots for those mid-level and lower players.

If the players really cared about the "middle class" they should have yanked a cap off of the table by now or demanded roster compensation limits by % of the cap and numbers of players within those %s.

Got my head spinning, I don't see how anything they've proposed does anything to support a middle class of player the 2nd or 3rd year and beyond in the next CBA.   Maybe I'll see something to it later, but I'm really struggling to understand how that line of thought does anything to advance things since the players agreed to a cap. 

It would be nice if either side did something that wasn't just an immediate money grab with little emphasis on the long-term.    It's disgusting.

It would be nice if either side did something that wasn't just an immediate money grab with little emphasis on the long-term.    It's disgusting.

The kids do not care about the long-term.  Why haven't the NHLPA named a sole voice for the players (aka Linden) since 2006.  Not having a Union president is killing this CBA.  Too many voices in the head of Fehr have him rattled.  I understand Don's dilemma in trying to deal with multi-nationals across several continents.  Although my multiple voices are regional...it is still fun to reconstitute them into finnish and italian via the bing translator. 

i've said it a bunch of times - the solution to the front-loaded contract loophole is really simple. a player's salary for a season equals his cap hit for the season.

next problem?

The next problem is that there is no more than a 10% increase from yr to yr.

The next problem is that there is a long ass CBA.

The next problem is you should kick Fehr to the curb.

The next problem is you should kick Bettman to the curb.

The next problem is that teams should own players for four years after development.

The next problem is that those players get better options to stay with their current team.

The next problem is the Diepietro rule (no dumbass long contracts).

The next problem is kiss and make up.               

All nice posts except that noone has told me why the players are being asked to save the owners from their own stupidity.

Holy moly, Kinik, you usually bash the shit**** out of me.  More Bourbob needed.

Usually the owners need to set fiscal restraints to keep parity and solvency within the league. 

Skinny, parity would be a good thing in Toronto:)

Skinny, parity would be a good thing in Toronto:)

Brutal, even by ditch standards.

Skinny will have his day...sometime.    Leafs rising will probably coincide with Cubs rising in 2015....WOO HOO.

All nice posts except that noone has told me why the players are being asked to save the owners from their own stupidity.

I tried to answer your question or at least give you my opinion as to why that needs to happen.  And maybe one post later Hockeybob also responded to you and gave a different and much more detailed response then I did.  

At the very least respond individually to both posts.  Disagree if you want but why bother asking a question or anybody's opinion if you're not going to read the responses and tell us what you think?

The reason is he his stance of player only reasoning is washing out his senses.  We will get other idiotic player only rants.  Be  assureed.  Tthe owners have the aces and if the players do not elect a president or someone to solve this other than Fehr...it will not happen.  Why does Fehr get an $8 mil bonus if the players garner a contract without him.  hmmmm

Tthe owners have the aces and if the players do not elect a president or someone to solve this other than Fehr...it will not happen. 

Got to give Fehr credit though, he's had the owners negotiating against themselves for months now.      Based on the initial crap offers from the league, I am of the belief the owners offers will get much worse once sponsors start filing suits to get money back for this year.    Owners are going to want the players to cover those losses and legal fees.    I think it's a matter of what timeline the sponsors are on. 

Fehr's guessed right to this point but that doesn't mean a large contingent of this group of players will ever get their money back after this.

I read the daily number for contract losses for the players is at 9.7+ million per day excluding the remaining unsigned players.    That buys alot of Taco Bell I'm told.

Based on the initial crap offers from the league, I am of the belief the owners offers will get much worse once sponsors start filing suits to get money back for this year.    Owners are going to want the players to cover those losses and legal fees.    I think it's a matter of what timeline the sponsors are on. 

I could be very wrong but I read somewhere lawsuits won't be necessary.  Supposedly there is an agreement in place with the sponsors that assures they only pay for games that are played.  Any games missed means pro rated refunds to the sponsors. That being said even if the courts aren't involved that still means more league losses and as you pointed out they'll want that money back from the players.  Furthermore a lost season also means the owners have to give NBC a free season tacked on to the end of their current agreement.  That's not for a while obviously but in the long run that's still at least another 200 million dollars the NHL loses out on, assuming NBC or somebody else would have signed for that much the next time around. 

Oh, take a look at this link.  According to a guy I know nothing about, Adrian Dater of S.I and the Denver Post a "depth player" who based on the wording appears to be part of the process and at the latest meetings said the players were ready to play but on Wednesday Don Fehr told them to hold out for more.   If this is true ( and I don't see a reason it wouldn't be) this isn't good for the NHLPA.  

http://prohockeytalk.nbcsports.com/
2012/12/06/depth-player-were-ready-
to-play-when-fehr-told-us-to-hold-o
ut/

Trevor Linden was the last NHLPA president, this is like when atari was last relevant.  Why vote on a proposal says the
Fehr.  It is not in my best interest.  I get 8 mil if you settle without me.  

I could be very wrong but I read somewhere lawsuits won't be necessary.  Supposedly there is an agreement in place with the sponsors that assures they only pay for games that are played.  Any games missed means pro rated refunds to the sponsors.

NBC and a number of the of major agreements are set up with contingencies but I'm more concerned about the individual franchise sponsors and companies with naming rights and what not.   We hear Molson-Coors will be looking to get some money back, I wonder about all the other recent sponsors.    Service contracts are another area where I think the owners may be somewhat vulnerable since they take bids for a number of services.     Anyway, I'm interested in reading about all that stuff, so post the addresses when you see it if you remember. 

My parents jobbed me for a quarter a tooth.  Dammit.