Leafs Abroad: Kulemin, Komarov, Grabovski coping well with lockout

 Proof BB, that Mac also reads these boards, we had this very conversation a month ago

And maybe instead of being able to offer your own players 7 year commitments, each team should be allowed to have one 7 year commitment, and three 6 year commitments, or something like that.  Not that I expect the NHL to listen to suggestions, but that would probably encourage movement. 

I don’t have the actual stats but its in some ridiculous range. But what infuriates me is, the actual outlay of the real money pumps up the teams loss figures for the season – and fans look at the $10 million it lost and believe poor Buffalo is being screwed by the current system and not by its own management decisions. I mean, they’re paying Vanek $14 million over two seasons! They deserve to be among the 13 money losing teams.

A bunch of players got bonuses up front on their deals knowing there was a likelihood of a lockout.

  Deserve to Be among the 13 team losing money? They actually planed to be, Pegula came out and said it, If he needs more money he will dig another well. Anyone going poor Buffalo is just mis-informed is all. They should feel sorry for Where they spent their money not how much lol

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I think everyone gets to keep earning big money if they deserve it, but two things change: 
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(a) Occasionally players will have to legitimately test the market and consider cities like Edmonton, Anaheim, Long Island and so forth in order to get the dollars they really want.  Teams will still hand out 11-13 million dollar salaries to deserving players, it’s just that they wont get to have 3 or 4 on one team.
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(b) players will have to continue playing well if they want to earn the same money they would have in the last agreement.  Lecavalier is the prime example here.  I think the guy is capable, but has become complacent (personal opinion – I could be way off on that).  Does he really deserve another 50 million dollars to keep playing at 50 point pace?  With a 5 year term, he would have to earn the back half of his contract – that’s all.  As fans, we should be thrilled about that.  

That’s a good point. At the end of the day it’ll be a little of both…a big contract squeezes out the money left for everyone else AND the big contracts get handed out less often.

So I went a little more in depth on Mackenzie’s numbers:
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I actually found 93 contracts that are longer than 5 years.  37 of those deals would not be allowed with the new rules.  They are as follows:
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Savard, Leino, Ehrhoff, J.Staal, Ovechkin
Hossa, Keith, Wisniewski, Zetterberg, Franzen
Campbell, Richards, Carter, Quick, Doughty
Parise, Suter, Gomez, Weber, Kovalchuk
Volchenkov, DiPietro, Nash, Redden, B.Richards
Briere, Bryzgalov, Crosby, Havlat, Lecavalier,
Malone, Ohlund, Carle, Garrison, Hamhuis
Luongo, Backstrom
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However, of those deals, 11 of them are within one year of the term restriction, and could be adjusted to fit the same money into a 5 or 7 year term with a minimal cap adjustment (approx. under 1 million extra per season).  
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So you’re really looking at 26 contracts the league wants to get rid of, and I would argue that even that’s somewhat inaccurate.  I don’t think the league has a problem with Crosby and Ovechkin being inked for a decade or more, for example.  So yea….3.2% of contracts are what is holding us up right now, lol.

Man that Natasha Staniszewski on tsn is one sweet piece of ass……I find myself watching golf highlights just to get a peak of her……

Yea, that makes sense.  It just doesn’t really add up to have long deals in an industry where 5 years completely changes the faces 

 U can say that again MB

Here’s why we’re still close to a deal

http://espn.go.com/blog/nhl/post/_/id/20654/heres-why-were-still-close-to-a-deal

I agree. It’ll sure make negotiations interesting when you remove one of the variables. Now it’ll almost be like a game of chicken to see how high, per year, teams will go to attract players.