For me, the best idea I've seen so far is having a reduced cap hit for a player who signs with the team who drafted him. It would definitely also give teams a better chance of keeping certain players for their whole careers which is something that fans love.
Why not go the whole way and let each team franchise one home grown player ala NFL?
I'm just going to use a post from the Dan Girardi thread to make a point:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Fitzy Duke of NY
RFAs just arent the bargain that they used to be.
smart UFA signings and getting players locked up to cap eficient long term contracts, and convenient ELC inductions into the lineup are the ways to win championships.
Which is exactly why I made that thread about having a separate Cap for RFA/drafted/developed/promoted players.
Dan Girardi was an un-drafted free agent.
The Rangers developed him, he made his NHL debut with the Rangers, and now entering his prime years (the payoff years) the Rangers should be able to keep the player they invested years, thousands of man hours, millions of dollars developing. Now he's entering his prime, his best years as a player, and the Rangers should NOT be punished for keeping him.
Its absolutely ridiculous that this is the way the system works.
The league says "thanks for developing this fine player, now give him up to the highest bidder or suffer the consequences"
And it has also given player FAR too much negotiating power. Which is what caused the friggen lockout to begin with.
Look at some examples that would have/would in the future be able to stay together:
-Buffalo: two entries into the EC Final. Mass exodus from that team.
-Hawks: Stanley Cup. Had to trade away some of the key components to the Cup run.
-Atlanta: Kovalchuk.
-Florida: Bouwmeester, Luongo(Isles drafted, but Florida did the dirty work), Horton.
-Kings: once their guys develop, that team will contend, and then have to be dismantled.
-Islanders: suffer a lot. And they have a deep prospect pool. Once those guys develop, it'll be exodus and more heartache for the Islanders.
-Oilers: Hall, Eberle, MPS... Can they keep all the future SUPER stars they have coming up. Probably not.
-Rangers: Stepan, Kreider, Grachev, Staal, MDZ, Girardi, McDonagh, Dubinsky, Callahan, Anisimov...we are not going to be able to keep all these guys. After years and years and years of waiting for this organization to do things right, the league setting a salary cap so we can't spend on UFA every simmer...the Rangers finally do things right, and now they'll be punished for it????
-Avs
-Coyotes
-Flyers
-Bruins
-Capitals
The list goes on and on of teams stacked with drafted/developed/promoted players that will or have been dismantled because of the Cap system.
These teams would be healthier longer, any team can build this way and be healthy for a long time, but the league disallows longevity now.
Now, players HAVE to play musical chairs. There's no team identity now.
Building through the draft is a real viable option for small market AND large market teams to ensure long term financial health as well as being competitive longer. Building an identity. Fans connecting with their players. Forming REAL (not forced) rivalries.
I truely hate this new "hired gun" "mercenary" league. Every year, every team looks completely different. You can't get attached to ANY player anymore. The minute you start to identify with a player their pulling on another team's jersey in a press conference.
Its shameful.
There is no loyalty, no identity. Its all about the money.
Another thing... Before the Salary Cap, small market teams were kept alive party through revenue sharing? Right. And now teams are being forced to keep eachother alive through player sharing, by developing players for OTHER teams.
Let these organizations support themselves, by building a team. Building identity. Building a team fans can connect with.
Maybe these are just values that don't hold water anymore.
And I don't know whether drafting star players really should be rewarded even more. There are enough people around here complaining about the tanking. I wouldn't want the Pens to not have Crosby and Malkin count against their cap.
Bummer .
Here I was all heartened by the previous suggestion that drafted players should only cost 80% on the cap.... which would mean that, all else being equal, the Pens would have 10.4 million in cap-space right now with 20 players signed .
With the Caps it would be downright ridiculous too.
Ultimately the idea doesn't work for anyone but the teams that have recently tanked at the right time, because drafted players would inevitably ask for more money - especially in strong markets where teams can pay above the cap - knowing that they'd still be more cap-friendly than UFA's.
The Rangers for instance would end up one of the most screwed teams of any with this rule, because you don't have any real drafted superstars to get the major discounts on.
The issue with the OP's suggestion is that it still allows for the possibility of teams in larger markets to spend significantly more than teams in smaller markets.
A team like the Rangers could spend 60 million to retain all of their homegrown talent and then also spend money to the max on a UFA cap.
Meanwhile a team like the Thrashers is still going to be a budget team. They'll be able to spend 45 million in total regardless of if they are paying for their own guys or other guys.
A hard cap is the simplest and easiest way of ensuring that each team can compete under a relatively equal basis.
You point to a team like Chicago and say that they are going to be punished for having all this great home grown talent. Well they should have made better signings than giving Campbell 7+ million, and Huet 5+.
Again, you bring up the Rangers and say that they are going to be punished by the cap and not able to keep the players they drafted/developed. That isn't the case. If they can't keep those players it's because of contracts given to guys like Redden, Drury,Rozsival ect not because of the salary cap.
The issue with the OP's suggestion is that it still allows for the possibility of teams in larger markets to spend significantly more than teams in smaller markets.
A team like the Rangers could spend 60 million to retain all of their homegrown talent and then also spend money to the max on a UFA cap.
Meanwhile a team like the Thrashers is still going to be a budget team. They'll be able to spend 45 million in total regardless of if they are paying for their own guys or other guys.
A hard cap is the simplest and easiest way of ensuring that each team can compete under a relatively equal basis.
You point to a team like Chicago and say that they are going to be punished for having all this great home grown talent. Well they should have made better signings than giving Campbell 7+ million, and Huet 5+.
Again, you bring up the Rangers and say that they are going to be punished by the cap and not able to keep the players they drafted/developed. That isn't the case. If they can't keep those players it's because of contracts given to guys like Redden, Drury,Rozsival ect not because of the salary cap.
It wouldn't help or hurt any market size.
There would still be a cap.
Just a separate cap for "homegrown" and a cap for UFA.
The hard cap is not fair. Not at all. Because it doesn't take into consideration the cost of living and tax for each individual market.
In New York City the cost of living is astronomical. Try living on $30,000 here. As opposed to say...Phoenix.
Why do the Rangers need to overpay every player? Because the value of a dollar in New York is crap.
Just a separate cap for "homegrown" and a cap for UFA.
The hard cap is not fair. Not at all. Because it doesn't take into consideration the cost of living and tax for each individual market.
In New York City the cost of living is astronomical. Try living on $30,000 here. As opposed to say...Phoenix.
Why do the Rangers need to overpay every player? Because the value of a dollar in New York is crap.
When you earn multiple millions a year, those differences are negligible. Even if an apartment in Manhattan costs five times as much as in phoenix, it's not like the money is lost, it will be at least as valuable afterwards. And all other costs are laughable for pro athletes.
And even if they weren't, redden at 5 million or drury at 6 would still be awful contacts. And anyway what happened to "every free agent wants to sign here because it's the center of the universe"? Suddenly the desert is more attractive because food costs 10 bucks more per day?
Just a separate cap for "homegrown" and a cap for UFA.
The hard cap is not fair. Not at all. Because it doesn't take into consideration the cost of living and tax for each individual market.
In New York City the cost of living is astronomical. Try living on $30,000 here. As opposed to say...Phoenix.
Why do the Rangers need to overpay every player? Because the value of a dollar in New York is crap.
Doesnt that hurt the teams who unlike chicago weren't bad enough to have the #3 and #1 picks in consecutive years to draft Toews and Kane? Seems at least a part of their "building through the draft" involved being terrible and doing well in the draft lottery, as Kane/Toews were pretty much slam dunks. This isnt to take away all credit of course, as they had other home grown players that were integral to their run. It was just worth mentioning in my opinion.
Heck, you might not even be directly referring to the hawks (but i feel like many are). But nobody made them sign campbell/huet/hossa either.
In addition, I'm with the others that say cost of living does not really come into play much, i'm sure they could live very cheaply in nashville, but that doesn't mean players would choose the preds over the rangers.
For me, the best idea I've seen so far is having a reduced cap hit for a player who signs with the team who drafted him. It would definitely also give teams a better chance of keeping certain players for their whole careers which is something that fans love.
I could go along with this if the draft system were changed. That, in fact, may be the primary step needed. The current system was a match for the pre- Cap league. Now, with a hard Cap it shouldn't be necessary to reward failure with top draft picks. It is nonsense to take all competition between franchises out of the sport. Let the stupid suffer, I say. I hate when failure is rewarded.
As soon as a team grows a core of players, and those guys are due a raise, they have to dismantle the core they put so much effort into building.
Its going to happen to the Kings, Islanders, Oilers, Rangers and others in the near future.
Even if they don't spend any money at all on UFAs. It will be near impossible to keep all the top players they drafted or developed.
And when we talk about the Rangers and mention Lundqvist as a bad contract. Lundqvist was drafted by the Rangers.
That's nonsense. Right now a team can easily have five 6 million dollar contracts without having too many cap problems. So who apart from Lundqvist and maybe Stall look like they deserve that kind of money? With a lot of luck Kreider could be a longshot, but I don't anyone else among our prospects ever turning into such a player (please, only compare them with deserving 6 million dollar players, no Drury or Redden comparisons please)
A dynasty is nearly impossible now... A hard cap system usually results in that.
The only way a team can get a dynasty, is to have an unbelievable bargain. The Pats went with Brady making so little money for several of those years. That was so huge in terms of them keeping a lot of players during their best times. Now the NFL cap is less strict, that teams can actually keep guys, but it went for a good decade of being unbelievably strict, exactly like the NHL cap is now.
The only way to win championships are to get guys at bargain contracts. That means you have to take chances on certain players and sink them into long term contracts.
honestly, I think people are complaining too much about the cap. It's fine for the most part right now. To those saying we should follow the NBA's example, have you seen how many financial problems its created for that league?
A team can still win and be competitive every year, they just need to draft well and not give out bad contracts. I would only say that maybe (and stress the maybe) an easier way to get rid of bad contracts would be nice, but other then that, I can't complain about the system.
As soon as a team grows a core of players, and those guys are due a raise, they have to dismantle the core they put so much effort into building.
That's really not true - unless you're defining core as every nice player on a team. A team can keep a core group together, they just can't overspend on non-core players. That's one of the problems the Hawks ran into. The Huet and Campbell contracts are killer. And the fact that they had to overpay several players because of Tallon's QO snafu didn't help either.
Since teams aren't going to be infallible when it comes to free agent decisions, the cap basically makes it harder for a team to ice a Cup contender without cheap, young talent.
I have had a solution for this all along, and its called raising the UFA age to 29 or 30 years.
Make the arbitration eligibility later, as well.
Unfortunately, the players - who are the ones people pay to see - wouldn't be in favor of that and they'd bring up the argument that owners should share their revenue more in order to put teams on a more even playing field when it comes to spending.
Bad contracts are part of the game. It's a chance that is taken. I don't see why there should be an out clause when a misjudge of skill or character is made. It's like drafting a Daigle and wanting a redraft. Glen Sather is in need of replacement with all the boneheaded contracts he's handed out. I'd say he is more of an issue than the cap. The Hawks, as mentioned above, were blown up due to their own mismanagement, not the cap.
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