Sports

Bettman makes new pitch in NHL labor talks

Gary Bettman says he blinked first. He may have flinched up a way to kick-start the stalled NHL labor negotiations.

To get the NHL talks moving, commissioner Gary Bettman says he is offering to negotiate on the Players Association’s collective bargaining agreement proposal rather than his own initial payroll-slashing plan.

The NHL’s proposal, delivered Tuesday, is believed to be a six-year deal that would reduce the players’ share of hockey revenue from the current 57 percent incrementally to the 50-50 split long anticipated as the league’s ultimate goal. The NHL’s July 13 initial proposal asked for a slash to 46 percent, which the union said was 43 percent in current terms.

Additionally, according to reports, the league would set fixed salary caps, pushing back the starting level to $58 million next season, nearly the $59.4 million point of 2010-11. It would then increase $2 million per season for the next two years, and to $71 million in the final season. It was $63.4 million last season, and would be $70.2 million next season if the current CBA continued.

The Players Association is expected to respond this afternoon to what Bettman pointedly called a “counterproposal” to the union’s Aug. 14 submission.

Bettman said he made Tuesday’s offer in an effort to get the sides negotiating rather than just proposing.

“We believe we made a significant, meaningful step,” Bettman said. “It is also designed to address issues they raised with us, and also address the proposal they made to us.”

The sides had previously seemed to be arguing apples as opposed to philosophy. The league asked for specific percentages in givebacks in its July 13 starter, while the union sought to alter the very definition of the league’s salary cap, relating the players’ payroll pot to a straight increase from the current total instead of a percentage of league hockey revenue.

“We felt that in order to move the process along and bring a negotiation that has traction, we had to address the objections they were raising,” Bettman said of offering a counterproposal, rather than presenting a new concept.

“It is structured to get us on the same page, to try to get us onto a common language,” Bettman said.

Union head Donald Fehr and his special assistant, Steve Fehr, his brother, received the counterproposal in a 45-minute morning session. They adjourned to their temporary office four blocks south of NHL HQ in midtown, and returned with a few players 3 ½ hours later to tell the league they would need time to examine and disseminate the proposal.

“It’s a proposal that we intend to respond to,” Fehr said. “It is different in some respects.”

On July 13, the league asked the players to accept a slash in their share of hockey revenue from 57 percent to 46 percent, which the union claims is 43 percent as currently figured.

The union responded by offering to limit its payroll pot to annual increases of 2, 4 and 6 percent over three years from the current base of $1.87 billion.

Tuesday’s proposal could be viewed as a response to that fixed increase request.

The sides are facing a Sept. 15 expiration of the current CBA, after which the league says it will lock out the players. The league’s last lockout cost it the entire 2004-05 season to establish a salary cap. Its 1994-95 lockout cost it 46 games for a shortened 1995 season. The players staged a short strike late in the 1991-92 season.

Bettman insisted that the sides must first settle the “economic” issues before them, which usually means player payroll. He minimized the importance of revenue sharing, claiming the sides are close in both total dollar terms, and philosophy.

mark.everson@nypost.com