The owners are on emphatic record they will not authorize amnesty buyouts as part of an NHL transition to a 50/50 system in which the cap would decrease from a bookkeeping $70.2 million this year (should a 2012-13 season be played) to $60 million in 2013-14, a drop of more than 14.5 percent.
It’s about money outside of the system, Canceler-in-Chief Gary Bettman and deputy Bill (The Hill) Daly maintain in turning a studied blind eye to the pain 10 NHL teams will endure trying to comply with the cap without a mechanism to ease compliance.
For example, the Flyers project to having $2.5 million of space to fill seven spots (about $7.5 million to fill eight spots if Chris Pronger is on long-term-inactivity); the Canucks project to having $4.6 million to fill 10 roster spots; the Canadiens would already be over the cap with seven spots unfilled; the Penguins would have $7.4 million to fill eight spots; the Bruins would be in big trouble; and the small-market Lightning would have $2.5 million to fill eight spots.
The Rangers would be in a very tight spot themselves — about $2.7 million to sign seven players — if forced to accommodate Wade Redden’s cap hit even if the defenseman is on the AHL roster on a contract signed under the expired CBA.
These teams would be forced to proceed with radical surgery next summer.
But is it about money? Or is it rather about genetic engineering; about the league using this opportunity to divert players from big market franchises onto small market teams in less desirable situations who own scads of cap space?
There’s only one way to find out. And that is for the NHLPA — whose interests coincide with the big market franchises — to propose a sum-zero amnesty buyout program when the league and players reconvene at some point this week in an attempt to nail down an agreement.
Here’s the way it could be done without costing the owners so much as a cent outside of the 50/50 system:
Players bought out under this program before this season at either one-third or two-thirds depending upon their age could be re-signed only for the difference between the buyout amount and the full contract. The entire amount would count against the players’ collective share but the buyout team would not be charged a cap hit.
When a major league baseball player is picked up after being released, the new team pays only the league minimum while the original team is on the hook for the remainder of the contract. This would be similar in concept.
It would be a win-win. Players would be whole. The owners would collectively pay only what has already been committed. Some teams would add players at a bargain rate. And those teams caught in the transition vise would have at least a chance to comply without unwarranted suffering.
Yes, it’s true: Some players could be casualties and might not be re-signed. But that would happen regardless under normal buyout procedure; most certainly if teams are slashing their rosters over the summer.
Daly and Bettman — who yesterday announced cancellation of all games through Dec. 30, thus leaving the door open for a season of approximately 56 games that could begin on the final day of 2012 or the first days of 2013 — say it’s about money.
If it is, the league has no reason not to accept such a plan. Indeed, teams should press the NHL to propose such a plan.
Because in this equation, the owners have a seat at the table, the players have a seat, but the teams — the hockey people — they, to coin a phrase, are locked out.