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Differences Between the NHL's October 16th offer and current CBA
The OP glosses over a lot of the details. Here's a few more very important differences, ignoring the pension "win" for the time being, and ignoring the intangible gain of the "we won't be pushed around" theme:
- The $211 "make-whole" came out of the players' share in future years, so there's really a $300 million swing to the players on this issue alone
- October NHL offer increased UFA age by one year
- October offer increased salary arbitration by one year
- October offer made entry level deals only 2 years (trying to eliminate the valuable "2nd contract")
- As mentioned, 5 year contract terms and only 5% variance, players ended up winning a fair bit here
- Minor leaguers salaries above $100k counted against the cap (final CBA is about $900k) - this would have resulted in more dead cap space
- Salary cap of $59.9 million in 2013-14, so effectively no cap room at all to sign free agents
- No buyout provision in the October offer, which means even less available cap room to sign free agents
- Players on long term deals would count against cap even after retirement - this went away entirely
It's easy to say the players lost $600+ million by missing 34 games, but they get about half that back in the "make whole". I'm sure someone could do up a very similar comparison saying the NHL really didn't gain a whole lot here by not working off the NHLPA's counter-proposal from around the same time. We should also keep in mind that this was the first of about 7 of Gary's "take it or leave it" final offers, which very deliberately left little room for negotiation. So to say the NHLPA could have "worked from it" is a bit of a stretch.
I'm sure someone could do up a very similar comparison saying the NHL really didn't gain a whole lot here by not working off the NHLPA's counter-proposal from around the same time.
Did someone save the 2 sheets of paper and the napkin?
Because the owners were still making money by not playing
how about! the owners could have made more money by being on the ice, and so could've the players
it was a useless exercize to gain very little by the players
Quote:
Originally Posted by topher42
Did someone save the 2 sheets of paper and the napkin?
unfortunately the two sheets of paper are such a scribbled mess as to make them illegible(post offer running of the numbers that maybe should have been run pre-offer, I suppose)
as for the napkin, well lets just say someone used it and it was flushed
90M is 5.4% of the salaries players would have gotten THIS SEASON if there had been a full season. Players will lose more than 10 times of that during the duration of this CBA because of missed games & lower revenues.
I'm waiting for the first mainstream journalist to actually take this issue to public. What the NHLPA gained in the last 3 months is minimal to what they lost.
If they'd taken the deal thrown at them, they'd have come out ahead. Instead, they fought and wasted fan support to get a deal that comparatively hurt them. If you think that's a win for the PA, you'd argue anything is a win for the PA. But that doesn't surprise me, coming from you.
If the longer you bargain, the more you hurt yourself, what the hell is the virtue in being able to say you got a deal that you bargained for?
Players lost hundreds of millions of dollars for what? Seems like this deal could have been made a long time ago.
Yet players are "very happy" with Fehr's performance...
And yet, a deal like this wasn't made a long time ago because the league wasn't ready to deal.
CGG spells out pretty clearly what the PA got by extending the negotiation to the league's deadline. Did it cost them? Of course it did. Did it cost the league? Of course, else they wouldn't have come off their take-it-or-leave its.
This was always about two things; 1) How much the PA was going to have to give up (yes, they surrendered significant $'s and rights); and 2) The ability of the PA to maintain it's status as an independent entity that must be negotiated with.
Fehr and the PA minimized the first and preserved the second and it cost union membership $300M to do it.
Fehr's big mistake was to not even negotiate off that offer and get a 82 game season in. He could have gotten some contracting concessions and the players would have been better off.
Instead, now the players have to act as if pensions were the win for them because having a fight for the sake of a fight can't be the only reason why the season starts in late January, right?
Thats the main thing. They could have negotiated off that offer and wound up moe or less where they re today and a saved the season
Half the season was lost so that we could all watch the Fehr foot dragging.
This discussion raises the question: would the owners have agreed to the terms of the final agreement back in October? Or do they try to squeeze more juice out of the lemon?
This discussion raises the question: would the owners have agreed to the terms of the final agreement back in October?
I'm fond of saying that a strong, effectively organized PA response could have probably gotten about half of what they ended up getting in time for the Nov 2 deadline. Gary Bettman specifically alluded to being willing to negotiate on the make whole provision. I would bet Fehr could have gotten $100M of make whole money out of them. On some of the contracting provisions, I think they could've gotten "tweaks" along the lines of, say, 6 year term limits instead of 5, or 20% variance with a 40% total cap.
It's all complete speculation, and undoubtedly people who dislike Bettman will tend to believe they couldn't have gotten anything.
So explain the 97% vote in favor of the Disclaimer of Interest move?
More fear of getting "mobbed"?
Hamerlik publicly complained about the union leadership and got mobbed.
When a secret ballot was taken to see if the union should dissovle a whopping 97% voted in favour of that possibility. Clearly the majority weren't satisfied with the union, just like Hamerlik.
The other comparison that could be interesting would be the final deal VS the bullet point predictions that some in the media were throwing about at the beginning. If nothing else it could show how asinine this whole thing really was.
At any rate, the two considerations that should be minded are;
1) Even at with the so called "take it or leave it" offer in October, it should be considered a framework only with some allowance for movement. The criminal part of this whole thing was that the two sides weren't basing negotiations off of the same proposal until December.
2) The comparisons can't really be fully comprehended for another couple years. In September the league and PA could have counted on continued revenue growth and yet through an unwillingness to find a sense of urgency they not only threw away $800 mil from this year but have likely set the league revenue back a couple years on top of it.
All the talk of make whole and buy outs and all that stuff can't be looked at in isolation without seeing the effects on total revenue.
As a side note, can anyone point to the silver bullet that this negotiation achieved that would suggest the league issues have been solved? The way I see it is that the the same issues that plagued the league heading into the lockout have not been solved but have just been deferred a couple years, again, which sets up continued labour unrest moving forward.
Hamerlik publicly complained about the union leadership and got mobbed.
When a secret ballot was taken to see if the union should dissovle a whopping 97% voted in favour of that possibility. Clearly the majority weren't satisfied with the union, just like Hamerlik.
You're kidding, right. The DOI had nothing to do with being dissatisfied with the PA. If anything, it supported Fehr, because it was Fehr's idea and at Fehr's discretion. It was a negotiating ploy, and as such, an affirmation of Fehr's negotiating strategy.
As a side note, can anyone point to the silver bullet that this negotiation achieved that would suggest the league issues have been solved? The way I see it is that the the same issues that plagued the league heading into the lockout have not been solved but have just been deferred a couple years, again, which sets up continued labour unrest moving forward.
Why don't you start with a list of things you think didn't get done and we can debate whether they were necessary.
You're kidding, right. The DOI had nothing to do with being dissatisfied with the PA. If anything, it supported Fehr, because it was Fehr's idea and at Fehr's discretion. It was a negotiating ploy, and as such, an affirmation of Fehr's negotiating strategy.
So you're saying if a player was genuinely dissatisfied with the union he would vote to keep it? How did you expect the Hamerliks of the union to vote? The vote shows absolutely nothing about the consensus of the players on their satisfaction of union leadership.
The OP glosses over a lot of the details. Here's a few more very important differences, ignoring the pension "win" for the time being, and ignoring the intangible gain of the "we won't be pushed around" theme:
- The $211 "make-whole" came out of the players' share in future years, so there's really a $300 million swing to the players on this issue alone
- October NHL offer increased UFA age by one year
- October offer increased salary arbitration by one year
- October offer made entry level deals only 2 years (trying to eliminate the valuable "2nd contract")
- As mentioned, 5 year contract terms and only 5% variance, players ended up winning a fair bit here
- Minor leaguers salaries above $100k counted against the cap (final CBA is about $900k) - this would have resulted in more dead cap space
- Salary cap of $59.9 million in 2013-14, so effectively no cap room at all to sign free agents
- No buyout provision in the October offer, which means even less available cap room to sign free agents
- Players on long term deals would count against cap even after retirement - this went away entirely
It's easy to say the players lost $600+ million by missing 34 games, but they get about half that back in the "make whole". I'm sure someone could do up a very similar comparison saying the NHL really didn't gain a whole lot here by not working off the NHLPA's counter-proposal from around the same time. We should also keep in mind that this was the first of about 7 of Gary's "take it or leave it" final offers, which very deliberately left little room for negotiation. So to say the NHLPA could have "worked from it" is a bit of a stretch.
Yeah, the deal the players got was significantly better for them than the October offer.
-It's not a $300m swing when you go from paying $211m to someone else paying $300m. It's a $511m swing.
-They didn't just get $64.3m as next year's cap. They got it as the minimum for the duration of the deal.
-They got a legitimate concession in the owners losing their ability to walk away from arbitration awards under $3.5m
Every time the NHL said this was their best offer, they came up with another offer a few weeks later that was better. So yes, Fehr did a great job waiting them out until they gave him the best offer he felt like he was going to get.
We get that if a bully threatens to punch you and take your lunch money, you will always fork it over right away to avoid getting punched. What i dont get is why you expect hockey players to take that attitude.
Because we're not talking about their lunch money but their lively hood. One is a matter of principal, and the other is a matter of survival. The NHLPA (as a whole) gave up an awful lot of money so that a very small amount of their members can continue to get big money contracts.
__________________ "It’s not as if Donald Fehr was lying to us, several players said. Rather, it’s as if he has been economical with information, these players believe, not sharing facts these players consider to be vital."
Yeah, the deal the players got was significantly better for them than the October offer.
-It's not a $300m swing when you go from paying $211m to someone else paying $300m. It's a $511m swing.
-They didn't just get $64.3m as next year's cap. They got it as the minimum for the duration of the deal.
-They got a legitimate concession in the owners losing their ability to walk away from arbitration awards under $3.5m
Every time the NHL said this was their best offer, they came up with another offer a few weeks later that was better. So yes, Fehr did a great job waiting them out until they gave him the best offer he felt like he was going to get.
