There’s no mistaking the NHL’s intent in this lockout. Deputy commissioner Bill Daly laid it out to The Post.
“I continue to believe negotiation is simpler than 2004-05. This is about dollars and cents. Plain and simple,” Daly told The Post Wednesday.
The salary-cap battle is hockey history-book stuff. So, too, the linkage of player pay to revenue already has been fought.
This third owners’ lockout is in its third week, with training camps scuttled, exhibition games canceled. The last lockout cost hockey the 2004-05 season and the 1994-95 version delayed the start of that season until Jan. 20.
The last lockout, in which the league won a salary cap plus a 24 percent pay cut, still failed to stem the rise of salaries. So the NHL wants to slash total player pay from 57 percent of hockey revenue to 49 percent, dropping to 47 percent over six years.
The players have offered to limit the increase in their pay pool from the current $1.87 billion to $2.1 billion over three years. The NHL says pay must be cut, the players refuse to deliver their world-best skills for cut rates. It’s a standoff.
“I don’t know how hard it can be. But there has to be some willingness on the part of the [Players Association] to compromise. So far, there hasn’t been any,” Daly said.
The PA doesn’t agree the players should have to suffer another pay cut after a run of record revenues. They also believe their contracts should be honored as written, and not subject to a negotiated discount.
The sides left the negotiating table Tuesday expressing frustration. Union head Donald Fehr and commissioner Gary Bettman spoke thereafter, but the next order of business is simply scheduling the next round of talks, which probably will be in Toronto if they take place this weekend.
So hockey waits until something bad happens to someone to force one side or the other to change its stance. And fans get to watch Ilya Kovalchuk score goals in Russia.
mark.everson@nypost.com