Showing posts with label Sporting News. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Sporting News. Show all posts

Friday, August 24, 2012

Bettman proves that he is a ________!

English: NHL Commisioner Gary Bettman in 2007.
If you had any hope of the CBA getting hammered out by the September 15, 2012 - those hopes were squashed today. This is the zinger that Commissioner Gary Bettman uttered today at the end of 90 minute negotiating session between the NHL Owners and the NHLPA.
Jesse Spector of the Sporting News has a really good story on Bettman's comments that he made today and lets just say that the NHL's Commissioner isn't going to make a lot of friends with the fans and with the players.

Based on the comments that Bettman made today - we can say that the good will is over and it's game on now.

As fans we just hope that we don't have another lost season. As it stands right now, Bettman is bound and determined to lock the players out because he can.
Jesse Spector Sporting News --- Another difference between Bettman of early August and Bettman of late August is that the younger Bettman expressed a “need” to lower costs, which was understandable. For teams that are struggling financially now, or that would be in several years under the current system as leaguewide revenues outpace local revenues, spending to the NHL’s salary floor is becoming an annual challenge. Seven teams finished 2011-12 under the projected $54.2 million floor for 2012-13 under the current CBA.

Contrast that with Thursday, and “we think we’re paying too much in salaries.” That’s a shift from a statement of plain-to-see fact to difficult-to-grasp opinion, and one that comes off as entirely hypocritical in the face of the $196 million the Minnesota Wild spent this summer on Zach Parise and Ryan Suter, or the Nashville Predators’ matching the Philadelphia Flyers’ $110 million offer to Shea Weber.

The counterargument to that is that teams are just playing by the rules of the current CBA, trying to compete as best they can. But the NHL’s owners did not become owners by making stupid business decisions, and it would be a lot easier for Bettman to make his case if star players were only getting offers from teams in the biggest markets. There’s a salary cap and a salary floor, and when the small-market Predators talk about wanting to be a cap team, it doesn’t do much for the case that the players are currently overpaid.
I agree with Spector – seriously – how can these NHL owners pay these outrageous salaries to the NHL players and then turn around and in the next breath say that they are paying too much in player costs? It makes no sense what-so-ever – or at least from a sane person’s point of view.

Let’s not forget that they want to also limit player salaries to five years also – so what do they do they turn around and sign players to 6,7,8.9, 10-13 year deals.

I don’t think I am missing the point – if you’re hurting financially you don’t go out and spend a bunch of money that you claim that you don’t have.

Is anyone taking these guys serious when they wheel their representative – who is pompous, condescending, mealy mouth jerk – this is also the same guy that has preceded over two other work stoppages and in his smug way say’s that the NHL owners are paying players too much and they need to wheel back the players salaries and oh yeah the Edmonton Oilers just paid Taylor Hall who has played in the NHL a grand total of two seasons 6 million a year over 7 season.
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Monday, September 05, 2011

CHL vs the NCAA, is there money changing hands

Ontario Hockey LeagueImage via WikipediaAfter reading this article a few times in the past week then going back and re-reading the quotes from Paul Kelly earlier this summer, “As much as the CHL denies it, there are still instances where money is being paid to the family to lure kids away and de-commit from colleges." Those comments Paul Kelly that some have deemed controversial by many have been followed up with these comments.
Craig Custance; Sporting News --- “The amount of money under the table in those leagues is rampant,” said RPI coach Seth Appert, who just ended his term as president of the American Hockey College Association. “That’s against NCAA rules, no matter how we slice it.”

Said Berenson: “I know some kids have been paid, there’s no question about that. I can’t tell you what the OHL allows or what they don’t allow. I know some kids that have been paid.”

In a conversation with Sporting News, one player weighing the decision confirmed he’d been offered a significant financial package to play in Canada, saying it’s not an easy thing to turn down.

“Everybody has their price,” he said.

It’s not a new accusation. Kelly has been publicly vocal in his belief that elite players are getting six-figure payments to lure them away from the NCAA. And, Kelly contends, it’s for more than just education.

Kelly shared a conversation he had with a player who broke a college commitment last summer to play in Quebec. Kelly asked him why he did it.

“He said because ‘they wrote me a check for $100,000 and I’m going to go out and buy a new car,’ ” Kelly said. “This kid never had any education anywhere in his radar.”
With all that happened this summer, I have to wonder if I am the only one from the Fighting Sioux fan base that thought this? Why J.T. Miller all of a sudden de-commit from the Fighting Sioux to sign with the Plymouth Whalers? Did the Plymouth Whalers offer J.T. Miller something to change his mind and go play for the Whalers instead of the Sioux? Miller really hasn't talked about his de-commitment from the Fighting Sioux.I think it's a legitimate question that needs to be explored more.
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