 | A Situation of Your Own Making |
 nelsog writes "The fact of the matter is that the NHL is a the brink of doom unlike any other lockout in sports history. If the owners and players don't come to an agreement the NHL will cease to be (at least the NHL we know) and North American hockey will suffer a huge loss.
We have all been watching the World Cup these past weeks and to many it should bring up the point that there is a huge desire for hockey in Europe. A desire that has always quenched itself with players that have not made it in the NHL or were never given a chance. Imagine the desire if the Europeans were given back their native stars and North American stars. These teams may not be able to pay what the NHL has been but as the writer of the article brought up guys just want to play hockey. If you can play hockey and get paid more than any other job you could get who would not take this deal? (Maybe Malakhov- but that's a separate story)
Professional sport lockouts in the past have been a bit different from the current situation in hockey since the worldwide support for the support was different. When baseball locked out the only real outlet for them to go was Japan. Now I know that baseball is huge in Latin America but the reality is that these areas do not have the financial means (or security) to draw American players down there. Hypothetically, if football was to lockout the NFL owners would be in the power position. There is no worldwide outlet for football players. Sure Canada and Europe have leagues but not the desire for the sport to support an elite league with large salaries. The point of this is to demonstrate that most major North American pro sports do not have the worldwide draw to threaten the existence of a league like hockey does and so the players are usually attacking uphill.
If a sustain lockout occurs European players will play in Europe and so will North American players. Europe will have the elite teams and HOCKEYHEAD WILL HAVE TO GO TO DUSSELDORF TO SEE JOE THORNTON PLAY. I WILL BECOME A NURNBERG KNIGHTS FAN. The owners must realize the situation in the hockey world and the situation they created. Teams like the Rangers and Red Wings giving exorbitant salaries to players has caused the rise in every players salary since there worth is based on a comparison to these players. For the first time I've seen the owners are at a disadvantage in the negotiations. If they don't give into players demands then they will lose them and their whole investment in a team. We will lose the elite hockey teams in the world and watch dilluded hockey where the best players are spread out in different leagues. Does this help anyone except the players?
Sure we like to make fun of player's greed but it was owners who created this situation, not the players. The players are only looking for the value of their product as concluded by other players contracts if you look at in Marxist terms. Suck it up owners, did you really buy 10%, 5%, 25% of a team to earn money or a tax write off? Don't you make enough money on real estate investment, software, hocking crap? You are now caught in the grip of your own monster and must do as it advises before you destroy the best hockey league in the world.
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| "A Situation of Your Own Making" | Login/Create an Account | 14 comments |
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Re: A Situation of Your Own Making (Score: 1)
by Westcoastexpress on Friday, September 10
(User Info | Send a Message) | | Well I'm not sure that giving the players everything they want is a good idea. That would be like giving into a child throwing a tantrum in a store. If the owners do cave to the players demands, your senario of players scattered across the globle WILL happen as teams in the NHL fold or the league itself folds. Both sides need to get their heads removed from their a**es and get something done that works for everyone, there is more than enough money to go around and this time if one side defeats the other at negotiations, the game will suffer irreperable damage that it will not be able to come back from. |
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Re: A Situation of Your Own Making (Score: 1)
by NHLman on Saturday, September 11
(User Info | Send a Message) | I disagree with you on the point that the owners should end their stubborness. You can't say these players deserve these salaries when the teams are loosing money. You also failed to mention the fact that even loosing teams in Basketball, Baseball, and Football actually turn a profit. When a profit is not being produced by most teams, then you know it is time to drastically alter the way the league conducts itself.
In my mind there is only one reason that the NHLPA should not agree to one of the six plans proposed by the NHL. That reason is greed. The average salary of a NHL players is about 20 times salary of an average American and I think we can all agree that most of these players would be picking-up your garbage if they weren't playing hockey. So, I think these guys should realize how fortunate they are. But more pertinent on the negotiating front is the fact that the players are not helping to generate enough revenue to produce a profit. Here's an analogy, the NHL is a movie with highly paid stars that bombs. There is no way in hell that a studio company would keep on producing movies that they know will bomb in the box office and cause them to lose money. Why should the NHL?
The truth is that the owners are not trying to get a new CBA where the players will be paid a dollar a game so that they can reap huge profits. No, this is about correcting a defect. This is nothing personal, the owners do not have some vendetta against the players.
Anyone that supports the players' side, in my mind, is not a true fan of the sport of hockey. The players' unwilligness to truly negotiate is undermining this wonderful sport |
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Re: A Situation of Your Own Making (Score: 1)
by Rysto on Saturday, September 11
(User Info | Send a Message) | Is the money really there? I don't think that it is. World Cup games in Europe weren't even selling out. The fans, frankly, were pathetically quiet(of course, the ACC has been too). If European fans aren't even willing to shell out for games featuring the best their country has to offer, where the hell is the money for an ordinary team going to come from?
And if looking at this from a Marxist perspective is the only way you can justify they player's demands economically, then you know that there's something wrong with their numbers. |
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Re: A Situation of Your Own Making (Score: 1)
by rojoke on Saturday, September 11
(User Info | Send a Message) | If you believe for one moment that there will be a mass exodus of North American players into the European leagues, then I have two words for you. IMPORT QUOTA. Many of the European leagues, except for Switzerland and Germany, have limits on how many non-European players they can sign. And those limits usually are very small, maybe four or five players. I just don't see it happening.
And just because guys like Joe Thornton and Rick Nash have signed to pay in Europe for a couple of months, maybe a year, that doesn't necessarily guarantee that they will be joined by more of their NHL brethren. This is just a temp gig, in their eyes. Whatever salary they make will go to pay the insurance policies against injury while the NHL is inactive. If the owners have the fortitude to stick to their desire for a salary cap long enough, they players will eventually concede to it, or at least be more receptive to it. Either that, or the owners will fold the league and maybe start again. |
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