GATE-DRIVEN NHL HAS PLAN TO DEAL WITH LOST REVENUE
If season doesn’t resume, players will still get paid and salary cap won’t take a big hit
An incomplete season — one without playoffs — will cost the National Hockey League more than US$500 million in gate revenue.
That would mean the cancellation of the 189 games that remain on the regular-season schedule. And that would mean no Stanley Cup playoffs of any kind would be played: In most years there are 85-90 playoff games.
That’s a huge hit financially for the gate-driven NHL, which has already put in place a provision with the NHL Players’ Association for dealing with the severe drop in hockey-related revenue, and how it would affect the upcoming season’s salary cap.
Under regular circumstances, the size of the cap is determined by a set economic formula. If the formula was applied in a season with so much revenue lost, the cap would drop significantly. The NHL, realizing how troublesome that would be for so many franchises, has taken a strong position and the players would have no reason to quarrel over this.
Of course, there is no way of knowing if or when the season will resume. All of that is controlled by those making the coronavirus determinations.
But under these difficult circumstances, facing potentially significant financial losses, the NHL has done well to prevent a hockey fear of sorts over what could have been a dropping cap. The cap has gone up six consecutive seasons and was thought to be going as high as $88 million for the coming season before it was put on hold.
THIS AND THAT
NHL players will be paid for the final 15 per cent of the season, whether it’s played or not. I’m told NBA players won’t be paid for the rest of the regular season if games are not played … The sports media seems consumed with whether arena workers will be paid and who will pay them during this stoppage. That’s nice. I’m more concerned about businesses that are temporarily or permanently shutting down and all those Canadians concerned about their employment and their professions. This is an uncertain time for a lot more than arena workers … The new March Madness: grocery store shopping … Buffalo Sabres had the second pick in the 2014 NHL Draft. They selected Sam Reinhart. They passed on Leon Draisaitl. Imagine a Sabres team now with Draisaitl and Jack Eichel? That would be a modern-day version of Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin … Having lived the minor hockey life for years, I’m so sad for the kids who won’t complete their seasons. You don’t get that precious time back.
HEAR AND THERE
If there is still an NBA season or playoffs to be played, one thing that might be nice for the Raptors: player rest. All season long they’ve been forcing a roster of whomever was available and dealing with so many injuries. Now, Norm Powell can get healthy, Fred Van Vleet can get healthy, Marc Gasol can get ready, Kyle Lowry can get rest. If they do have playoffs and the Raptors are complete, they’re going to be a dangerous team. They’re a dangerous team without everybody healthy. What happens when everybody is well enough to play? … We’ve never really seen an athlete like Pascal Siakam before — going from 4.2 points a game, to 7.3 to 16.9 to 23.6 in his four NBA seasons. Rebounding has grown from 3.1 to 4.5 to 6.9 to 7.5 in his career. Rarely is this kind of steady and annual improvement seen at the professional level of any sport.
SCENE AND HEARD
Sometimes, it’s how you sound, not what you are saying. NBA commissioner Adam Silver and NHL commissioner Gary Bettman can say the exact same thing and it comes out completely different. When Toronto Blue Jays president Mark Shapiro talked about the Blue Jays cancellation being “more focused on our community and broader mankind and we’re all dealing with the uncertainty that lies ahead and doing the best we can to navigate through this challenge,” he sounds like a textbook I hated reading in university … The just returning Morgan Rielly gets to spend his time away with girlfriend Tessa Virtue. Is this the nicest couple ever, nice hockey player and the nicest of all-time women figure skaters … Leafs prospect Nick Robertson’s season in Peterborough was halted at 55 goals in 46 games. Can he score in the NHL? Similarly sized Alex Debrincat, a little smaller than Robertson, had 28 and 41 goals in his first two NHL seasons straight out of junior hockey … Centres faster than Brayden Point in the NHL: Connor Mcdavid. Nathan Mackinnon. Then who? … Tampa Bay Lightning coach Jon Cooper figures Washington”s John Carlson wins the Norris Trophy. “Look at his numbers,” said Cooper.
“He’s elite.” His general manager, Julien Brisebois, doesn’t agree. If he was voting, he’d pick his own defenceman, Victor Hedman. It’s an easy top three with Roman Josi of Nashville. The question is, which order do you place them?
AND ANOTHER THING
What I’d like to see again on television in a world without games: The entire 1993 World Series; The final series of the 1987 Canada Cup; All six games of last year’s NBA Finals; Any of the Muhammad Ali fights with Joe Frazier and all eight minutes of Marvin Hagler fighting Thomas Hearns; Oilers-flames hockey from the ’80s; The bat-flip game; The men’s gold medal hockey game from Vancouver; the women’s gold medal hockey game from Sochi; Donovan Bailey’s gold-medal races; New Year’s Eve 1975 — Montreal Canadiens against the Soviet Red Army; Lanny Mcdonald’s overtime goal to beat the Islanders; The 1989 Grey Cup and the 1996 Grey Cup in the snow in Hamilton with Doug Flutie. And that’s just a start … Word is, former CFL mainstay Chris Jones is staying with the Cleveland Browns in a personnel role. He wasn’t fired when head coach Freddie Kitchens was let go. He was moved from a coaching job to more of a scouting position … Kind of a shame the goal-scoring championship in the NHL might not be settled, with David Pastrnak and Alex Ovechkin at 48 and Auston Matthews at 47. There hadn’t been three 50-goal scorers in a season since 2010. That was Ovechkin, Sidney Crosby and Steven Stamkos
We’re all dealing with the uncertainty that lies ahead and doing the best we can to navigate through this challenge.