NHL Lays Out Vision for 2021 Season in Private Call; Talks of January 13th Start Date

[Phil in Absentia]

The NHL is still aiming for a Jan. 1 start, even though the scheduled New Year’s Day Winter Classic at Minnesota has been canceled.

The objective remains to play a full 82-game season with full arenas, but the league understands that is not likely. The NHL is monitoring the state of COVID-19, travel restrictions between the United States and Canada and within the U.S., and regulations concerning indoor mass gatherings. In other words, which teams would be allowed to have fans in arenas, and how many?

A shorter schedule and the possibility of starting the season in a limited number of “hub cities” would require authorization from the NHL and the NHLPA. These would not be “bubbles” ? la Edmonton and Toronto this past season. Players and staff would not be segregated from polite society, but rather would be expected to follow yet-to-be negotiated protocols as, say, MLB players during their 2020 season.

Groups of teams would be sent to designated hub cities to compete for two-to-three weeks, and then shuttle home for a week or so of practice before their next assignment. The idea would be to play a portion of the schedule under this format before evolving to a more typical schedule once (or if) fans are permitted in a substantial number of NHL arenas.

Geographical realignment, including the creation of a Canadian Division, is a possibility.

https://nypost.com/2020/10/24/nhl-la...-private-call/


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[4EverRangerFrank]

I applaud the planning and optimism - lets see what the virus says.

[Dunny]

I think the Canadian teams will only be able to play Canadian teams.

[Costa]

What I would do is start the season day after the Super Bowl. Then people have something to watch until MLB opening day. I see no reason why teams can't have their home games at the local arena as long as they take the proper precautions.

[Phil in Absentia]

The development of two potential COVID-19 vaccines could be a major assist in the battle against the coronavirus, but they might not be a game changer when it comes to NHL fans being able to return to arenas in the near future.

Dr. Susy Hota, medical director of infection prevention and control and infectious diseases specialist at the University Health Network in Toronto, said even if a vaccine becomes available early in the new year, it will take several months for enough of the population to be vaccinated.

"In order for there to be some kind of a herd immunity effect from vaccination ... you still need about 85 per cent coverage in the population for it to really be helpful," said Hota, who also is an associate professor in the department of medicine at the University of Toronto.

"I think we do have to mentally prepare ourselves, I'd say, for at least a year to try and roll out the vaccine and feel like you've got coverage to a point where it's more protective on a population level."

NHL commissioner Gary Bettman has said the league hopes to return Jan. 1 and wants to play a full 82-game season with fans in arenas. League officials have also said they must be flexible in their planning and the format used to begin the season might change over time.

According to Statista.com, an NHL team will lose nearly $1.5 million US in ticket sales and revenue generated from food and beverage for each home game played before empty seats.

One return to play possibility for the NHL is dividing the league into four regional divisions, including one featuring the seven Canadian teams.

The divisional teams could travel to a hub city for a series of games then return home. Another scenario could see a team like Vancouver fly east and play two or three games over a week in Montreal.

https://www.cbc.ca/sports/hockey/nhl...rena-1.5811653

[ThirtyONE]

They should absolutely do short series like baseball. Makes no sense for MTL to fly to Vancouver for one game.

I do think the news of the vaccine is great great news for next season though. I know there are others who need it first but if the athletes and staff can get them in a timely manor, that'll change everything.

[Phil in Absentia]

Right — rather than home-and-home, it's effectively mini series, right? So you'd basically go three to five games in a row against the same team before the next matchup?

[ThirtyONE]

Right — rather than home-and-home, it's effectively mini series, right? So you'd basically go three to five games in a row against the same team before the next matchup?

Which is fucking awesome and allows for bad blood to be established. In fact, I wouldn't hate mini-series even in a non-covid world.

[4EverRangerFrank]

^Yes to this - despising your opponent is good motivation.

[jsrangers]

how it works in the minors and by the 3rd game the animosity in most series is pretty high by puck drop. Again though I think its lessened with no fans especially in a regular season game. AHL and NHL always did it to limit travel costs. Gotta save that bus fuel.

[Phil in Absentia]

There has been a lull in the talking since the NHL hit the NHLPA with its request last week for additional salary deferrals and an increase in the escrow cap that would amount to approximately $300 million flowing to ownership for 2020-21.

The six-year collective bargaining agreement agreed to by both parties in early July during the Return to Play negotiations stipulated that the players would defer 10 percent of their pay with escrow capped at 20 percent. Players thus would have been guaranteed 72 percent of their face-value pay for the coming season.

Citing liquidity issues, the league now is asking players to defer 26 percent of their pay while increasing the escrow cap to 25 percent. That amounts to a guarantee of 55.5 percent for 2020-21. The league is also asking players to increase the escrow cap for the fourth, fifth and sixth years of the deal.

There is, we are told by several well-placed sources, continuing adamant, widespread opposition within the union to this request to renegotiate the terms of agreement. Indeed, the agreement was intentionally structured by the NHLPA to protect players under contract as much as immediately possible while passing the cost of a flat cap and rolling escrow shortfalls onto later generations.

While it is true that the players association is entitled to no more than 50 percent of hockey-related revenue over the life of the agreement, the adoption of annual escrow caps coupled with unlinking the cap from actual hockey-related revenue have ended the assurance of a year-by-year 50-50 split.

The original 10 percent deferral was scheduled to be repaid without interest in three equal, annual installments beginning on Oct. 15, 2022. Perhaps the union would be more amenable to at least talking about adjusting the agreement if the league agrees to repay all deferred money with interest.

The lack of progress over the last five days in crafting protocols for 2020-21 would seem to jeopardize the NHL’s targeted Jan. 1 puck drop on a hypothetical 60-game regular season.

https://nypost.com/2020/11/24/nhl-se...ce=twitter_app

[4EverRangerFrank]

3 years of 'no interest' money amounts to a lot of money. The larger issue is guaranteed monies for 2020-21 at 72 percent of face-value pay versus now seeking 55.5 percent. THAT'S a lot of money to give up. An earlier post lead to an article stating that it is estimated that teams lose $1.5M per game in lost gate ticket sales, food concession, etc., so you can begin to understand the shortfall all around. The question becomes; Who is better able to weather this financial storm?

Please figure this out amicably so we can have a season to look forward to.

[Bugg]

Brooks is often off base, but suspect he got this idea from someone in the NHL office hoping Seattle ownership fronting a big chunk of the expansion fee would keep things afloat for this this season https://nypost.com/2020/11/28/how-th...ng-nhl-season/

[josh]

Nope. The issue with playing is not making enough to pay salary. If players don’t take a pay cut, no one makes anything.

Requiring Seattle to pay skips the whole revenue shortage of it. It would harm the league, teams and players financially long-term.

It’s a horrible attempt at a band aid fix on a HUGE problem.

[Phil in Absentia]

Yeah, I’m usually pro-players in almost all of these scenarios, but this isn’t an even playing field. They locked out for a 50-50 HRR split but there’s not enough being made (if anything) on gate, concessions, merchandise, etc to come even close to 50-50. I get that the players agreed to a deal this summer, but shit has gotten worse. You’re playing chicken with being paid at all this season.


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[josh]

If they want to emulate real life and have half as many people do the same amount of work, those can probably be kept (close to) whole.

I have to imagine they’re waiting to see the return on these retro jerseys. Nothing else happening.

I assume the nhl knew it was going this way, and that’s probably a big reason we got a new LW. (Serious) the league couldn’t afford the best prospect in a long time going to a shit market if there was no hockey.

[Bugg]

Nope. The issue with playing is not making enough to pay salary. If players don’t take a pay cut, no one makes anything.

Requiring Seattle to pay skips the whole revenue shortage of it. It would harm the league, teams and players financially long-term.

It’s a horrible attempt at a band aid fix on a HUGE problem.

The Seattle ownership group 1. has the $ and 2. will have to pay the $600 million by next season anyway. $300 million is roughly $10 million per team. Doesn't anywhere near may up for 40 games of gate revenue. but if you hope to can have some fans actually go to games by the end of the season and playoffs, even at limited capacity, you can cobble the best you can hope for out of a bad situation. If you play a season and get a decent tournament, that works.

Missing a full season would be a catastrophe. And missing a season probably means either folding or moving teams. That means fewer paychecks and jobs.

Also would leave us to watch "Oak Island"; "We found this rare and exotic NYC subway token: could it belong to the Knights Templar? MEETING!"

[Phil in Absentia]

Bettman kept the owners out of the talks with Fehr over the summer that led to the completion of the season and this memorandum of understanding that – on the face of it – guarantees a season in which the players will be paid 72 per cent of what they’re owed.

Bettman sprung the MOU on the board of governors, who unanimously endorsed it. It’s believed some voted merely on Bettman’s recommendation. Now, having subsequently read the MOU after it passed, some are unhappy with it.

It would probably cost each team at least around $150 million (all figures U.S.) to operate without fans for a season, factoring in payrolls, travel costs, team employees, league dues. It’s believed some have told Bettman they would be financially better off not playing.

It’s not like the players are happy, either. They spent the summer and fall thinking that they would at least get 72 per cent of their salary this season. Now they face the prospect of going as low as 55 per cent – based on Bettman’s last ask – or even getting as little as 32 per cent if the salaries end up being prorated for a shorter season.

Or nothing at all, if the season is not played.

https://www.thestar.com/sports/break...y&utm_content=

[jsrangers]

He's a clown but we already know that, and yes it would be a loss for Scott Mayfield his example but the poor guy could probably scrape by at a hair below 1M for the abbreviated season if it meant playing.

Call me crazy but I don't think anybody is trying to leverage the pandemic to their advantage nor do I think it was their plan all along to do so. As a result I find this paragraph almost comical. At this point if they play great if they don't they don't. There's bigger problems to solve than these two sides sword fighting while others are truly trying to figure out how to put food on the table and pay their mortgage or rent.

The NHL’s behavior in this matter is as fishy as it gets. That is saying something. It wouldn’t surprise me at all if this had always been the plan, to get the PA to agree to a deal in July with the knowledge the league would soon come back for more. If the NHL truly negotiated such a calamitous deal, then why isn’t their Board outrage directed at Bettman?

[jsrangers]

Forbes article:

In July, the NHL and the National Hockey League Players’ Association agreed to a six -year extension of their collective bargaining agreement. In these incredibly perilous times, this was great news for hockey fans since this meant labor peace until 2026.

Well, not so fast. Despite having signed the CBA just five months ago, the NHL has requested further concessions from the players to weather the Covid-19 storm. Initially, the players agreed to a 20% escrow and a 10% deferral of salary. Put another way, the players agreed to be paid 72% of their salaries this season with the understanding that the 20% dropped into escrow was as good as gone. As far as the 72% figure, remember that the 10% deferral comes off the top followed by the escrow deduction.

Unhappy with the current deal, the NHL is asking the NHLPA to agree to one of two proposals according to The Score. The first proposal would see the escrow figure increase to 25% while players deferred 20% of their salaries. Alternatively, the league is asking the players to defer 26% of their salaries next season while keeping the escrow figure flat at 20% for the 2020-21 season. There are additional details, but the bottom line is that these proposals would see the players go from taking home 72% of their salaries this season to an average of 63%.

The league has been criticized for backpedaling on the ratified CBA. That initial reaction is understandable. That being said, while perhaps ill-timed, the NHL’s request for further concessions isn’t crazy; there is some merit to it.

Requesting amendments to a ratified agreement is a big deal, and the NHL knows that. So to approach the players’ union for further concessions means the league is seeing something new and material that requires urgent attention. Indeed, the NHL believes that its financial assumptions have so dramatically changed that this coming season is no longer financially viable within the four corners of the existing framework.

So what has changed for the league? Its fans—or, more precisely, no fans. The NHL didn’t anticipate that it wouldn’t have fans in arenas this season. Most were expecting some return to normalcy this fall. That expectation has now been pushed to sometime next year at the earliest. So there was a belief that fans would be back; they will not.

That substantially alters the financial outlook for the league. Under the existing framework, players will take home $1.6 billion in salaries. As per the Hockey News, with league revenue hovering around $1.8 to $2 billion without fans in attendance, players would account for 80% of league revenue. That’s a far cry from the typical arrangement of a 50-50 split of league revenue.

The NHLPA, however, is banking on an additional $1 billion injection of revenue by way of some fans attending some of the games this according to a well-placed source within the Union. If that is indeed the case, then the players would take home closer to 53% of league revenue, which presumably would be far more palatable for both sides. At this point, however, having fans in the stands for this upcoming season does not seem too likely.

In addition, the NHLPA understandably believes that nothing should change since the sides already have a deal. The NHL should have been more aggressive in its forecasting for the upcoming season, the NHLPA would reason, and if the league is now unhappy with the existing deal, well, too bad.

But the league’s position is not outrageous by any means. While the timing isn’t ideal, the substantive nature of the proposals is sound. If there are no fans in the buildings, then the NHL’s position makes sense. NHL owners understand they will lose money this season; they are, however, asking the NHLPA to help minimize the extent of those losses in these exceptional times.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/ericmac...h=3583d2c87fbe